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Pregnancy

Talk about every stage of pregnancy, from early symptoms to preparing for birth.

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Original poster

Combination feeding

17 replies

BEO · 29/10/2023 18:26

Hello, could anyone who combination feeds or has in the past comment with their stories and any hints/ tips.

I have read you have to exclusively BF before introducing a bottle for about 4/6 weeks. I am then hoping to still BF most feeds but give a bottle of expressed milk once or twice per day or when needed.

Has anyone who’s done this ever introduced the odd formula bottle too? If so when?

Just any tips/dos/ don't etc. I only ask about the formula as my friend express feeds and her baby has the odd formula depending how much milk she has stocked up/if she’s away and had a drink etc.

And I’d rather no comments on how it’s much easier/less faffy to exclusively BF, I’ve decided I want to do combination or if I can’t BF then to express feed, so any comments on just breast feeding or formula feeding won’t be very helpful. TIA

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snoopy18 · 29/10/2023 18:33

I combi fed my son from birth. He took to bottle & boob fine thankfully. I mostly breast fed him to get milk supply up & night feeds were exclusively breast as milk production is at its peak apparently. The formula was used couple times of day at first and gradually increased as I stopped breast feeding at 7 months soon as his teeth came in as he was biting. Planning to do same for number 2 but just depends on how it all goes. Good luck!

Original poster

BEO · 29/10/2023 19:04

@snoopy18 ah thanks that’s really helpful! I’m hoping to do it the same length of time ish but we go abroad for 10 days when she’ll be 5 months old for a family wedding so hoping to have introduced some formula by then as they’ll probably be a few days where I have a drink and not sure how much milk I could take/store.

did you introduce a bottle in the first few days/ weeks then? And they didn’t get confused with nipple?

many thanks for this and best of luck with your next x

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JC89 · 29/10/2023 19:25

I EBF for the first month or so, then we did a bottle of formula at bedtime and sometimes expressed milk for the first feed in the morning (which meant I could sleep through that feed and DH got up with DS!). I was surprised that it wasn't actually any worse for me when he had teeth (it was painful for the first 6 weeks or so just when he latched on but then it got better) and ended up still giving him milk (just a couple of times a day) until he was about 3 years old.

JC89 · 29/10/2023 19:28

Also on our NCT course they said the level of alcohol in your milk is actually really low so you're probably ok to feed after a drink as long as it's not loads. You'd be unsafe to hold the baby before you were unsafe to feed them (you still might want to be able to give them formula so that someone else can feed them if course!)

Vexxa · 29/10/2023 19:33

I was advised to combination feed my newborn from birth - we've had no issues at all with this.

Original poster

BEO · 29/10/2023 19:55

Thanks everyone for your responses making me hopeful, everyone I’ve spoken too about it keeps saying how difficult it is and how it can confuse baby and why would you want to do it etc but I truly think it’s the best of both worlds! Partner or grandparents can feed and I can get a rest/have time away knowing baby is getting fed and also get the closeness of BFing and being able to go out for the day with baby without having to take milk/bottles/pump etc.

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User69611 · 29/10/2023 20:25

I breastfed for two weeks then started pumping (Medela Swing electric pump) once a day, and introduced one bottle a day using expressed milk. The bottle was by MAM and baby took to it fine and didn't affect BF at all. Did this till 6 months then did a few bottles of formula a week to keep up taking the bottle, but gave up on pumping as it's a faff and you don't get much milk by that point as you only make as much as you need, so unless you keep it up very regularly it's hard to get enough out for a bottle! Then BF'd till 18 months. And drank booze whilst doing it which was fine.
Good luck!

Original poster

BEO · 29/10/2023 20:38

@User69611 thank you very helpful. It’s good to see it doesn’t have to be strict and you can pretty much adapt/change what you do to suit you and your babies needs .

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notanotherclairebear · 29/10/2023 20:58

Another one here who combi fed. Baby had a tongue tie and destroyed my nipples so it was so, so painful to BF. I expressed and we gave a bottle from 10 days old, then introduced formula as it was just too stressful being attached to a pump constantly. Ended up doing a combination of BF and bottles with both expressed milk and formula. I BF until baby was 14 months old and we never had any rejection of either bottle or nipple. In contrast, baby number 2 was so easy to BF and we didn't try to introduce a bottle until about 8 weeks - never took, would only BF. It was exhausting and my biggest regret was not introducing a bottle from a younger age.

