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Parenting

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Should I increase bottle feeds for three week old baby?

3 replies

PL2021 · 23/08/2026 08:21

Hey all. I am after a bit of advice on feeding my 3 week old. He was born a whopping 9lb 5, and dropped 7.5% in the first few days. When the midwife came for his 5 day check, she calculated how much I should be feeding him (exclusively pumping and bottle feeding) and told me to up his feeds to 120-150ml per feed every 3-4 hours. I initially thought this seemed a lot for a 1 week old at the time but followed her advice. At first, he wasnt taking any more than 90ml per feed, but gradually over the next day or 2 he did start to take 110-120. He had reached his birth weight by day 14 and was starting to take closer to the 130-150ml mark on his bottles. He is now 3 weeks old and never seems satisfied after a 150ml feed, often rooting for more 10-15 minutes later and taking at least another 30ml or so before being satisfied and going off to sleep. The constant top ups seem to be dragging his wake windows out and I feel like he is then becoming overtired. I am pace feeding him, he is on size 1 MAM teats. I did try size 0 to try and pace him more but they seemed to give him much more wind so I think he was possibly working too hard on them?
Should I be considering now upping the volume of his bottles? I am super worried about overfeeding him because I keep reading online that you can stretch their stomach. For context, he doesn't spit up hardly at all, burps well (most of the time) and once his tummy is satisfied, sleeps like a log for a couple of hours.
Sorry for the long post, any advice would be appreciated thank you.

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Foxyloxy89 · 23/08/2026 08:24

Is there a reason you'r not feeding him directly from the breast? You clearly are producing plenty of milk? It would be much easier for you and you would g be stressing about how much he is taking?

Alwaysgrowing · 23/08/2026 08:49

It probably doesn't matter a huge amount whether you do the extra 30ml or not. I'd have thought the pace feeding would stop the stomach stretching issues. I'd be happy as my 2nd was terrible at drinking a decent amount in one go. Maybe though he needs time for the milk to go down and him feel full so try settling him walking about etc for 15-20 minutes first. I don't really know. Out of interest did you have iv fluids in your labour? I read recently this can artificially increase the birth weight that the baby quickly wees out so it appears they've lost weight in the first week but it's just water weight. I wandered with the big baby and initial weight loss this could be the case for you?

My eldest was on a feeding plan in her first week for jaundice. I can't remember how much but it increaseed each feed. and could then drink quickly, also eat quickly and I do wander if it stemed from that. I didn't know about pace feeding though at the time.

mindutopia · 23/08/2026 09:47

I would feed whatever amount so that he nearly always leaves a bit in the bottle. Basically, you always want to offer enough that it’s more than he wants so you know he’s fed up and full. Every baby is different though. At 4 weeks, it was a struggle to get 90ml into my one who was bottle fed.

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