Breastfed baby having the odd bottle of formula

[katiee1999]

Hi everyone,

My son is 17 weeks old (4 months) and has been exclusively breast fed since birth. Has anyone had any experience feeding formula (Aptamil) before bedtime, or just when baby is being minded for a few hours? I've also read that some women think it makes their babies sleep better? Not sure how true it is. Just wondering how people go about it!

TIA

Made no difference to sleep whatsoever and about that age he stopped taking a bottle at bed time without a huge fuss which made it not worth bothering anyway

but he did have the odd bottle of formula as I was back to tutoring soon after this.

Nothing wrong with it. I hated pumping and it worked for us. It won't help the sleep sadly.

I have a 19 wo and started giving him two bottles of formula a day when he was about 17 weeks - one before lunch nap and one for a dream feed. Not sure it’s helped the lunch sleep but he’s now managing 11-7 overnight. He seems pretty happy taking it and hasn’t affected his bowels or anything

Makes no difference to sleep, but both mine have had one bottle of formula before bed (one was a terrible sleeper. The other is doing well, so far).

Turned out to be very lucky they were used to formula when I unexpectedly ended up in hospital and couldn't have my baby in with me.

If your baby will take a bottle then it’s fine but you may fond it causes digestive issues as formula is different to breastmilk. Certainy won’t help sleep especially if you are in a regression.
Most people that need to leave a BF baby would use expressed milk.
I personally couldn’t be bothered with expressing and didn’t want to faff with formula so have just carried on with BF.
I’ve never understood the rationale for a night time bottle when boobs are most effective at getting a baby to sleep, but each to their own

Wel it made no differnce to sleep for mine. I did find it made getting bf fuly established difficult as had used bottles when newborns. Then I have had probs with rejecting bottles. (Used a beaker cup instead.). If you are established feeding and want to give the odd bottle it may be ok but it may also effect your milk surply. They reject you or the bottle .As mentioned I have experienced both.

Just to add, adding a bedtime bottle made zero difference to digestion, no issues there at all. Nappies are still the seedy golden variety.

Thanks so much everyone! I've been really proud of myself for managing to get this far breastfeeding, and I honestly really enjoy it! I'm also going back to uni in Sept and I'll need to transfer baby onto formula as expressing is so much hassle. I just feel incredibly guilty because I'm going from exclusively BFing to adding some formula ☹️

I could have written your post a couple of weeks ago. I had also exclusively bf my baby since birth and felt really strange at the thought of giving him formula. I felt a bit sad to start with but defo don’t regret it now. Good luck if you do give it a go 👍🏼

My DD has one bottle a day at bedtime. It means that she is happy to take a bottle so family have been able to watch her for a few hours on occasion, and it means I know how much milk she's taken before bed, I think (eek!) Gina Ford reccomends this.

No huge impact on sleep tbh

Honestly thankyou so much ladies. I feel loads better!

Hi OP, I share your feelings, I also have to go back to work soon and I am hoping for BF at least mornings and evenings/nights with FF during the day. I am also trying not to feel guilty but it is hard.

It's absolutely fine, don't worry :)

You know how you always hear about how Sweden has this magical 98% breastfeeding rate or something? Apparently their mothers don't beat themselves up over the occasional bottle of formula, and it's not counted in the stats as having lost breastfeeding status.

I agree don't expect it to have a mega effect (or even any effect TBH) on sleep. IME sleep is largely just baby personality related, affected a little by parental behaviour - if you generally separate sleep from feeding from an early stage and treat BF like bottlefeeding, in terms of having discrete feeds with a clear beginning and end, if not a full on routine, it does seem to lead to more independent sleep for some people. Replacing one feed with formula is unlikely to undo all of the rest of the stuff (DS2 had a bedtime bottle, a hangover from newborn top ups that DH liked, he used to have his bottle and then demand BF to sleep :o) But having said that, even some completely formula fed babies are very reliant on parents for support of sleep. So it can just be down to the personality of the baby and luck.

Zoo how old is your baby? If over about 6 months your supply should adjust just fine to feeding at evenings/weekends and formula during the day on work days. If over about 9/10 months you could even skip the formula during the day and just breastfeed when you're together.

Mine has a single bottle at 10-11ish every night. Makes no difference to his sleep, but I get more because I can go to bed early and leave that feed to DH!

You've done really well to get to 4 months, now is a good time to introduce a bottle for flexibility later on.

I always gave my bf baby the odd bottle and made the full switch at 5mo. I think the trick is not to wait for them to get too hungry so they're not worked up when they first try it.

You dont need the 6 month+ formula, the stage 1 stuff is fine until 1. The back of the tin will say how many ounces to give.

As for the sleep, I dont think it would ever be confirmed as it would discourage breastfeeding, but my baby and the only other bottle fed baby in my mum group are the only ones that sleep through to my knowledge. Some of the breastfed babies are still waking 3 times a night at 9mo 🤯

@BertieBotts he's just about 6.5mo. I do hope by the time I have to leave him for the nursery (10mo) we'll be ok BF mornings and evenings.

Thanks for the information, it helps to soothe my troubled mind.

@Wolfgirrl my one has been up every 2-3 hours since birth, I was thinking about trying a bottle before bedtime but he eats solids and made zero difference to his sleep (and he eats like a lion).

@zookeeper19

Then give it a go you never know!

Even if he's not breastfeeding morning and evening when he's with you, that doesn't mean he won't be fine being without it on the days you're apart if that makes sense. I know it feels weird at his age as he's so reliant on you.