Does this mean failure to bond

[Orangejuicecar]

Baby is 6 weeks. If I try to breastfeed she goes into a fit of crying that’s hysterical, it sounds as if she’s being tortured. Why?

Are you exclusively breastfeeding? Is this with every feed?

DC2 does this either when he’s got trapped gas or if he’s very, very overtired and just needs to go to sleep. So if it’s not with every feed either of those would be my guess.

Every feed

Are you being led by baby, feeding when you see hunger cues?

Could be CMPA (we aren't baby cows so if you use dairy it can upset their digestion.) hope it improves soon, very hard on both of you. I expect its digestive not bond related.

Could it be oral thrush? That would make it sore for baby.
It's unlikely to be failure to bond so please don't worry about that. And congratulations.

Any signs of reflux? Could be that feeding gives her acid and she knows it's going to hurt.

Tongue tie, reflux, wind, CPMA, tired…. Have you seen a breastfeeding consultant or spoken to a midwife or HV? I don’t think it means failure to bond.

Congrats on the new baby, hang in there, they’re tricky little creatures.

Thanks. She doesn’t cry if fed by bottle, only if I try to breastfeed.

I'd say classic bottle preference. Babies have to work at boobs to get milk, they don't with bottles.

Has she been checked for tongue tie? By someone competent and fully trained eg NOT a HV or GP or midwife unless they've had enhanced training.

How many bottles a day is she having? Sounds like bottle preference. It’s much easier and less effort to extract milk from a bottle than boob, which leads some babies to start rejecting breast if they are also fed by bottle a lot. Agree with PP - get tongue tie checked. If no tongue tie and you want to directly breastfeed then cut down the number of bottles and do loads of skin to skin.

Ring the NCT infant feeding line https://www.nct.org.uk/baby-toddler/feeding/early-days/support-breastfeeding-or-bottle-feeding-our-infant-feeding-line

trained volunteers who can talk through what’s happening and give information from there.

She’s had all the checks etc thank you … she prob does have bottle preference but it’s kind of a chicken/egg thing. I had to give her bottles because she cried when I tried to feed her so she prefers bottles so …

If baby will take bottle and u are happy to keep doing it then I would say go with it but if u want to bf then I would cut out the bottles x

It's not a failure to bond it just sounds like she struggled to BF and maybe finds bottles easier.
Maybe colicky

Fussing at the boob is their way of stimulating milk supply.

Are you happy to continue with bottle or so you want to get back to breastfeeding?

It isn’t that simple, because I can’t starve her and she regularly just refuses to breastfeed, she just cries hysterically. I can’t not feed her, so have to give a bottle. I just don’t really understand where her aversion to breastfeeding came from in the first place.

@Toddler101 i hate bottles, it’s a lot of work. But she isn’t exactly fussing, she gets really upset sometimes if you try to feed her which is also quite upsetting for me.

To go back to your original quote, no it's not a failure to bond - al babies are different and have different preferences!

If bottle feeding makes her happy, I'd stick to that and try skin on skin bonding in other ways (baby massage, baths together etc)

I breast fed one baby and bottle fed another - I have a great bond with both, just like you will have with your baby try not to let this get you down.

If you pump BM for bottles you just need to clean them they don't need to be sterile so it's much easier to do.

You need to stop thinking about how it upsets you. Your baby wants to be fed and so far prefers a bottle for whatever reason.
It's not because she doesn't like/love you

My first was like this, until around 4 months, when she did an abrupt 180 and started refusing the bottles instead. She went on to bf until she was 2. If you can persevere and want to then things will probably get easier. If you don't want to carry on then don't.

I’d personally bottle feed if my child was more settled no matter how much more “
work” it is. I found sterilising and cleaning bottles a task and a half but I still did it because I had no choice. You can’t surely want to keep upsetting baby just because you find the extra work a little difficult which it is but if baby’s happier surely you’d do it? My milk never came so I didn’t even get the opportunity. You’ve got to follow babies lead sometimes

It also has nothing to do with your bond, I’ve got the best bond with my girl and as I’ve said we didn’t breast feed at all.

@Orangejuicecar do you feed responsively, when baby shows hunger cues?

My 4m has a crying fit if I try to feed when they're not hungry.

Have you tried taking a bath with baby and feeding on the bath, skin to skin?

Work isn’t really sterilising bottles, it’s pumping milk. It would be a lot easier to just feed her directly from the source if you like

@purplebluediscorain that post was really quite hurtful.

I think feeding her in the bath would be lethal as I struggle to position her anyway so slippy baby and water … I have tried skin to skin but haven’t found it massively effective to be honest, I just worry I’ve somehow upset or distressed her and she doesn’t ‘like’ me, I know that’s stupid written down but when you just want to feed and comfort them and they get upset it is upsetting. I do feed responsively but it’s not always easy to tell what she wants!

If the response about feeding in the bath was to my post, I didn't mean feeding in the bath, i just meant it can be nice and bonding to do things like bathe together if you want closeness.

Your baby loves you! You're her world! You haven't upset her, they're too young for feelings like that, it's just she has a preference to feed from a bottle which could be for any matter of reasons. It's so easy as a mum to beat ourselves up, but the bigger picture is that you have a lovely daughter who is feeding well (albeit not how you planned), but you should try to move past this and just enjoy her as much as you can.

Sending you a big hug!

@Orangejuicecar i do sometimes need to think before I speak but you really won’t loose your bond with your baby. You’re a good parent already for the concerns you have and it may just be easier to give baby a bottle and you could still have skin to skin tone and lots of cuddles and interaction! You’ve got this either way! But take it a step at a time and a day at a time and you’ll get there.