Bottle feeding newborn

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Hi 39 weeks pregnant here and lying awake realising I don’t really know enough about bottle feeding if I can’t breastfeed. I’ve read the NHS website guide on preparing a bottle which advises boiling your kettle and then waiting 30 mins for the water to cool before making the bottle and that you should only make up one bottle a time. It also advises that you look out for baby’s early cues that they are hungry and don’t wait until they are crying to feed them. So I’m now confused as if I wait for their cues to feed them then it’ll take me 30 mins plus to make up their bottle... So is there any easier advice to follow? E.g. should I aim to feed them every 2-3 hours and how many times a day would I bottle feed them? Also is there a set amount of time after which a bottle becomes unusable? Or can I make one up and leave it on the side or in the fridge until the baby is hungry. Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer!

Use ready made formula for the first week or so .It is more expensive but then after a couple of weeks you will have a routine and know what is best for you and baby.X

for making them up I know it's not recommended now but I did it the old fashioned way. Emptied and refilled kettle, boiled it and left it to cool for 30 minutes to reach the correct temperature to make bottles, added the water then equivalent number of flat scoops of powder. Shook them well, then left to cool naturally at room temperature. When cool I stored them in the fridge, they can be kept for up to 24 hours. So we made several at a time.
To warm up I used boiling water and a plastic jug (we had a flask that we filled with boiling water for going out).
I think it's so much easier than messing about making them as needed. And I know most people use the perfect prep machine but sorry to me that's laziness, you don't need a machine to make bottles in my opinion. I'd only ever make them the old fashioned way, regardless of what's recommended.
And I found ready made isn't quite as thick and not cost effective.

And I believe it can be kept warm for up to 1 hour. After that it must be thrown away. At least that's what was right when I had my son 5 years ago.

You should feed on demand. All babies are different so you can’t say for definite but most newborns will be every 2-3 hours at least if bottle fed. The kettle thing is a right faff. I did it for a day or two and it took so long to make a bottle and then to cool it down again. The perfect prep machine is a god send. Perfectly warm bottle made in minutes. They are quite pricey but you could definitely get one second hand. Don’t bother with the night and day one it’s extra money for little benefit. They are pretty easy to set up and clean.
You can make up a bottle and keep it for 2 hours.
I think you can keep bottles made up in the fridge but the NHS guidelines are make up one bottle at a time.

I have an empty sterilised bottle ready and a sterilised bottle with 4 oz cooled boiled water in (DS currently takes 5oz). When he's hungry I boil the kettle and add 1oz freshly boiled water to the empty bottle, add the formula (which gets sterilised from the boiling water) give it a swirl then add the cooled boiled. Perfect temperature for a feed and takes about 2 minutes.

Hope that makes sense and helps!

If you do make them up with the kettle and keep them in the fridge you need to cool them quickly by running them under cold water. Not let the cool at room temperature as suggested above.
My son is 10 months. So I’m pretty up on the current advise.

Also we were using the prep machine but it made DS very sick and he had painful wind. Works for a lot of babies but for a lot it doesn't, can make bottles very frothy and the water isn't sterile. We had a different baby the same day we ditched ours and wish we'd done it sooner.

A prep machine! Would be lost without ours. There is not a chance in hell my DS would wait 30 min for food. He’s still crap at ‘signals’ at 6
Months. He goes from absolutely fine to starving in about 4 minutes

Thanks all!

Swirl don’t shake and the bottle won’t be frothy.

My baby doesn’t give any feeding cues whatsoever! Goes from 0-60 real quick & becomes a right angry boy when he’s hungry lol! We’ve taken to boiling water & filling a flask up as it’s then still warm enough that the formula is sterilised, then running the bottle under cold water/putting in a jug of cool water until it gets to a temperature able to drink. I was told you had to boil the kettle every time you made a bottle & you must use that water within 30 mins & use the bottle within 2 hours, this just became unfeasible as baby couldn’t wait that long for it to cool! I like the idea of having cooled down water & adding the last oz as boiling water, seems like a great plan!

I should add my baby is only 4 weeks so I’ve got the latest guidelines, but they just seem so difficult! Seems like they want to make formula feeding as hard as possible

Thanks really helpful to hear your experience. Completely agree, the guidance seems so hard to follow! Great idea with the flask. Think I’m going to get some of the ready made bottles as well to get me through the first few days/nights if needed. Fingers crossed!

FYI perfect prep are £60 at asda right now

I always made up enough feeds for 24 hours each evening, cooled them under the cold tap and stored them in the fridge.

When baby wanted to be fed I warmed one in the microwave (loosen the top first), shook it and it was fine. No problems at all for three babies.