Mixed feeding - how long did you manage to keep it going ?

[ataraxis]

DD is nearly 10 weeks old and I started mix feeding her at around 6 weeks as she wasn't gaining weight despite constant feeding. I know her latch isn't great but BFC has told me positioning etc is fine so not sure why. I struggled with both my other DCs and ended up mix feeding them as well but can't remember how long for.

Anyway, DD currently gets 2 formula bottles a day, and the rest is BM or expressed top ups. I am aware that mix feeding will affect/has affected supply.

I would love to continue with a reasonable amount of breastfeeding until 6 months but don't know if this is a realistic proposition with a ff/bf combination. Has anyone managed to successfully mix feed for a long period of time?

Still mixed feeding. Eleven months.

Managed to reestablish bf after only ff for one week. Did this through a combination of feeding all the time, herbal teas to increase supply (Mothers Helper), breast compression and (latterly) pumping. Kellymom offered good advice. You have to be committed but it can be done.

I always bfed before offering a bottle. This meant that feeds lasted an incredibly long time, and totally buggered up my ability to have any other kind of life beyond my baby. I bf very frquently until 6 months, then twice a day, now once a day only. I do enjoy it now.

I started mixed feeding ds1 at about 4.5 months. by 8 months he was fully formula fed, and for the last few weeks I could only manage enough for one bottle per day.
domperidone helped, but he was sick every time he had milk after I had taken it, so it was pointless.

Not read the whole thread but I am mix feeding successfully.

Wk 4 -introduced one ff.

wk 13 -introduced 2nd ff

wk 23 - introduced 3rd ff

DD is now 27.5 wks. She has:

7.30am - bf
11.30am ff (gradually reducing to replace with just lunch) and solids

3.30pm bf

5.30pm bf (this will go next week and it will just be dinner) and then dinner

6.30pm ff

11.00pm ff

My supply is very good (maybe I am just lucky). I plan to cut out the 3.30pm feed for ff in a few weeks time and am hoping I will be able to continue with just the morning feed for a while but who knows?

(she also may have a little feed at another time during the day if she seems hungry).

Thanks for all your posts, they have really given me confidence that mixed feeding can work. I will look into some of the references provided.

tiktok, if you come back to this thread - do you have any advice about the latching issue? I am really at a loss on this, as in theory everything is in order (including according to bfc) except that she just doesn't get the suction/vacuum that is needed.

This evening, for example - I fed her pretty much constantly (from both sides) from 4.30-6.15 at which point I had to stop to spend some time with my other DCs (plus she was getting tired). So I gave her a top up and she still took around 90ml. Any suggestions would be really appreciated.

My reasons for stopping B/Fing are very, very long. They appear in Musings about why you didn't BF for as long as you like. Or something like that. My reasons mainly though were that my health was suffering (as someone said earlier, twins do not leave you a lot of time to eat let alone sleep or at times even go for a wee) and I'd had enough. I forgot to put that DT1 went on strike too.

sorry to anyone I upset with my comments. It was miserable in the early days of feeding and definitely not enjoyable.

ataraxis, the important thing that would help in your situation would be for someone knowledgable to watch a whole feed, but from what you say, this has already happened. Would be worth a second opinion, IMO, though. There is a lot we don't know about palatal and lingual anomalies - and you say latch isn't great so maybe there is something there. You may need to amend 'classic' positioning to get a very deep latch, for instance.

I hear what you say about needing to stop to attend to the other children after a l...o...n...g time feeding - could you have given her a smaller top up? 90 mls is quite a lot - she may have been happy enough with less, and you could have bf again when you next had a chance (risk with the 90 ml is it is more than she needs and it means the gap between that and a bf is lengthened). Anyway - what do you think?

slightly different experience for me, ds was ebf until 7.5 months, then I returned to work so he got 2 bottles of formula when I was at work, and I bf when I could (silly flexible shifts, no regular hours so it varied when I fed) and I managed to keep that going until ds was a year old. It was a big struggle though.

Thanks tiktok, I will see where I can find a second opinion and ensure that it is timed to see a whole feed.

I will also try reducing the amount of top up and keep it to only when necessary to not completely neglect the other two .

Hopefully a combination of these will at least prolongue the amount of time I can bf her for. Thanks for all your help.