bedtime bottle refusenik

[camflower]

happy christmas everyone, wonder if anyone can explain this: ds has just hit four months and has had a top-up bottle of formula before bed since he was seven weeks old (he was really slow to put on weight). he is bf the rest of the time

normally he gulps it down and gets really cross if you make him stop to try and burp him half way through but three nights ago he refused point blank to drink it and has been the same ever since - anyone would think i was trying to make him take poison!

he has just had his 16-week jabs, which had a far worse effect on him than any of the previous ones and was utterly miserable. so bad, in fact, that i gave him his first calpol, which he hated (but it did the trick). he had his bottle ok that night but there were a few drops left and i gave them to him to help to wash down the calpol. is it possible that he suddenly associates the bottle with medicine and feeling miserable??

also, he is learning to roll and he has been a bit distracted at the breast of late - lots of pulling on and off and looking around and making noises. he had one night where he slept for 8 hours in a row, another where he slept for 6 and i actually woke him up for a feed cos my left boob was getting painfully engorged. now his sleeping has gone to pot and he's up feeding/comfort suckling what seems like every few hours all night.

i'm guessing this is one of those phases but it's the bottle refusing thing that is so weird - it's like he suddenly can't stand the taste of formula. has this happened to anyone else??

ironically i was at the doctors for the jabs and i was wondering if i could drop the formula feed now his weight was better - a clear case of being careful what you ask for cos you might just get it!

Seasons greetings to you too...
If he is 4 months has he started on soilds? If not you could try him on baby rice and breast milk I bit before bed might make him sleep a bit better and just leave the formular feed all together? He might just be bored of the bottle.
My son gave up BF at 9 months over night because soild food was better, it can happen some times I guess.
Hope this helps.

Don't start him on solids at 16 weeks, please...

If he's suddenly refusing a bottle, he probably needs the next teat size up. Give that a go before you try anything more drastic...

But if it really is the taste of the formula you could swap to an expressed feed at bedtime?

I don't think you should start on solids either. The current advice is not to wean until 6 months.

Have you tried expressing in the morning and then giving this instead of the formula? The previous suggestion of a bigger teat is a good one too. Also, could someone else give the bottle? He may just think that if you are there he would prefer a bf.

thanks for the advice but no joy on any of the above - bigger teat, expressed breast milk, dh giving him the bottle ... he just won't be doing with it, so it is definitely the bottle he's taken against.

v weird that he loves it one day and hates it the next. since he's decided to be exclusively breast fed he's now fitting in extra feeds during the night. hey, who needs sleep anyway??

Do you co-sleep? I did it with DD and got much more sleep.

v weird that he loves it one day and hates it the next.

That's what my DD appears to do when she outgrows a teat.... New teat and we're off again. Really, do try.

We do tend to co-sleep the second half of the night, it does make it easier to drop off. But on the other hand it gives him the opportunity to snack even more!!

Will try again with a bigger teat tomorrow ...

I would just like to point out that baby rice can be given from 4 months +. I realy cant see the harm in trying if you wanted to.
As 'Ineedsomesleep' said her self it is only 'The current advice is not to wean until 6 months' Im sorry but the advice given to mums changes every week and it is just that advice. I know there are guna be more messages back agian saying dont try soilds but if you have tried the things that the other mums adviced and they dont seem to have worked then please consider the baby rice....
It sound big step but if your little one is starting to get interested in his surroundings ('distracted') then is it not worth a go?
From my exsperence with my 2 year old son when he was around 4 months he started going 'backwards' with his bf's, distracted and getting up more and more in the night. So we looked in to the opions:
carry on bf only and be a zombie
introduce a bottle feed (not an opion for us as I hate the smell of formula)
Or introduce a very very small amount of baby rice and my milk, a tsp if that at first.
We went down the soild route, he was on baby rice on it own until 5 months and then a small amount of veg pree and rice until 6 ish, nothing more then that just a very slow start to soilds.

I know what the goverment say about 6 months but that figure is based on what they thing is best for all babies not on what sutable for yours all babies are different and only you can know when its right for you not the guild lines. After all it is also 'current advice' to 'exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months' but you did what was right for your son at the time and added one bottle feed and carried on bf too which was a great call on your part because if was what you baby needed.

Im sorry I know this is long and if you have no wish to try any soilds for a while then just ignore the post but in my exsperence with my son it was possible to swap being a zombie for a tiny little bit of soild (though he still woke 2-3 times a night but that was better in 5 times a night.

Good luck with waht every you wish to do.