How much formula.. 5 weeks old?

[Mrspebble]

Hello.. I was feeding my little boy 3oz but recently went up to four.. He was taking a bottle every three hours day and night like clockwork.

Today he fed ok a bottle at twelve ish.. Just after, then two.. Now rooting again ..

What is normal.. Thank you.

Hello congratulations on your little boy!

I bottle fed my DS from 12 days old (BF didn't work for us), and I was told by my health visitor to feed 'on demand' - basically whenever they want it. I don't think it's really possible to over feed such a young baby. Also, every few weeks they have a growth spurt where they might suddenly drink a lot more milk/more frequent bottles for a few days. Then they settle back down again.

I think there is usually a growth spurt around 6 weeks so that might be making your little man more thirsty today?

Also, their tummies grow bigger quite quickly in the early days so you might find that you need to give bigger bottles in order to keep him satisfied for longer.

A a general rule I was told that if DS finishes his all his 5oz bottles (drains them dry), then up it to 5oz. Then when he starts regularly draining the 5oz bottles, start offering 6oz and so on. If you do this you should find that in general your baby keeps the same sort of gap between bottles (ie three hours). Although don't assume it's all gone wrong if some days he seems to want feeding every 90 minutes: that will be a growth spurt! Just roll with it and in a couple of days things will be back to normal.

Enjoy your lovely snuggly new born!

There's no normal, he is probably having a growth spurt. Just feed him when is hungry, just a breastfeeding mother would.

The guidelines on the side of the tin are just that, guidelines, and all babies are different. My DD rarely went as much as 3 hours between a bottle, and certainly never got to the 4 hours before she was weaned.

Gah sorry for annoying typo: obvs that should have said "if DS regularly finishes all his 4oz bottles then increase the size to 5oz"...etc etc.

Dot be surprised if in the next few weeks your baby is suddenly able to drink a 6oz bottle! Don't worry about him getting too much: as his tummy gets bigger an he takes more milk he will naturally start to space out the time between his feeds on his own. Usually spacing out the night feeds first = more sleep for you! You don't need to do anything to achieve this, it will happen naturally in the next couple of months :)

Feed when hungry x

Dd is 6 weeks old and has been on 4oz for about two weeks now. She isn't a big or hungry baby so maybe you should up and ounce.

Congrats!

My wee one wasn't a great feeder at this stage but I treated bottle feeding like breast feeding in as much as I fed as and when she wanted. This meant some long feeds and some very short ones. The HV was a bit about it (she was at 2 weeks mind you "no routine yet, hmm?") but I found it worked for her and me.

Up until relatively recently she would vary between 1.5 hours and 3 hours between bottles.

Oh! And as mentioned above my general rule of thumb was that when she had finished a bottle) or near enough) more than once I would generally up her bottles an oz. I always felt that the fuller the bottle the more she would take.

Thank you so much.. Xx

I was so upset at not being able to breastfeed, and had absorbed so much negative stuff about formula, that I was paranoid about over feeding my newborn son and agonised about how much I gave him. Complete nonsense, like so much stuff I worried about when he was little. Trust your baby's appetite, and give him what he needs.

When I was bf, the guidelines were 150-200ml of formula per kg of bodyweight per 24 hour period. So if your little one weighs (say) 5.15kg then they should be having 770ml-1030ml per 24 hours. If feeds are every 3 hours then that is 8 feeds per day so 97ml to 128ml per feed (which works out to between 3 and 4.5 oz). Sorry if it seems complicated!
I found my DD's hunger varied throughout the day. I watched her when feeding and if it looked like she still wanted more, I would make up another oz to offer her - sometimes she just wanted another tiny sip to be satisfied.
I tended to increase the day bottle amount rather than the night ones as I wanted her to get used to packing in food in the day and dropping the night feeds!
It sounds like you are doing great!

We make up 5oz bottles for 7 week old DS. Sometimes he will drain them and wants more so we give him another oz ready made formula. Other times he only drinks 3 or 4 ounces so it doesn't seem worth increasing the feed size just yet.

He generally feeds every 3 hours during the day but sometimes after 2 hours. At night, he has just started going 7 hours from either 8/9pm

My almost 6 week old DS is now taking 8oz every 2.5-3 hours so I wouldn't worry, just let him have as much as he wants :)