Has anyone quit BF while baby won't take bottle?

[Cindy1802]

Curious to know - has anyone quit breastfeeding cold turkey out of desperation for baby to take a bottle?

My son is almost 4 months and we have been trying to get him to take a bottle since he was 2 weeks old, and he point blank refuses. He has CMPA, silent reflux and is a TERRIBLE sleeper. I am desperate for more than a 1.5 hour stretch of sleep. Due to his CMPA I have had to change my diet. I am desperate for him to take a bottle so that I can just have a bit of a break from the relentlessness of night wakings, or even just be able to leave the house for more than 2 hours during the day. I dread the nights, but all I can think about during the day is going to bed to get some sleep.

I'm not actually considering just quitting cold turkey (yet 🤣) and i wouldnt do that to him, but I'm just wondering out of interest really, has anyone done this and had success with baby finally taking a bottle?! I sometimes wonder what he would do if I wasn't available for some extenuating circumstance! Surely there is someone out there who has been pushed beyond breaking point?

I can totally understand your frustration as both of mine were bottle refusers.

What are you trying in the bottle? Is it EBM or a formula suitable for formula with CMPA?

Have you tried moving up a test size?

Have you had any success with a cup? I could go out and leave them at this age with DH and a cup of EBM or formula.

Is he on any anti reflux medication and are you entirely DF?

I had to be out last weekend for a few hours, and my husband made a small nick in the bottle teat so the milk slowly pooled into baby's mouth, and he managed to drink an oz that way. I guess that's similar to a larger teat size? I came home as he was getting annoyed by dad so who knows if he would have drank any more.

I'm using expressed milk due to the CMPA, but did try formula in the early days before I was diagnosed, he didn't take it either. And yep I am strictly dairy free, I've done the yogurt test and failed. He's on gaviscon for the silent reflux.

I’m fairly sure it happens due to lots of different circumstances. Back to work, illness etc
I did have one friend who went way for the weekend leaving her baby with her DH in order to get the baby to take a bottle. She was going back to work and she’d completely had it with feeding. I think there was a bit of fight but baby did take the bottle in the end.

An ounce is fine. They don't have to guzzle the huge quantities that FF babies do.

BF babies take on average 25 floz per 24 hours so if he's taking one floz a feed from a bottle or cup, I'd take that as a win.

Has DH tried a cup instead, we really didn't have success with a bottle but had enough success with a cup so that I could go out.

If DH is trying bottle feeding, reading this article called "How to bottle feed the BF baby" might help.

I'd go back to the GP too and ask for omeprazole instead if gaviscon as the current medication obviously isn't working.

Has the GP referred LO to a Paediatric Dietitian yet too?

Hmm interesting, do you think his awful sleep is a sign the gaviscon isn't working? He's much more settled on it (as he was so miserable and cried most of the day before we started using it) but sleep still hasn't got better. We've had a handful of better nights but on the whole we see each other a lot through the night. Last night we went to bed at 10, and woke at 12, 1.30, 2.30, 4.30, 6.30. (That includes a 30-45min wake up for feed, gaviscon, nappy if needed and keeping him upright for a while, so he sleeps for just over an hour before waking again)

The GP was meant to ring me last week to discuss, but she never did - so I will ring her this week.

I will get hubby to try cup feeding actually, it didn't really cross my mind as I assumed he was too little!

You must be absolutely exhausted, the nights sound really tough.

Probably an obvious suggestion but have you tried different brands of bottles? My BF baby rejected 3 types before we finally found one that they got on with (Mam anti-colic ones). And we did get on better with the slightly faster teat size.

Also at 4 months you will soon be able to start weaning which may help with the reflux and give dad more options with a hungry baby during the day. It's been a while since mine were little but maybe worth asking the doctors when you do speak to them to see if earlier weaning is still recommended to help with reflux.

Definitely don't stress about introducing a bottle. There's a bit more about cup feeding here.

And do ask about better reflux meds. Gaviscon is fairly cheap so is usually the first thing that the GP will prescribe. It sounds like it's been a little beneficial but I would push for the Omeprazole.

Have you read this on Dairy and other food sensitivities in BF babies?

@BakerJ yep we've tried lots of different teats. I think we'll try a cup next. Thank you for your ideas! And yes I'm exhausted, I never thought I would be able to survive on the amount of sleep I'm getting! I'm ok during the day as my toddler keeps me well distracted, but I find the nights really tough, being pulled from sleep so often for milk that he can't need. I always try to resettle once he wakens so quickly, which does work sometimes, but not very often and he may only go back to sleep for another 30mins or so.

