my milk better!!!

[bea]

hello! just a quickie!

dd is now 8 months old, quite happily on solids, drinking water happily from a beaker... but still breastfeeding... morning, just before naps (mid morning and early afternoon!) and just before bedtime...

in a couple of weeks i have the opportunity to go out in the evening!!!(yippeee... yet dreading it as well!- hen night!) so dh will have to put her to bed thus she will have to miss out on her bedtime feed... she has never liked the bottle and never taken to it!.... does not like Hipp Organic formula milk (spits it out!)...what should i do???

i'm looking to end her b'feeding anyway... as i fear teeth are starting to pop up! so is it necessary to switch to formula? does she still need milk? any suggestions on organic formula which she might like? - or do you think she's just being cussed and would prefer my milk? arghhhh!

i'm sorry if all this sounds muddled.. but i guess what i'm trying to say is....

does she need formula?

how will i get her to sleep without a booby feed?

thanks in advance?

ps! not my hen night!

Hi bea
At 8 months your dd still needs either breastmilk and/or formula as she is still too young to introduce cow's milk. It's great that she drinks from a beaker...have you tried expressing? Would she drink ebm (expressed breastmilk) from a beaker? The best time to express is in the morning when you have the most milk...you can store in in the fridge for 24 hrs or freeze it for up to 2 weeks (I think). I don't blame her for not wanting formula as it must taste awful after being used to breastmilk. My dd was the same, never took a bottle...basically I just never went out!

Could you try to join the hen night later? You don't say what time your dd goes to bed...could you go out after she is settled? If you are out, and your dh has to settle her, at least the breast isn't an option, but he could be in for a torrid time!

Even if you decide to wean (and teeth are no excuse sorry! A baby can't suckle and bite at the same time!), the night feed is generally the last one to go...I know that's not what you need to hear but there it is!

Let me know if you think of any other questions! M

Just to explain, what I mean by the breast not being an option if your dh has to settle her is that he will have a lot better chance at getting dd to take a bottle/formula or bottle-beaker/ebm than you will, since dd won't "smell" the milk on him. Whereas if you try it she will know that if she refuses the bottle, you will be able to breastfeed her instead! I hope that makes sense!

mollipops, they nay not be able to bite and suckle at the same time, but my eight month old has very sharp top teeth which are 'pressed' very fimly into my nipple when he sucks, can be extremely painful

Bea - could you give it a trial run? Go out at bedtime and leave dh to settle her (with some sort of cup of expressed breast milk/formula) and see how it goes.
My ds also refused bottles for months (didn't matter what type of milk) and always had a calming boob before bed. On the one occasion I went out at bedtime I spent most of the evening thinking that I had left dh with a screaming, hungry baby, only to return to a peaceful house and a sleeping angel (hadn't drunk his milk but made up for it the next day).
This may get me slated (sorry folks) but if she'll settle without it, going to bed without milk for one evening isn't going to harm her (if she were truly hungry she'd drink the EBM/formula).

I weaned ds onto bottles at 6 months (as I was returning to work) and it took 4 days of refusals and strops before he accepted that there was no longer an alternative - since then he's been fine with bottles (but now won't take milk from a cup - they make you laugh don't they!)

See if you give dm2's suggestion a go. I always thought that I was the only one that could get ds to sleep but then I had most of the practice as dh was working abroad and I have in-built equipment he doesn't have to the same degree. If you don't have a dh to hand you could try practice runs with whoever is going to babysit anyhow with a meal etc provided as a thank you.

However, dh did persevere and manage to be part of ds's bedtime routine when he was around even though it was intermittant. I left him to it and stayed out of sight from bathtime onward (it's amazing what a glass of wine can do to your sense of hearing). After bath and dressing, they went into the darkened bedroom for a bedtime story and gentle singing. We have a Thomas the tank engine book that has a button that makes chuffy sounds which ds would hold down constantly. To drink, a glass of water seemed to do fine and although the settling process took longer with dh they would get there.

You may have to remind dh that they are trying to settle the child not build them into a fury and point out what the pointers are and how to distract from them.

I still had breastmilk which suited me and ds fine but we did make an important step to breaking some of the cycle.

On the wicked, selfish mother level, your dd will prob go to sleep eventually and you won't have to deal with it. Sitting looking at the car lights going by or watching telly might help to soothe. Once I came home early as ds had been screaming for over an hour and when I got there (from my wild game of bridge) he was sound asleep, all screamed out.

bea - see how it goes with teeth - you may be OK - if baby is latched on properly they shouldn't use their teeth. Having said that some do go through a phase when the teeth go in testing their bite and they can do that while feeding. Usually your reaction is enough to stop them - my boy would cry and I'd say don't bite and he soon got the message. He is still having the last feed at age 2.7 and he has certainly got plenty teeth! But never bites. Would be a shame for you to give up in anticipation of a problem that might never happen. Yes indeed they do need milk for a year and that is another 4 months of formula which she doesn't even lilke (not to mention the cost) and of course the b/milk is better for her.

When I went out my husband would do something different to settle him - once I found them in an armchair both fast asleep listening to music. The feed at night is usually for comfort and baby can learn other ways to be comforted. And as mollipops says you can always put her to bed first - sometimes this is better for peace of mind when you do go out. Hope you have a nice evening.

thanks for all the suggestions!!!

i think i may start to try to express and let dh settle her down... i have tried to give her ebm before in a bottle and she was having none of it!!! so maybe i should now try with a beaker now that she is quite happy drinking water out of it!

i think the thought of me not putting her down is more scary than it actually happening... unfortunately i think i'm going through the

"but nobody can look after her as well as me!!!"

frame of mind at the moment... she can survive just as well with her dad! (bless him!)

and on a different note... hmm not sure the eveing will go well as my friend has planned a night out to see 80's bands!!! oh no! i didn't much care for them then... never mind now!.. watching a load of 40 year olds trying to regain some of their fame from past years!!! (the bands... not me! - i'm a spritely 31 year old!!!)

once again thanks for all the thoughts!

might let you know how it went!

