Is it bad to not want to breastfeed dc2 (after breastfeeding dc1 till he was 7mo) ?

[WhyTheHeckMe]

Baby due in 9 weeks and I'm feeling really anxious. Ds is now 2 and a dream child, however the first year he was a nightmare. Never slept anywhere but on me or in the car day and night, woke up hourly and generally was a miserable baby. He was ebf till 6 months and once he started food I started formula too, by 7 months he decided he didn't want breast anymore and life slowly got better. By the time he was 10 months he was so much more chilled and was sleeping through and that's where we still are now.
I was depressed when he was little due to feeling trapped, I couldn't leave the room without him screaming. He was such a clingy baby and everyone told me its because he was breastfed.
Now I'm wondering what the hell I do with new baby! I want to breastfeed for the whole 'breast is best' thing, but the thought of it makes me feel sad. Sad that ds will potentially be bored while I'm sat feeding and terrified that I may end up where I was before, with a baby that only ever slept if he was in my arms.

How have other people managed it with having a 2 year old around? I keep thinking should I just bf for a week or 2 then move to formula. Ds wouldn't take a bottle of expressed milk till he was 6 moths old so I was his only source and it was exhausting.

Sorry for the ramble

Honestly, you can feed your baby however you want but some babies are just clingy - breastfeeding is nothing to do with it.
I had a similar age gap and breastfed both. With the second I would set up loads of toys and snacks for the toddler (plus use t.v. if needed) and became an expert in breastfeeding whilst walking round the house (I often used a sling for this). I would let the toddler snuggle both of us whilst his sister was feeding and read him stories. If i managed to put the baby down for a nap in the toddle pod I would use that time to give the toddler lots of one on one attention and occasionally take the toddler out to the park whilst the baby stayed home with daddy so he had some proper mummy time. It's hard going but it really is managable x

I've breastfed babies for between 4 months and 13 months and it hasn't had any correlation with their personality or sleep.
In fact the one I breastfed the longest is the most confident and outgoing though took longest to sleep through.
One slept through at 6 weeks while ebf.

Also I introduced bottles with no problem at 2 weeks, 4 weeks and 8 weeks so I think that is just luck too.

My DS is 2.5 and DD is 4 months. I’m currently combi feeding DD. She is bf for all but one bottle of formula which DH gives at 11pm. It’s worked really well as it means she’ll take a bottle at any point of the day if I want to leave her, but practically speaking bf is actually (for me) much easier than ff. Sit on sofa, feed for 5/10 min and done. Repeat every 2-3 hours. No bottles to wash or formula to make up. Yesterday I had an appointment and thought I’d be back in time for her next feed, got back and DH said she was hungry so he gave her a bottle. No problems at all and I wasn’t stressed about being away from her and he wasn’t stuck with a screaming baby while I was away.

I think how clingy they are is just their personality rather than how they’re fed. However I don’t bf DD to sleep. The early weeks are tough though. Up to about 6 weeks I spent pretty much all day just feeding DD. We were very lucky to have my DH on leave and then family come to help out with DS so I could do this, although there were a couple of days where we watched a lot of tv.

Oh and I mostly bottle fed my DS. There isn’t much difference at this point between their sleep habits. DD seems to be a better sleeper actually and more happy to just chill out wherever she is. Probably cos she gets ignored more than DS did.

And there’s so much to remember when leaving the house with a toddler and a baby, at least I know I can’t forget the baby’s food

Thanks so much everyone. To be honest combi feeding isn't something I'd really considered but I guess I could definitely look to do this for one feed a day so I know that baby would be capable of taking a bottle, meaning I would feel a little less trapped.
Caterina when did you start combi feeding?

We started after a few days actually. DD was jaundiced and not feeding well and with previous low supply issues with my DS I was just wanting to get her weight up and

Sorry pressed the wrong button!

We topped up with formula a few times a day as she wasn’t gaining weight, although always bf first to try and maintain supply. However fortunately she turned a corner at about 4 weeks and took to breastfeeding well. I then deliberately made one of her feeds a bottle feed. At first I swapped round each day which one it was, but eventually she got into a pattern so we just picked one feed.

Ideally I’d express for that feed. But I do t get enough milk out and it’s a huge faff with a toddler too so she just gets formula

I'm another one to say feed how you like BUT formula won't necessarily bring you a better sleeping baby. Why not just plan to breastfeed (because those first few feeds are so good for the baby) and see how it goes.

I was terrified of how I would cope with DD2, DD1 was so difficult and I couldn't image breastfeeding a baby like that while looking after a toddler, turns out DD2 was a breeze, fed and slept well.

Good luck

Ds1 was 19 months old when ds2 was born. Ds1 had fed constantly, bloody constantly for months. I wondered how on earth I'd manage to feed ds2. Turns out he was totally different . Short feeds, slept well.

Do what you like but I BF both mine and the first one was a no sleep clingy nightmare and my second was a dream who would settle herself to sleep with a dummy from abiut week 1 in the cot or buggy took seconds to fall asleep never had to hold her or feed her to sleep...literally easiest baby ever and i bf them both the same.

I also found feeds were shorter and easier second time round perhaps just because O was distracted by my toddler and never let the baby spend too long feeding!