Baby will only dangle feed when she is fully awake

[Peridotty]

Last time I asked about my BF routine and got some really great advice so I'm back on this forum as another issue has cropped up.

I have a 12 week old baby girl. I have no problems with breastfeeding when she has just woken up. She latches on immediately, drinks calmly, cradle position, ZERO problems.

However, when she is fully awake, she goes on a nursing strike. When I see her cueing and eating her fist, I will offer her my breast but it causes her to scream and cry. As soon as I put her in a cradle hold, it's like she knows what is coming and she will scream.

If she is hungry she will take a bottle of expressed milk. I don't want to encourage that behaviour so I try my best to not give a bottle and try to get her to sleep instead so that when she wakes up she will feed normally. I have been successful on many occasions in not needing to give a bottle at all, but on some days I have to give one when she is overtired and goes on a nursing strike. I tell myself that at least she BF normally the majority of the time so I shouldn't be too hard on myself and be upset!!

Today and yesterday I have discovered that when she is fully awake and rejecting the breast, she WILL take the boob in a dangle position! I basically lie her on the bed (crying), dangle the boob in front of her mouth, she will latch on and drink. She will then go to sleep.

Is this common? Is this just a phase? Thank you

@Peridotty I know you posted this years ago, but I was wondering what you figured out? Was it just a phase she was going through? My 12 week old daughter is doing the EXACT same thing you described. We have never had an issue getting her to latch up to this point but now cries when I begin to put her in the cradle position, etc. Please let me know if you ever figured out what was happening!

@Starlight531 it could be due to the flow/ speed of milk transfer. It’s quite common for 12 week old to start to be a bit fussy as the amount of breast milk settles down around week 12. Dangle feeding uses gravity so baby wouldn’t have to work as hard. Using a bottle is also easier for baby too. You could try breast compressions whilst she is latched to help milk flow? I’d be careful about using too many bottles as she may get a flow preference at this point

Did either of you work out what was going on here? And did they go back to cradle position? My 9 week old daughter is doing the same thing as of this week. I love breastfeeding and really want to continue but it’s not the most practical position when you’re out and I’m reluctant to start bottle feeding yet to avoid nipple confusion.

My dd was like this - it turned out she had reflux. Don't know if that was a reason. Perhaps a better position to prevent it?

Did anyone every figure out how to solve this? My 12 week old baby is doing exactly the same thing