Emmagee, now that you mention it I do recall at some point when dd first got her top teeth that I had little reddish "dents" on my nipple! And yes it was painful. Funny how you forget these little things! But it didn't last, I think the skin must have toughened up, just as the nipple does intially have to get used to being sucked (I had really bad cracking...yuk, THAT I would like to forget!)

Anyway that's not actually from being bitten, it's just the pressure of the teeth. If they have their lips flanged and are attached properly, the only time they can actually bite is as they come off. It's usually at the end of a feed, just in "play". I found saying "NO!" very loudly and then taking dd off and leaving the room worked a treat (you bite it, you lose it!) - she never tried it a second time! I ended up feeding her til she was 14 months...so I can only say persevere for a while if you can bear it.

Sharp teeth can create pain in breastfeeding - an easy solution is to take an emery board and just flle it across once or twice which blunts the teeth sufficiently to make it less painful. If the teeth are serrated (as many baby teeth are) they do not need to be actively biting down to create pain.

I had a vague relation (!) say to me when dd was 7 months, 'oh is she teething, its a good job you give up b/feeding before they start getting teeth isn't it?' I was still feeding and continued to do so for months, so looked rather puzzled before answering that I was. I think she was, and probably still is, under the same impression of teeth=pain, but it wasn't the case for me at all (in fact I remember the clamp of gums being just as 'painful' as any small teeth incidents)

Just want to put your mind at ease over this Bea, if you are really worried about teeth - don't be!

As far as settling to sleep with a drink I managed to get my dd used to going to bed with an anyway up cup of water from about 10 months. I did this by giving her the last b/feed in the evening then laying her in her cot and giving her her beaker to hold and she went to sleep on her own (I realise I was incredibly lucky with this-but its worth a go). Eventually the last feed of the day was dropped but the bedtime routine was the same and she has been the same ever since. The middle of the night feed was our last ever one to go and this was when she started sleeping through the night at around 12 months. good luck

If you are still reading, I found holding my baby's nose made him unclench any jaw clamp with teeth. I found I had more problems with this form of experimentation toward the end of feeds.

Interested in views on bedtime routines. I try to bath first, finish up with a feed, and then put the (hopefully!) drowsy baby to bed. But my sister fed hers first, then bath, story, and bed - theory being that they would learn they didn't need a feed to sleep. Any views?

Hi Florenceuk - I didn't purposely set out to do that but it kind of evolved into being a feed first, bed later routine. I didn't force it and was amazed when at around 10 months dd would actually settle herself to sleep in her own COT, after being a 'falling-asleep-latched-on-move-to-cot-carefully-pull-back-covers-lay-down-still-attached' kind of baby!! BUT I didn't mind dropping that feed before the early morning one because she was happy with her beaker, so it definitely had its plus points

Personally can't imagine trying to plan a scheme like your sister's, not that I'm saying its wrong at all its just that I was far more baby led - but then also tried things (like the cot) to see if they would work every now and again. I always think if you decide what they WILL and WON'T get used to then you end up fighting battles with yourself

(listen to me, making out like some chilled out saint, I'm sooooooo not, its just a theory!!)

Florenceuk-ds went for the bath, feed, story option too. But he has never seemed to associate going to bed with feeding, even though as a very wee one it was a similar situation as Lizzer. Trying desperately not to wake him after finishing his last breast feed. He's more than happy to go to his cot, even points to it now (16months) when he's really knackered! So I don't think there's a right or wrong way here. Go with what works for your little one, and you, best.

Florenceuk, having had a first ds who didn't sleep through the night until over two I became absolutely paranoid about my second falling into the same bad habits and sleep associations so I moved from bath, cuddle/story, feed to bath, feed, cuddle/story. I even fed him in the towel straight from the bath so that if he did doze off I would have to wake him to put him sleepsuit on!! It all seems a bit contrived now, but saying that it did work and once he stopped associating feed with sleep he started going right through the night.

florenceuk, I too was keen to avoid an association between feeding and sleep. I think it's a good idea to swerve away from a big milk feed just before your baby goes down for one reason anyway - for us at least, it can result in them bringing it all up again. Too any times have I had to change the bedding 5 minutes after I've said goodnight. As Lizzer says, you may find your rouintine changes naturally over the months. And you can always compromise on the bedtime drink aspect - make it a sip of watrer, not a big milk feed. It doesn't have to be all or nothing.

I add or deduct bits to my son's routine anyway. His needs change and I am trying to avoid small details becoming too fixed in my toddler's mind, ie: we no longer choose a favourite toy to put on his pillow, (we read more books together instead) and we are now cleaning his teeth in the bedroom, not the bathroom, because he was getting cross about the cleaning rigmarole, so I've changed settings.

Hope this is of some use!

We had a bath then feed routine til ds was 14 months old (bf up to 10m then bottle after). however I was concerned about clean teeth as he cleans them in the bath and also having a full tummy when potty training rears its head in the future. We changed to giving him a bottle downstairs before bath time about a month ago with no problems at all.

Thanks! At the moment DS goes down wonderfully with bath and then a feed, even if he plays up a bit during the feed - so I'll stick to what works for now. But might try a story as he gets older, and the feed doesn't take as long.