Newborn formula feeding!

[H8624]

Please someone help having a mild panic!

I was planning to breast feed but it's not going too well at the moment (the latch) so we are told to use formula whilst I still try to feed. Bought some aptamil ready made bottles but cannot for the life of me work out how much to give my little boy at each feed!

The bottle has instructions but it seems like an awful lot and he only took half in the last feed! Worried as I don't want to over feed
Him! He was 8ib 8oz at birth if that makes a difference! 3 days old...

The bottle said 90ml 6 times a day but we did 50ml to try and he only took 20ml!

Pace feed to his cues. If you were breastfeeding you wouldn’t know how much he was having.

Have you had support for the Latch? Worth getting in touch with LLL they are doing support via zoom. Could offer breast first and then offer bottle if he still seems hungry?

At 3 days my boy was taking 20-30 mil at a time. 9-10 times a day. Ish?

At 3 days old my boy was having 1-2oz every 2-3 hours. Good news is you cant overfeed a newborn they will just projectile it back up, so you'll know. Normally they do stop when they are full. Good luck!

As much as he wants. He will stop when he's full. You really can't overfeed them unless you are obviously forcing it and distressing him. At 3 days old, I can't imagine he would take more than about an oz or so per feed, if he takes more, great, that's fine too.

Honestly, he'll stop when he's had enough. I remember really worrying about exactly how much I should be giving my baby, but in reality babies are very good at telling you what they want/dont want.

We got really bad advice from NCT feeding support to only give 10ml at a time. My newborn was starving but was a drowsy baby and ended up losing 13% of her body weight 😫 I still feel so guilty

We then used the WHO guidance to calculate how much we should give based on her weight. But should have just fed her until she didn't want anymore

I wouldn't worry about overfeeding him. My LO never took as many oz in 1 feed as it recommends on the formula bottle, shes always been a little bit but more often even now at 9 months. He'll let you know when he's had enough.

OP, I just gave as much as my baby would take and tried to spot a pattern. So we started on day 1 feeds of 5-10ml, then slowly more like 15, then 20, then by the end of 2 weeks 60, 3 weeks 90 and by 8 weeks 180ml (she’s a very hungry chunk!) You can’t overfeed them but I found trying to space them out as quickly as she would let me, ie trying to feed every 3 hours not every hour, helped her take nice big feeds and helped with her reflux. Good luck!

Have a look at Lucy ruddles book on mixed feeding.

20ml sounds about right for a top up on day 3. You don't want to give too much as it gets harder to keep up with their needs through breastfeeding.

You will probably need to push for support with your latch and working out why breastfeeding isn't getting him enough. This is imperative, it won't magically sort out by itself.

Also look up about paced feeding, this is a good way to help protect breastfeeding. Put baby to the breast as often as you can as well.