Bottle refusal and breastfeeding

[Coffeebeans24]

My 9 week old son is breastfed with the odd bottle since birth. Initially took the odd bottle fine then started refusing. This absolutely worried me because I never planned to breastfeed for long and I started trying one regular bottle a day of formula...some days he will accept it (after some struggle) and some days will completely refuse.

My mental health is not great as I am really keen to now wean him off breastfeeding and feel trapped. Today I tried to hold out...and managed to make him have 2 consecutive feeds of around 1.5oz each but again this was after a great struggle. I then gave up and gave him a good breastfeed as he was looking quite upset and hungry by the evening.

Has anyone been through this? I can't face breastfeeding for much longer and I am keen to switch to formula.

Just to add I have tried expressed milk and initially he took this and now refuses this too.

He's drank 2oz of formula from a mam bottle today....I'm hoping we are making progress. Will try to keep offering a bottle a day and see how it goes. Wish me luck!

He's drank 2oz of formula from a mam bottle today....I'm hoping we are making progress. Will try to keep offering a bottle a day and see how it goes. Wish me luck!

Glad he is taking something, OP how are you getting on today/tonight?

Yesterday evening he drank a further Oz from bottle so i felt hopefully...started thinking as long as he is accepting a bottle a day I might even be happy combi feeding. I think feeling trapped was what put me off breastfeeding.

However this morning he refused again. Back to square one. I also noticed a new rash and now worried about cows milk allergy however this has been coming and going for atleast a week and i can't confidently correlate it to formula. I do feel this is really affecting my mental health and may even speak to my GP as I probably need some sort of support for my own mind...

Thank you for checking in

Just to add...I continue to breastfeed I just offered a morning and evening bottle to replace a feed which he took yesterday. He refused this morning.

I have a preschooler and have been neglecting him and dad has had to take over as I don't have the mental space for both right now and I think I can't keep obsessing about this...I need him to accept the bottle ideally so I can switch and be a better mum to them both...

I completely understand where you're coming from, my 2nd was a bottle refuser until about 10 months. We really did try everything. All I would say is if you can't crack this and transition to bottle feeding, the longer you BF, the easier it becomes. 9 weeks is still early days, once they're in a better routine themselves and go longer between feeds (and are physically more capable at latching on etc) it really does become easier and a lot less hassle than it is now or fiddling about with bottles. I wish you the best of luck because she had to come everywhere with me, I never got a break and that did make me resentful at times.

Oh, no stops and starts then, OP. That's tricky when you don't know what to expect. Best of luck with the evening bottle tonight.

Keep trying, you are going to have good days and bad days for a little while but hopefully as you go on you'll get more good days.

Hi, I have just created an account to respond to your post as I’m going through the exact same thing right now with my 5 week old. From the mental health decline feeling trapped, preschooler in the mix, baby only taking 1oz, rash… I am really keen to know how you got on and if things improved?