My 8 week old still has 8 bottles a day.

[AlienLady]

I breastfed for 3 weeks, tongue tie, slow weight gain and hospital admission meant formula top ups and then just transitioning fully. This is her schedule…

This is her schedule

2/3am 3oz
5/6am 3oz
8/9am 5oz
11/12 4oz
2/3pm 4oz
5/6pm 4oz
8/9pm 4oz
11pm 2oz

According to hipp, she should be having 5-6 bottles and then 5 bottles after 8 weeks. How do I get her to cut 3 bottles? She sometimes doesn’t finish a bottle, she’ll drink half then drop. I change her nappy and then she drinks the rest. She’s on a size 1 teat.

Falling asleep on the bottle is common if it's too much effort to get the milk. I would switch up the teat to at least a 2. But as for the feed sizes, what size is she? If she is on the smaller side her tummy just won't be big enough for big feeds yet. The formula packets are just a guide. With breastfeeding you feed on demand and don't know exactly what volume they are getting. Assuming she is gaining weight etc I would not worry. But I would change up the teat.

Right now, she’s 10.5lb at exactly 8 weeks tomorrow

She's only 8 weeks. It's far too early to worry. If she needs more small feeds right now for the cuddles and comfort then just go with it.
All too soon she'll be weaning and you won't get those lovely snuggly feeds with her, when your heartbeat slows right down and you look into her face and see her tongue against her milky lip as she suckles the test
If you really need a longer break, try baby massage: with all f mine it gave me an extended window as they slept for hours as they processed all the stimulation. You only need one class (local NCT will have a practitioner) and sleep, burping, stimulation generally will change.
Good luck.

Just feed her on demand. As long as she’s getting enough thats all that matters. Babies know when they’re hungry.

Every baby is different, please don't think your baby SHOULD be following what it says on the tin. My baby is 16 weeks now and I don't even look at the tin, I feed him when he's hungry and he takes what he wants to from the bottle, he doesn't have the same amount every day; they're individuals, not robots.

Agree to feed on demand. I found the formula packet guidelines generally way off for newborns as they need little and often but more accurate as they get older. When they get older I’d also focus on maximising their intake during the day to get more chance of a good night sleep but obviously it’s too soon for that now as their stomach is still tiny.

She’s 8 weeks, she can’t read the recommendations or understand your routine. She’s obviously hungry so feed her.

I breastfed and there are no feeding instructions written on my boob, nor did I have any idea how many ounces DS was consuming at each feed. He got fed when he indicated he was hungry and he stopped when he’d had enough/fell asleep on the boob. I think your baby knows what she wants and when 🤷🏻‍♀️

What’s wrong with feeding her she wants it?!

I’m assuming the formula tin instructions don’t have the magic ability to know the expected feeding pattern of every single individual 8 week old baby across the world?

Unless she’s vomiting up huge amounts of her milk after every feed I don’t see what the problem is?

Why is she only allowed to eat according to the formula’s instructions?

That’s seems about right to me. Ds was breastfed but at 8 weeks he definitely was feeding at least every 2 hrs day and night.

At 12-18 months I introduced one bottle of cows milk and the largest amount he could drink in one go was 5oz. So I can’t imagine many 8 weeks old are drinking more.

I think they suggest making 1os more if they drain bottle. So make 5oz if they drain 4oz incase they want it. But if they aren’t then they aren’t hungry at that moment

She's still little, I wouldn't worry about increasing feeds. You can only give her the amount she wants. My first child roughly followed the packet (next 2 not so much), but DD1 was over 9lb at birth!

Normal, mine had loads of bottles even when he was 6 months. Couldn't be fed. I breastfed him to 4 months I swear he was never off me and he had 3 bottles 😂
Now he's 4 he eats feck all 😂🥲

I think thats fine, shes having 30oz a day which is normal

I found the 12lb weight mark to be a bit of a game changer in terms of how much my DD's could consume in one sitting and therefore how long they could go between feeds.

I would bear with it for a few more weeks and check that he/she is gaining weight. If your health visitor is happy with progress then ignore what the tin says.

It might be worth considering if the baby is too warm and drifting off too quickly once they get half way through a feed. My DD2 had serious weight issues and my health visitor had me undressing her, tickling her toes and generally trying to keep her alert and feeding.

The other thing is regular winding? Pause half way through at your 3/4 oz and do some brisk back rubbing and chatting to him/her. A good burp with hopefully no follow through will often create space.

Best of luck !

My daughter was 10 months when she went on to formula and had 5-8 bottles a day. At 8 weeks she was breastfeeding every 45-60 minutes and fed 3-5+ times a night. At 12 weeks she breastfeed for seconds a feed during the day and fed all night.

Are they gaining weight now, are they meeting milestones, are they thriving? If yes, keep with your routine.

Around 5 months my daughter started to do longer fewer feeds which for us coincided with her reflux being better treated and her allergies being diagnosed. She was gaining weight but she wasn't meeting milestones and she wasn't thriving so we kept going back to the drs and infant feeding team for support. Let a happy baby feed how they want to feed as long as is sensible and practical.

Totally normal, nothing to worry about. I think mine had 7-8 bottles a day for months!

The amounts on the boxes are bonkers and based on some mystical baby who plugs a large amount with large gaps in between. For 90% if babies they are totally off the mark.

The 5 bottles a day you mention would mean an average gap of 4.7 hours between feeds. That's only really possible if baby is properly sleeping though (yeah right 😂) and having largish gaps in the day.

I don't remember when we hit 5-6 bottles, but I remember being happy that a day's work could fit in one run of the steriliser. I think it was somewhere around 6-9 months.

I'm trying to remember (long time ago) but we had roughly a 7pm, 11pm, 5am (that stretch didn't last!) 7am, then every 3ish hours in the day. That is about 8 or 9 bottles. She then reintroduced the 2am bottle but slightly bigger spacing in the day 🤷

Even by 9m, it was something like 7pm, 11am, 5am, 10am, 3pm, 5pm.