Breastfeeding and formula

[rosie1998]

I was wondering if I could breastfeed and give formula bottels once my baby is born . Is it bad for the baby if I do both ? Also there's so many formula which is the best one to use

@rosie1998 its totally up to you, what makes you want to combination feed? I did with my DD as she was hard to get on the boob the first couple of weeks as she wouldn't wake up, I will be giving this baby a bottle of expressed milk a day so he knows how to use a bottle but if I have to use formula I will, we used aptamil with DD xx

Hi @rosie1998 I'm also planning to combi-feed, breastfeeding 95% of the time and one bottle of formula given at bedtime by my husband.

You'll get a range of answers here, most likely saying that baby will get confused, prefer bottle etc, but i know plenty of people in real life who've used this approach and it was great for;
Getting baby used to bottle (just in case)
Bonding with Dad
Mum getting a few hours rest
We'll be using Hipp Organic formula. Just do whatever feels right for your family!!

John Lewis sell bottles with teats that are breast-like. If you want to do both that looks like a good way to start

It's not bad for the baby exactly, but you lose the gut forna benefits of just breastfeeding, and most people who combined feed stop breastfeeding fairly early. Obviously the benefit is that other people can feed the baby - some exclusively breast fed babies absolutely refuse to take a bottle, ever, which you might find a practical problem. It's up to you - there are consequences either way.

Fauna not forna

Ive done both & plan on doing it again this time. Any breast milk is better than none its hard going so why im doing both x

I combi fed but I pumped so she was only on one nipple rather then switching between breast and bottle as this could be confusing

@rosie1998 I'd be concerned about milk supply dropping if you combination feed from the start. Your baby feeding from you is what tells your body to make more milk and keep up with their growth. If you supplement with formula from early on, your body might not keep up production and your milk supply can drop, leading to more formula top ups, leading to less milk and so on until you are only formula feeding. Some people are lucky enough to have no supply issues no matter what, but you don't know if you will be one of them.

That said, whatever you decide is

I’ve been mix feeding - baby is 10 weeks today. He’s doing well however timing is really important with him. I have to get him on the boob as he starts to stir else if he gets to the point of hangry he will not settle on boob and will flare hands as I think it’s the flow of milk that is causing it. Also I didn’t know at the time but teat in bottles come in different sizes. I’ve just changed to newborn slowflow as apparently this is closest to boob and I’ve noticed he has gotten more patient when on boob.

Just do whatever suits you

Certainly not bad for the baby. I think the only risk is that, if you're skipping breastfeeds for formula in the early stages, it might be harder to establish breastfeeding. I believe the recommendation is to get up and running with breastfeeding, get your supply going, etc - then only introduce bottles after about the six week mark. That said, I'm sure people manage to combi-feed from birth. Might be worth doing some digging around the 'Infant Feeding' board for advice/guidance.

I exclusively breastfed for 6 months then switched to formula the only one my baby didn't throw back up was Aptamil!

My baby took a bottle fairly easily coz my boobs were really sore for the first week (my baby put on lots of weight and everyone said we had a perfect latch (so anyone who says if you're doing it right it it doesn't hurt is making it up imo it stop hurting pretty quickly tho) so I expressed some and gave her those bottle or my DH did she didn't get confused and it made it much easier to wean her off boob when she got older!

Combi feeding is absolutely fine. It was my plan with my first but he turned out to be a total bottle refuser. Personally I wouldn't wait until 6 weeks to introduce a bottle, I'd do so at 2/3 weeks and then keep it going. You can pump while baby has a bottle if you're concerned about supply. Good luck.

I've done this with all of mine and plan to with baby 4 (on the way)
It just works for me, I used to breast feed when at home/night times and then have bottles for when I was out or if someone babysat. I had a party to go to once which I wanted to have a few drinks at so I bottle fed the next day so not to pass any alcohol on. Do whatever works for you. My babies never had a problem latching from breast to bottle teat

We combination fed as I had abnormal bleeding after an ELCS and every time I had a gushing bleed my supply would dip and I was exhausted. We introduced bottle at day 3 much earlier than I had planned but it’s been fine for us, Now at 3 months he gets a bottle about 5 days out of 7 either expressed milk or formula. We were doing SMA but had to switch to the prescription dairy free formula. One tip is keep the newborn/stage 1 teat after the newborn stage so that baby has to continue to work hard on the bottle and there doesn’t prefer the bottle over breast (bottle can be easier)

I combi fed my DS from the second day. I had low supply, he had severe jaundice and tongue tie and was just terrible at feeding! I was heartbroken at the time but you know what I still breastfed him until he was almost three. Formula saved our breastfeeding relationship.

Hi @rosie1998 , we are using both with DD (currently 7weeks), we have been since week one. She took really well to the bottle (we use the medela bottles), and I breastfeed (both sides), bum change (to wake her up) and top up with bottle until she is full - this can be 20ml or 135ml depending on the time of day and if she's having a growth spurt. TBH breastfeeding alone would have been easier (a lot less prep required), but it didn't work out that way with us. One bonus is that DH can give the occasional bottle in place of breast to give me a break.

Oh and we use HIPP Pre (which is available where we live) - which is a less sweet formula meant to better simulate mother's milk, not sure if it's available where you are? We changed from the Aptamil Pre as DD was suffering from some wind, the HIPP really helped with it!

We combi fed initially through insistence of the mws as dd was losing weight and so after every bf we had to top up with formula, then eventually when this stopped we had one formula feed at night dh did and I did all the rest bfing. We used aptimel. In the end it worked out for us but I will say initially when I was told I had to introduce top up formula feeds dh then refused bfing and there was a week or so where things were very tricky. I’d literally spend hours getting her to bf as she wanted a bottle. I think that was when we stopped the top up feeds as she had gained enough weight. I think most people would have just given up at that point and moved to bottle feeding. We never had any prisoners getting dd to use a bottle but it was introduced very early due to weight loss. I’ve read that hvs now recommend not introducing a bottle until 6 weeks but equally I’ve read that by then lots of babies will refuse a bottle and so to avoid this you should do it by 2 weeks, but obv if you do it that early there’s more chance of nipple confusion. Personally I never had a supply issue.

Dd refused bfing not dh 😂

Oh, and we never had any problems not prisoners! Fgs what typos!