5.5 month old dd refuses a bottle, will she ever accept it or shall i give up?

[maltatheterrible]

dd 5.5 months has breastfed til now, but her weight gain has slowed to an ounce or two a week, I am working full pelt (cleaning, taking her with me) and i think my supply has been affected by this. Health visitor advised that i've given her a good start but if I wanted to introduce a couple of "supplementary bottles" it might help out a bit.

to be honest I am ready to stop breastfeeding, i do enjoy it but she is waking 4/5 times a night and it would be lovely if dh could do a couple of feeds.
Unfortunately she screams defiance at a bottle, I've tried formula, expressed bm and a variety of teats and a doidy cup but she goes goes rigid and gets hysterical when offered anything but me.

has anyone had success switching after such a reaction or shall i stop stressing us both out and carry on breastfeeding and looking like a zombie?!!

had a similar experience and going through it a bit again with dd2.

certainly keep trying, but its best if someone else does it and you leave the room. if dd knows you are there, and if she can smell you especially she'll only want breast. it worked for us when we went away for the weekend i'm afraid. she had no choice but to take a bottle. bit extreme, but could you face leaving her for a day with someone else? she would have to take one if she got really hungry.

others might have less cruel suggestions!

try giving her an empty bottle just to play with and perhaps suck, she might be happier if she is familiar with it like that.

hi egypt, thanks for the early morning response. i'm loathe to try the cold turkey approach and leave her with my mum, because the one time i did try and insist on the bottle, she got so upset that she threw up violently and wouldn't even feed from me for half an hour, she was so upset she was shaking

guess how crap I felt after that

dh has been doing most of the attempted bottle feeds but it's like she just can't work out how to suck and she just wails whilst patting his face in a beseeching manner, it's heartbreaking and we give in!

aww, i'm not surprised. we give in too with dd2. i'm not sure what I can suggest. she would take ebm from a bottle sometimes, just not formula, so it's not q as difficult as your problem. in the end, dd took formula when i was holding her, facing forwards and rocking from side to side - which is her favourite position. she was also in a trance staring at the tv!! so i think she was totally distracted and kind of didn't notice so much.

someone will be along with some better ideas soon......

maybe a sippy cup instead?

but i would def only try it with ebm until she is happy then change to formula - not too many changes at one time

My dd1 was the same. Unfortunately I never persuaded her to take a bottle and I tried everything from warmed latex teats to feeding in particular positions, dh tried etc etc.

Once weaning was established she started to take formula from a free flow cup. I think weaning helped her to accept that food could come from places other than my breast and that was the breakthrough point. Sorry, that's not terribly cheering is it, has she started weaning yet?

out of desperation i have tried her on purees and bits of brocoli/mango but she shows no interest whatsoever so I guess she's telling me she isn't ready yet

i am pretty sure she is never going to take to a bottle, think i will save myself the stress and try a cup in a few weeks

thanks for response, i need honesty not false optimism!

My dd was like this too. She took a bottle of ebm every evening until she was 4 months old then refused completely all teats, beakers and cups! Turning it into a battle might make it worse. I was desperately worried because dd had to go into nursery full time from 6 mo, but as ProfYaffle says, she got much more open minded about where her food was coming from once she started weaning. The nursery just mixed milk into her food and offered the bottle with no pressure on her to take it, and she gradually accepted it more and more. At 8 mo she now takes breast, bottle or beaker happily.

I know it doesn't help with the night wakings right away though!

I know what you mean about saving yourself the stress, i wish I'd just given up with dd1. dd2 is now 23 weeks I've never even tried her with a bottle. dh and I were saying the other day how much easier it's been than the hours of screaming we had trying to pour tepid ebm into dd1

I couldn't get my ds to take a bottle of anything beyond about 11 weeks (had EBM before this). Eventually I gave it up as a bad job, until he was having solids and had learned to drink water from a sippy cup. Then was able to switch his small afternoon feed from breast to a sippy cup of formula, followed by his breakfast time feed and now finally (11m) his bedtime feed. Luckily for me I didn't have the pressure of nursery to worry about. I totally agree with the posts that say your baby is going to become more open-minded about where food comes from once well into solids.
Point about sitting them facing away from you also seems to help - friends had this work with switching from breast to bottle at 4 / 5 months, and I've found this helpful with bedtime feed.
Good luck!

I found my DS would eventually take bm from a bottle when:

1. gently persevered
2. someone other than me fed him (not associated with mummy and her breasts)
3. he was sat up in a more 'eating' style position, not too nestled (so again not relating it to bf)
4. ensuring milk was nice and warm
5. making kissy kissy noises against his cheek (don't know why but it made him suck more)

best of luck!

Just succeeded with DS taking a btl of EBM on mon, he's also 5.5. I managed it at his bedtime feed after bath after wks of refusal. - nothing different, he just started sucking this time. (tommy tippee back to nature, - spent a fortune on diff btls, dont really know if it made a difference).

Try and act like it's not important, try different times of day (somebody suggested a sleepy night feed on another thread).

good luck!