Is baby being fussy or not enough milk?

[firsttimer08]

hi everyone,

ive been breastfeeding my 1 month old and giving a top up formula feed of 4oz at night. for the past 3-4 days he has been very fussy and keeps on crying /rejecting the breast and i have to give him another bottle which he gulps down quickly.

so now i am ending up giving him 2 bottles of formula during the day. yesterday i expressed milk in the morning and got 3oz from both breasts in total - however this evening after the baby kept rejecting the breast i gave him formula and simultaneously expressed milk and got a total of only 1oz !

did anyone experience this? i have asked the health visitor for advice but they onlyt say i shld keep up with the bf.

does the behaviour of my baby mean he likes the bottle or am i not getting enough breast milk? i feel v. disappointed as i wanted to solely breastfeed and it seems gradually we are moving to only formula. maybe i am doing sthg wrong. i would be grateful for any advice.

thanks.

Small babies find bottle feeding easier - it comes out so much faster, no 'work' involved.

This happened to my friend - the baby ended up just rejecting the breast altogether.

IMO, if you really want to BF, try to ditch the bottles. Why were you topping up? Its normal for a small baby to cluster feed in the evenings (feed for a long time)

The baby continued to be very fussy in the evenings and night even after a feed, so i introduced a top up feed on advice of everyone that my milk supply may be low. I never once experienced engorgement, let-down or leaky breasts (and its been 4 weeks since the baby was born).

Today he kept crying for 45 minutes or so, he kept rejecting the breast and eventually i relented by giving him the bottle - it seems he was adamant to get a bottle or else he wld rather cry. It seems ditching the bottle is impossible at this point - any advice on how i do that?

The HV seems to be of the view that 1 or 2 bottles should not lead the baby to reject the breast altogether. Plus that seemed to be the practice of almost everyone i know and their babies never rejected the breast. What was your friend's experience?

she started introducing a top-up daily at about 8 weeks - by 20 he was totally ff. didnt want breast anymore.

sorry im bfing, cant type very well! someone else will help soon

I've never experienced engorgement (I felt vaguely full when my milk came in but not for long) I didn't know what a let down felt like.

My guess is that its nipple confusion and that you need to get rid of the bottles if you want to continue to BF. I don't have any specific advice on ditching bottles, but to encourage your DS to latch on, try some biological nurturing techniques (www.biologicalnurturing.com/) to get you both to relax and hopefully DS will feel comfortable and latch on. Basically take yourself to bed, nice warm room, lots of skin to skin contact with your baby and stay there for as long as possible. Don't worry about doing anything, just try to have someone bring you what you need (food, drink etc)

To reassure you that its unlikely to be anything wrong with your milk supply - DS cluster fed for hours and hours (at worst between 4pm and 2am with no more break than for me to go to the loo). He started on the 50th centile and worked up in the first few weeks to the 75 where he stuck until recently where he's dropped back a bit (he never stops moving!) The cluster feeding slowed right down to a couple of hours by 10 weeks or so.

Don't think that was very good advice from the HV, it seems a bit early to introduce a bottle. I can tell you that my DS was very fussy in the evening up until about 8 weeks, think it was partly wind so we gave him Infacol, and I just kept swapping him from side to side. He gained well so I don't think it's necessarily supply as such that's the issue.

There's some good advice
here

and here

• didn't find it till a bit late for me but it might help you!

oh yes, we had awful wind till about 8 weeks or so. We found gripe water worked best for us. I definitely should have winded him more often while feeding, even though he would have complained about it.

hmm thanks for the advice and the links! i will go back to the basics of skin to skin contact and hope that that damage is not already done. Its just that i've seen so many people give a bottle (at least of expressed milk) early on and continued to feed until 1 year or more, I did not think that nipple confusion could arise. I try my best to hold off on the formula - but i haven't received the right support from my family either, who keep pushing me towards the bottle.

I guess i have to be a little more determined and stand my ground - though i hope DS is less stubborn and takes my breast.

a babymoon is a fab idea. Basically just go to bed, you naked on top half, skin to skin, and just offer breast frequently, lots of hugs etc.

Lots of babies are different - my dd used to take a bottle of expressed milk a few times a week - now at 7 months she is a bottle refuser!

Hope it works for you.

Definitely try to ditch the bottles for now!!

Babies are very irritable in the evenings and not much will settle them! they like to cluster feed - lots of small snacks! - and a bath and a massage used to work for us before bed.

firsttimer - where are you btw - can you find a BF support group where you can just go along and have a chat. It can be very relaxing and you can get some advice / anecdotes without people pushing a bottle on you.