2 week old feeding too much?

[NorthDevonBeachLover]

I have a 2 week old little boy, he is always offered breast milk first but often falls asleep on the boob or gets irate and won't latch on properly. Midwife advised that I do a top up of formula if he wants it which we have been doing but he is pretty much drinking 3oz of formula on top of the breast milk! Is this okay? Normal? Can you overfeed a baby?

Are you doing paced bottle feeding? Maybe speak to a lactation consultant instead of a midwife, as supplementing a full feed of formula will impact your supply. You could try give him maybe an ounce of formula and then try latching him again, just to keep your supply up and to get him to latch without getting too irate 🙂

Oh and to answer your question you can't overfeed a breastfed baby, but with formula you do have to stay within the recommended daily amount.

My DD struggled to latch properly for a few weeks and I was never advised to top up her feeds with formula. She would often fall asleep on the boob and would feed quite frequently but it does get better.
If you have a local breastfeeding group or consultant you can speak to then they will be able to advise better than midwife.
Be careful topping up with formula so early as your supply is getting established so ideally you would want to just be breastfeeding for approx first 6 weeks

I would also be cautious about too ups. Are you sure she really needs them? Babies generally are very sleepy the first few week. I'd do plenty of skin to skin, tickles, blowing on her face etc to wake her up a little and stop the top ups unless there is a concern about her weight

Sorry just saw it's a boy not girl!

I'm worried about giving too much formula, if I could solely do breast I would but he just doesn't seem to get full ever. He had a forceps delivery and doesn't settle easily anyway, we have cranial osteopathy booked in for next week to see if that makes a difference at all.
I'm a FTM and really worried that I will make him ill from too much feed.

@NorthDevonBeachLover I would definitely see if you can speak with an IBCLC as they will make sure latch and everything is ok. But tbh, it sounds pretty normal, my DD fed loads in the first few weeks and then had periods where it felt like she was always on the boob, it can be completely normal but you definitely need professional advice from a breastfeeding consultant rather than just a midwife or health visitor they don't specialise in feeding.
I'm in Cornwall and we have a peer supporters group on Facebook and they do weekly meets in various locations, not sure where you're based but it's worth seeing if there is something like that near you as they are free and can really help

He may be cluster feeding to up your supply and this can sometimes be mistaken as hunger /worry that you don’t have enough milk but really he is just stimulating the breast to produce more milk, if he is having wet and dirty nappies just on breastmilk then you will know he’s getting enough.

if you want to use formula though as well you can combi feed but may be better to just replace one feed per day at same time than do a top up after every feed.

You won’t make him ill as such - you can make a formula fed baby too fat but presumably HV suggested too ups due to poor weight gain?

My daughter is 12 weeks. From 9 weeks we had to introduce top ups. We just breast feed at night and give her 4 bottles during the day / started at 2 ounces now offer 3 at every feed. So what your doing doesn’t sound outrageous at all - but every baby is different. The two questions to ask are, is he putting on enough weight and is he settled/does he seem hungry all the time? If so he’s getting enough milk, if the answer to either question is no, then he needs the top ups. Having said that, cluster-feeding is normal at this stage.

Osteopathy helped my little one improve her latch so she hasn’t needed more and more formula. And I found a video on YouTube called Dr Newman’s visual guide to breastfeeding very helpful too.

The first couple of weeks breastfeeding is just that and very little else, tummies are small and newborns feed little and often. Introducing a 3oz top up after each feed, will slow and affect breast milk production and delivery, please get some breastfeeding support of you want to sustain breastfeeding.