Re-lactating after trialing formula at 7 months

[LSMZ]

Does anyone have experience of switching their baby to formula for a short period of time (i.e. two weeks) whilst pumping to maintain breastmilk supply and then switching back to breast? Especially interested to hear stories about older babies i.e. 7 months old

I've not done it but if you are, I'd consider getting some RL support.

Have you got the numbers of the BFing Helplines?

I did.

DD1 was EBF until 10 days. Then mixed fed until 21 days. Followed by FF until 16 weeks. Then mix fed again until 12 months.

I did at 4 months with DD1 due to breast refusal and didn't pump but probably offered 2 feeds a day, with maybe one successful. So not exactly the same but did resume breastfeeding exclusively with no trouble at all afterwards. Too exclusively in fact - she then bottle refused at 9 months!

Does your baby already drink from a bottle? Because that could be the hardest part I’d think.
Are you needing to be away from them for a little while?
It’s maybe worth a try but I’d be prepared for it to potentially be quite hard work.

Actually I want to trial a hypoallergenic formula to see if she is reacting to something in my diet that I can't identify. But I wanted to go back to breastfeeding if it doesn't change the situation. I thought it would be good to know if there are success stories of managing to get back to breastfeeding or if once they are on the bottle they don't want to go back to breast.
Logistically I don't know where to start as she is addicted to my boob haha. All naps and night wake-up are on the boob and she doesn't take a bottle reliably (she will drink a small amount of my expressed milk). Also the hypoallergenic formula tastes disgusting and she won't take it even when I mix it with my breastmilk so we are doing well so far 🙃🙈

Mine was with DD1 so I could devote all my time to it. I could not have done the same with DD2.

I hired a hospital grade pump from the NCT and pumped 12 times in 24 hours - 3 overnight.

I started the latch with bath sharing. Every night. Once she was re-latching we spent a long weekend (4 days) in bed skin to skin.

We never returned to EBF though.

@stargirl1701 wow that's devotion for sure! Well done! I think I will have to be prepared for it not to work too or maybe to be mixed feeding afterwards

The milk came back very quickly - just 48 hours! That meant some feeds were expressed BM.

The latch took far longer to re-establish.

What do you think she could be reacting to?
The most common is milk but you’d need a prescribed formula for that and usually the first one they try isn’t completely milk protein free it’s just broken down in lay mans terms. And yes the taste…

If you are thinking that she may be reacting to something on your milk, have you tried eliminating dairy first?

Kellymom has a good article on BFing and food sensitivities here

I've tried eliminating loads of things and nothing has helped much. I am suspicious of legumes and peanuts. But in all honesty her symptoms haven't really improved much no matter what I've done which I why I wanted to try formula. I've been prescribed neocate just can't get her to take it even if I mixed it with my breastmilk and I don't feel I have so much supply to be pumping that much in order for her to refuse to drink the whole bottle. I've tried her with a bit of yoghurt this week and nothing terrible has happened so I may try a milk based formula and see if she will take to that

That's very interesting! We have a terrible latch anyway 😞

What type of symptoms are they?
Not all food proteins pass into the blood and therefore breastmilk x

@fashionqueen0123 I didn't know that I thought all of them did. She has bad reflux, eczema, mucous in every nappy, trapped wind, poor sleep. We used to have quite a few poos a day, poos overnight again with lots of straining even though they were soft poos and also a green liquid outline to the poos although that has settled now.

If latch is also an issue, do any of her symptoms sound like these?

That sounds like a potential dairy allergy if she has eczema. Have you cut it out of your diet? That’s one way to trial it and just keep Bf. I wouldn’t worry too much about other foods.

It could be combined with a tongue tie or reflux as you mention about that latch.

There is also lactose overload, but not to be confused with lactose intolerance.

It might worth trying to cut out dairy and speaking to an IBCLC.

@fashionqueen0123 Yeah I thought so too and I cut out dairy twice. Once for 4 weeks and then went back on for two weeks and then off again for nearly 6 weeks. I reintroduced it this week because I'm struggling to eat well without it and I've lost too much weight and I feel I'm getting no where. The symptoms haven't improved and eczema was the best it's been whilst I was back on dairy for those two weeks. I went off dairy again because she was quite bloated and gassy for those two weeks but she also cut her first two teeth on those weeks so that may have been why? I also cut out soy and I've stayed off that because I did think that made things worse. I think it's something else but can't work out what. I did get an IBCLC involved but unfortunately she wasn't very helpful. Didn't check her for a tongue tie because she said I wouldn't have had the supply I've had if she was tongue tied (she's 95th percentile). But the latch definitely means she takes in so much air. She did mention about foremilk imbalance and lactose overload and I do think we may have had that. I do try to do some block feeding because she's a big comfort feeder but it hasn't helped significantly.
I love the connection of breastfeeding so much but I can't bare to see her in discomfort anymore and I don't want to stick her on meds if it's related to an allergen. But if it's not allergy related I want to continue breastfeeding. But I'm not sure my formula plan will work. I'm going to try a milk based formula for the night feed tonight and see what happens.

@CadyEastman she definitely has some of those features. But I think she would be too old for a tongue tie cut now without a general anaesthetic which im not sure would be worth the risk

I wonder if it’s worth seeing a GP and mentioning the reflux then. They usually try something very basic like gaviscon first. Yeah I was wondering about block feeding too.

Hmm that’s a tricky one then - alrhough it’s good if she doesn’t have a cows milk protein allergy.
I wonder if the taking in wind is causing some of it.

Definitely the wind is making her miserable. I've seen the GP multiple times. Tried gaviscon (caused constipation and ineffective) and omeprazole which I should have tried for longer but it didn't massively change things in the 5 days I tried it and I didn't want to medicate her heavily if I can help it

My daughter has multiple food allergies, 20 at last count and severe silent reflux. 5 days is too soon to have seen a benefit from the omperazole, it actually often makes it worse during the first week or so whilst the body adjusts to the request to make less acid. My daughters reflux only responded to the highest dose of omperazole, with as much gaviscon that I could get in her and lactulose for the constipation eventually she went on domperidone too.

She reacted to a lot of foods when I was breastfeeding which had a very negative effect on my health i dropped a lot of weight and had severe pnd. Food diaries were my best friend and had to include everything in them. I soon learnt that she had feeding aversions and was difficult to keep occupied soon after I had eaten something she reacted too much earlier than the screaming, sick and loose stools.

I did ultimately have to switch to formula when my health couldn't take it any more. To get her over a bottle aversion and to accept the formula I had to stop cold turkey. She went 26h without drinking but then was on formula until she was 2!