Original poster

BEO · 29/10/2023 21:16

@notanotherclairebear thanks for that. Will bear in mind to try a bottle early on even if it’s every few days so that I know they’ll take one. Don’t want to have to exclusively BF as I know how hard and tying it will be And that’s just not what I want! Thank you

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endoflevelbaddy · 29/10/2023 22:05

I combi fed from birth with both my DDs. I was never very attached to the idea of breastfeeding but wanted to give it a try, so I knew I wouldn't be upset if introducing the bottle early interfered with establishing bf. It was actually a HCA on the ward the first night with DD1 who came and offered a bottle as she wouldn't be put down and I'd had an EMCS after 36hr labour and desperately need some sleep.

I ended up doing mostly bf through the day and formula at night so DH could share the load, and then later the odd bottle of formula in day if I needed to stretch out time between feeds for any reason. I was never very successful at expressing, could get a couple of oz. Not sure if it was a supply issue because of the combi feeding or just not the best pump, but it didn't really matter when they'd happily take formula.

I only remember DD2 once having a bit of a paddy and rejecting a bottle at bedtime so had to bf instead but otherwise they seemed to switch happily between the 2. It worked so well for us and meant they were happy being fed / settled by someone other than me all the time.

snoopy18 · 30/10/2023 06:02

We did both bottle & boob from birth & he was fine

Liveafr · 30/10/2023 07:36

Hello, I can't comment on combinaison feeding , but here is the guidelines on alcohol and breastfeeding:

emmylousings · 30/10/2023 07:53

I gave DC1 a bottle when he was a few days old as my nipples were so sore, and he seemed to appreciate it. I continued to BF him for 2 yrs, with him having a bottle at nursery. As long as you keep bf, you will have a supply and it will just adjust depending how much DC feeds. Its really possible to have the best of both worlds, in.my experience.

Batnm · 30/10/2023 08:32

My son had bottle and breast from day one. He is mainly breastfed but will have a bottle of formula with my husband.

My top tips are:
1-get as much help with the latch as you can in hospital. Don’t feel like you are a burden, it’s the midwives job to help you and they are experts at this.
2- when you are home, get the midwife/health visitor to check the latch again. Even if it’s just for reassurance.
3- take pre-made bottles in your hospital bag. That way you can use them if you feel the need to. It’s reassuring to have it to hand without having to press the buzzer and ask for help. I found it a massive help when I was alone and exhausted in the hospital.
4- involve your partner (if you have one) in bottle feeding.

wishing3 · 30/10/2023 08:36

This is only based on sample size of my two kids but I didn’t find it hard to get them to keep on with breastfeeding (no refusal) but hard to get them to take a bottle initially (first child) and keep on taking bottle (both kids). They both got to a point at around 3 months where they started refusing bottles. So I’d say make sure you never eh leave it a day with no bottle or you may not be able to go back!

PointyMcguire · 30/10/2023 08:59

My experience is possibly coloured by the choice being taken out of my hands, but we combi-fed DD from day 2 as I was incredibly unwell with an infection post-birth. For me I found in quite stressful as the midwives were quick to stress for every bottle DD had I needed to express, otherwise it’d have an impact on my milk supply. I muddled through with this until around 8wks when I transitioned to ebf as I found trying to juggle both was making me anxious, constantly worrying about my milk supply.

DD is now coming up 10mths, she’ll take a bottle if I’m out, but otherwise prefers it direct from source.

On the plus side, we never had any issues with nipple confusion (we used MAM bottles), but did have a brief stint when DH wasn’t paced feeding her bottles so she started to get fussy on the boob/prefer bottles, easily rectified but at the time it didn’t really help my stress/anxiety. It also took me a while to find a pump that works for me. The super expensive Elvie I bought before birth was next to useless, in the end I settled on hiring a hospital grade Medela symphony, but if I do it again I’ll likely purchase a Spectra as hiring for months on end gets costly.

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