@CadyEastman thank you for your advice. I will defo try a cup, I have a TT sippy cup in the house which I will wash and sterilise and give it a go. Which type of cup worked for you?

When he wakens in the night he doesn't seem unhappy, he just wants boob - and I do think he is using me as a dummy for comfort but he won't take an actual dummy. So due to him not seeming unsettled I didn't think it was reflux related but I could be very wrong!! This is a very different experience vs my first baby.

Yes I've read into other allergies which I don't think he has - or at least he can tolerate the amount of e.g. soy I eat via bread etc. I have purposely avoided swapping dairy for soya based products. The allergy symptoms did clear up by eliminating diary only, and his miserable mood cleared up with the gaviscon. So it's just the AWFUL sleep is the one remaining symptom, but as I say he doesn't seem unhappy or unsettled when he wakens.......

Did I mention that I have CMPA. Got given butter instead of vegan butter on Friday whilst out, it had garlic in so didn't spot the difference.

I barely slept on Friday night and was exhausted all day on Saturday. I feel for the little man!

We just used the TT cup. We moved to a doidy cup a bit later.

@CadyEastman ah gosh what a nightmare. Hope you feel better now.

Thanks again for the tips 🤞

Hi @Cindy1802 how are you getting on? I’m in the same boat now with my 5 month old, desperate to stop BF but he just chews the bottle teat and no interest in a cup. Have you seen any improvements yet? Thank you :)

@Sleepingallday no luck here I am afraid. We tried a cup last week and he just spat all the milk out, every last drop 🤦🏼‍♀️ I'm a bit fed up of trying and failing now, so probably will take a break for a bit. I have accepted that I'm probably going to have to wait until hes eating a decent amount of solids that I can leave him for more than 2 hours 😭

Hi I have a baby with a milk allergy who also refused bottles. I asked everyone, la leche league leaders etc and the last resort they said was to basically not feed baby at all until they took a bottle which obviously I was unwilling to do so she's nearly a year old now and won't take a bottle. She did however start to be able to stuck from a straw quite young and I think it was from watching me use a reusable bottle with a straw, she would try and drink from mine. Now she will happily have water in a straw cup but doesn't really like any milk alternatives or even breast milk in the cup. Her sleep was similar to your baby's and I found her sleeping really improved at 6 months so hopefully you turn a corner soon!

Yes I did. I had a multiple allergy baby and was on a very limited diet and very underweight and has severe treatment resistant depression and psychosis. My daughter was 10 months with a severe bottle aversion caused by her GP prescribing a formula she was allergic too when I was admitted to a mother and baby unit. I had run out of medication that I could breastfeed on. All the staff tried to get my daughter to accept formula in a bottle but she refused to even let them hold the bottle and her so not able to try different bottles. We had to send her home to dad to figure it out. She accepted a little bit of formula in food so had maybe 2 or 3 Oz in cereal she didn't drink anything for 26h! Then she went to nursery for the day and she had 2 5oz bottles for them over the course of the day and she stayed on formula until she was 2. She was slow to wean and at 10 months she was still pretty much solely milk fed. She was 13 months before she engaged with weaning.

Oh @Superscientist that sounds like it must have been a really hard time for you all. Hope things are much better now.

I just wanted to come back and update that my ds has finally taken a bottle…he had a really long stretch of sleep overnight whereas he’s normally up every hour/2 hrs (pure hell) and then once he woke up I thought let’s try the bottle now, and he did take it at last! I think before he just wasn’t really hungry enough but getting hungry overnight was a sort of nice way to build up hunger rather than him
getting upset during the day.

@Cindy1802 not sure if any of that will resonate with you but hope you have a good outcome soon if you haven’t already :)

Have you tried using a dummy at night? I had a similar issue with one of my twins and him accepting a dummy was the difference between me losing my mind or not. If they don't accept it straight away I was advised to put it in their mouth then tap to the rhythm of feeding with my finger on top which worked. May seem like an odd time to introduce one but if you're really stuck it might be an idea.

I really wouldn’t stop cold turkey, for both your sakes.

DS never had a bottle, went straight onto a sippy cup. This one https://amzn.eu/d/iSHBjY5

I finally had some success which actually left me gobsmacked, I couldn't believe it. I followed the course by Hannah Love, and it worked on the first try. It may have been a fluke but today we'll try again and everyday going forward, wish us luck!

good luck!