will bfeeding just twice a day be a disaster?

[olivhohoho]

my dd is 4 months old and has been bf with the odd bottle of formula at night for the last two weeks. I was originally going to switch her to all fomula but part of me would like to carry on bf for a little longer. if i gradually cut down to just 2 bf a day, say morning and evening, would my supply readjust itself to provide enough milk for these? dont want to do it if there wouldnt be enough milk there for dd to be satisfied by it.

Lots of people seem able to do this. i wasn't one of them! You will only be able to find out by trying...

ooooh,dont know what to do. am back to work ina couple of months so plan was to wean her onto bottles totally over the next few weeks but now am hoping to bf am and pm. guess i'll have to just give it a go and cross my fingers that it works....

A couple of months is still a fair old while. Rather than cut down breastfeeding now, I would get into the habit of expressing more and feeding her ebm from a bottle. (That's what I did with DS3, then I carried on expressing when I came back to work, and it seemed to work very well.)

I'm crap at expressing! she has had one bottle of ebm a day since about 7 weeks but in the last month or so, i can only get abot 1 1/2 to 2 oz each time, no matter how long i g ofor - i used to get 3 or 4!! will keep trying though.

thanks for your advice by the way!

It is not easy to figure out, is it? I don't mean my advice to sound like gospel, obviously - but I just wouldn't like to think that you were stopping earlier than you really wanted to.

I did from 6 months with ds - continued to feed am and pm until well over a year old. Reduce and substitute gradually, one feed at a time for a week before the next.

Hi, advising as a breastfeeding councillor- It is very hard to sustain an adequate milk supply to meet the demands of your 4 month old just over 2 feeds a day. Especially when they are the most important feeds, as soon as you begin to reduce the amount you breastfeed your supply will go down, and although your body is clever, its not that clever to makesure there is enough to satisfy a hungry baby at these 2 feeds. If your serious about doing it, the only way to make sure you keep your supply up is to express in the day 2 -3 times, Is this possible in your line of work?
Also If your doing it to keep the bonding between yourself and your baby, then fair enough, but just to tell you that to get all the health benefits for you and your baby that breast feeding provides, is only valid if you exclusively breastfeed, once you begin adding formula feeds to the baby's diet, the health benefits are lowered considerably, and almost cancelled out if your only giving 2 feeds a day. Hope this helps

thanks for your help. unfortunately, when i go back to work, i wont be able to express - i'm a teacher so dont really get any time to myself during the day. hadnt realised that any real benefits of bf are negated by additional ff, quite disappointed by that. the bottle of formula i've been giving her at night has been such a help too

i think i'll carry on till a couple of weeks before i go back to work then see how i feel then. dd seems happy to have bottle or breast, its mainly for me that i want to carry on , i just dont feel ready to stop yet.

don't beat yourself up about the bottle of formula you gave in the evening it was only one out of probably 5 feeds so wouldn't have that much of a negative effect to the breastfeeding benefits. Its when the majority of them are bottle feeds that it begins to matter, which i'm presuming is going to be the case for you.
So as you now know that is more about you enjoying the experiance, why don't you try and do it aslong as possible, it will inevitably mean you will have to top-up with formula after both of these feeds, however atleast you will feel you have done it for aslong as you possible could.

thanks daisy. i'll do that and keep the one ff as its keeping me sane at the moment!!

Daisymaisy, who are you a bf counsellor for?

i am a teacher and i expressed everyday while back at work 2x a day for a year. breaktime and lunchtime. your breaktime and lunchtime are yours to spend how you wish. you simply need to advise the appropriate person in senior management to find you a private place where you can express.

ditto what hunker said.

im going back to work from the 8th jan for 3 days a week and will only be bf am and pm (also nights as he still doesnt sleep through and wakes 3-4 times for 10-15min feed)he's allergic to formula so will have to use expr bf at nursery.

although if he could have formula i still wouldnt give up totally. we both enjoy the closeness it gives and i know exactly what hes getting (not quantity i know but quality wise its better (i believe anyway))

also as he has been weaning my supply is going down but has adjusted on its own accord to suit him. just as when they had growths spurts and it increased it has decreased to foloow suit.

im hoping to bf for as long as possible, at least a year.

Kamikayzed, no when you introduce solids, health benefits that breastfeeding provides for you and your baby do not diminish, as naturally you give less milk feeds and more solids, but you are still exclusively breastfeeding the milk feeds. In breastfeeding lingo, exclusively breastfeeding means only offering breastmilk.

As like many breastfeeding councellors I'm self employed. However I am unicef trained and therefore follow their ethos and code of practice. Hope this answers your question Hunkermunker.

I was able to do that oliv, and know others who could. If you wouldn't be too disappointed if it didn't work for you, then give it a go.

To gain the full health benefits for yourself and your baby, unicef says to exclusively breastfeed for 6 months, and that for every feed you replace with formula, you are lowing all those health benefits.
In answer to your question the babies in theory are 6 months so its not really valid.

Yes, the full benefits. But some formula doesn't negate the breastmilk the baby's receiving. It's better a baby has two breastmilk feeds than none, surely?

that is correct hunkermunker, it just reduces the full benefits, but is definately better than no breastfeeds.

It was when you said the health benefits were almost cancelled out with only two feeds a day that I thought I should say something - because whilst two feeds a day is hard to sustain in a very young baby, in reality it's not likely to only be two feeds - there's the middle of the night comfort back to sleep, the weekend feeds, half term, etc, etc - if a baby's still used to breastfeeding, there's no reason they can't be breastfed at other times as well.

If someone things that there's no benefit or only the tiniest benefit to giving any breastmilk, the chances are they won't bother.