Is this enough milk at 9 months?

[TattyMcTatts]

My little boy is 9 months old and EBF. His appetite for solids has increased rapidly recently and some days he will go for very long stretches without a breastfeed. I am returning to work when he is 10 months old and was planning on continuing breast feeding just first thing in the morning and last thing at night.

With this in mind, I started to replace some daytime feeds with formula, but this is really hit and miss, and most days he will only have about 2oz. He sips some water with meals, but not convinced he actually swallows much!

So, my questions are, when I return to work, and he attends nursery, he will potentially have 2/3 breast feeds a day (morning, evening and potentially a night feed if he wakes up):

Will this be enough nutritionally? I know his main source of nutrition at his age should be from breast milk.

Will he be sufficiently hydrated throughout the day?

My instinct is telling me he'll let me know when he's hungry (which he isn't!) so just to follow his lead and go with nutritious meals and morning and evening breastfeed? What are your experiences?

Thank you!

I can't say if it's the right thing but I returned to work when my two were about 8 months. They breastfed first thing in the morning, when I got in from work and at bedtime (3 x long feeds). During the day they ate decent solid meals (we did BLW) and had water in a sippy cup with meals (didn't drink much of it though). DH / DM gave them a small cup of cows' milk mid-morning and mid-afternoon.
I didn't feel the need to introduce formula as they were getting the vast majority of their milk as breastmilk, and cows' milk is fine in their diet from 6 months (it's just not nutritious enough to be used as the only milk). Both ate really good balanced solid food meals (with red meat etc for iron) and I'd introduced vitamin drops at 6 months.
At weekends they had a few more breastfeeds during the day as I was around to offer it.

Oh and meant to add that I made sure they had plenty of wet foods in their diet to make sure that they were properly hydrated (porridge, yogurt, fruit purées etc).

@ffscovid

I can't say if it's the right thing but I returned to work when my two were about 8 months. They breastfed first thing in the morning, when I got in from work and at bedtime (3 x long feeds). During the day they ate decent solid meals (we did BLW) and had water in a sippy cup with meals (didn't drink much of it though). DH / DM gave them a small cup of cows' milk mid-morning and mid-afternoon. I didn't feel the need to introduce formula as they were getting the vast majority of their milk as breastmilk, and cows' milk is fine in their diet from 6 months (it's just not nutritious enough to be used as the only milk). Both ate really good balanced solid food meals (with red meat etc for iron) and I'd introduced vitamin drops at 6 months. At weekends they had a few more breastfeeds during the day as I was around to offer it.

Thank you, that's really helpful!

I’m doing 3 bottle feeds a day with my FF 9 month old which I will drop to 2 feeds when she is 10 months and 1 feeds when she is 11 months. As long as your little one knows how to drink water from a cup or sippy cup, he will drink what he needs.

That's absolutely fine @TattyMcTatts . I returned at about the same age with both of mine and did the same. Nursery can offer a cup of cows milk in the day if they think they need it, which is fine as it won't be their main drink.

He'll be fine.

One of the best things about breastfeeding is that baby controls what they take. They therefore take what they need.

You might find they have longer feeds less often.

The main source of nutrition being milk is rubbish btw. As solids increase and milk decreases they get their nutrients from their food as well.