Bad advice to combine breast and formula and now feel trapped

[Mindy1]

hi

to cut a long story short my 11 day old dd lost too much weight in hospital and i was advised to 'top up' 40 min b/f with 3oz aptamil, this went on for 4 days and now i have been told to cut it back to 2 oz. To be honest dd is not a great breast feeder - falls asleep on breast etc. I am concerned about cutting formula out as i think she may not get enough milk from me - she always takes her bottle. I would like to continue b/feeding and am wondering if anyone has experience of this type of situation. Also we are in a 4 hour routine which is working well and I am loathe to break that

Thanks

4 hour routine is too long between feeds IMO for a new born

if you want to exclusively breast feed you need baby on the breast a lot more than every four hours, the more the baby goes to the breast, the more milk will increase to meet demand.. babies have tiny stomachs that need filling little and often, it is normal for babies to feed every hour or two.

try ringing NCT or LLL or one of the other free helplines for more advice

howbreastfeedingworks.com/tag/breastfeeding/ numbers on this website here

you need to breast feed more often. why are you loathe to break the 4 hour thing? in the early days it should be feed feed and feed not to any routine. you need to to build up your supply. the more you feed the more you make.

If you're supplementing with 3oz of formula every 4 hours, that's 18 oz in a day, right? How much does your baby weigh, in lbs? If you multiply that by 2.5 to 2.7, that should indicate how many oz your baby is taking, from you and in formula - just to give you a (vague? possible?) idea of how much your baby is taking.

You can't just cut out formula entirely, but if you reduce it, she'll start feeding more from you!

And yeah, a 4-hour schedule (any schedule really) is unreasonable for a newborn.

Agree with Lulu, 4 hours is too long between feeds for such a young baby, and especially if you want to boost your supply.

It can become a hard cycle to break -

Baby only feeds every 4hrs so doesn't have much of a calorie intake.

Baby doesn't feed as well at next feed because they don't have the energy.

And so it goes on .....

Put the baby to breast every couple of hours and she will probably feed, and as it's so hot strip her before the feed so she's a bit more awake. As soon as you see her start to get sleepy, tickle her palm and/or under the chin to keep her awake.

I know you are loathe to change the 4 hourly feeds, but the only way to boost your supply is to feed, feed, feed. Your milk supply is still establishing itself and needs to know there is a demand.

Good luck, it might seem a faff but it is worth it

Nothing new to add really, just want to confirm what everyone else has said.

4 hourly feeding for a newborn is not often enough. A newborn should feed 10-12 times every 24 hours to establish supply.

Do not worry about not having enough milk to feed her, every time you put her to the breast your body will make more milk ready in time for the next feed.

Kellymom is a great site, if you just start out at www.kellymom.com/bf/normal/index.html and select from the links on the Left it will explain everything to you.

Congratulations and good luck

4 hourly feeds are too far apart for a formula fed baby as their stomachs are so small. They are definitely too far apart for a breast fed baby as the others have said above.

It sounds like you have been given some really crap advice by the health care professionals. You need to talk to someone who actually knows about breast feeding - do consider ringing one of the helplines. Congratulations on your new baby

Have a look here and see if you can find a group near you.

My ds was a sleeper and didn't want to wake up to feed. I had lots of support from la leche league and nct breastfeeding lines/people as well as from local breastfeeding councellors - I would strongly recommend that you seek some support - as it is out there and breastfeeding (imho) is sooo lovely! (and beneficial to you both!).

IME it is entirely normal for an 11 day old baby to fall asleep at the breast (because of hormones in your milk and because breastfeeding is a lovely comforting thing). This is another reason why it is important to feed the baby whenever they are hungry and not just at set times to make sure she is getting enough. At this age, my daughter fed roughly every 2 hours (during the day and much less at night), but sometimes it was more.

Re the 4 hour routine, many mothers who I know who have tried this with formula find it is not frequent enough for their babies. Sometimes babeis simply need to feed more often regardless of what they are being fed.

There is also the baby cafe website to have a look at, not all of them are on tinks link.

I used to top up my baby with one formula feed every day, but otherwise I was breast feeding every 2 (ish) hours. So I agree with the other MNers with the advice to feed more often.

at first I found breast feeding to be really difficult, but I was so glad that I persevered as it became a lot easier after a few weeks and then became really enjoyable.

I had a sleepy ds1 who lost wewight in early days and so i did do some formula top ups. He got better at feeding as he got older.

I did 3 hourly feeds in the day to get lots of milk in him, waking him if needs be (though i just let him wake naturally during the night! he did do longer stretches at night). Can you express to help boost your supply, i did that in the mornings and would give him the expressed via a bottle for his evening feed, after a bf when i felt i didnt have as much milk naturally.

I used to have to strip ds1 to his nappy to help him stay awake during feeds...felt mean at the time, but meant we did get back on track with bf.

With DS2 i did mix feed from 6 weeks and to be honest it was great, meant i continued bf for much longer than i otherwise would have done so also i would say if you are happy doing mixed then i wouldnt worry about it too much either.

Mindy: really bad advice you got in hospital Falling asleep on the breast is normal, but I would be concerned in your case that your baby is falling asleep because the breastfeeding is not rewarding for her - you are giving so much formula, the breastmilk is not being stimulated.

Would be a good idea for you to call one of the helplines and also read some of the links suggested here.

What you are doing now will mean you will not be able to continue breastfeeding for much longer - that's not what you want, from what you say in your post. You'll need to change the frequency of feeds as soon as possible - doubling the frequency as a minimum, and following the advice in the links on how to increase your supply. You will need to work on reducing the amount of formula given, too.

Hope it works out.

Thanks for advise, with mastitis, bleeding and blistered nipples and dd screaming for bottle we have decided to go with formula - it just didnt work for us

Sorry to hear that Mindy Hope your mastitis gets better soon

And Congratulations I've just relaised your baby is still under 2 weeks old so probably still appropriate to say that!