FF baby and night feeds

[WorkingItOutForMyself]

Ok, I'm after some advice as I just don't really know what to do.

I have a wonderful little boy who's 5 1/2 months. He was EBF until 4 months. We both struggled and struggled. I had thrush and mastitis often, he had a late diagnosis of tongue tie and reflux... phew it was hard work.

Anyway, for my own sanity we introduced bottle feeds at night when he was 4 months. I slowly cut down on the BFing and for the past 3 weeks he has been almost exclusively ff aside from 6oz or so of expressed milk during the day. I'm finally happy with his feeding and he seems happy too.

Anyway, when he was BF he fed every 2 hours in the day and 3/4 times a night. Usually he'd feed at 10pm, 2am, and 5am. I would just bf back to sleep whenever he woke without another thought.

Now he's on formula he feeds 3 hourly in the day. Over the course of 24 hours he'll have 7 6oz bottles. In the evening he'll have a bottle at 7pm, one around 11/12pm and then he wakes between 3/5am. I feed him every time he wakes (unless its been less than 3 hours).

I'm aware that he's having quite a lot of milk. The box of formula suggested 35oz in 24 hours and he's having about 42/45oz. Because we gradually transitioned over from bf to ff I'm only now looking at it and wondering if this is ok? Should we be keeping closer to the 35oz guideline?

Is it time to try and stop the middle of the night bottle? We occasionally try to settle him back to sleep without a feed but if I'm honest I give up quite quickly... I'm not expecting him to sleep through the night and I'm quite happy with the current state of things really but I'm not sure if I'm doing the right thing or not. Are FF fed babies often still having 2 feeds between 7pm-7am at 6 months old??

Now that I'm posting I'm wondering if sleep is actually the right board for this at all...

Many, many formula fed 6 month olds do sleep through the night. For most babies that is perfectly achievable. You wouldn't be starving him or traumatising him or anything. However, if you're happy with the feeds as they are, carry on.

If you're worried he is having too much milk, just cut down each bottle/some bottles to 5oz and see how that goes. Although is he is hungry for more, obviously give him more. Don't put him on a diet!

Personally I would try reducing the middle of the night bottle with a view to cutting it out completely. I'd go 6oz to 5oz for a couple of nights, then 5oz to 4oz for a few nights, 4oz to 3oz for a few nights etc. Once that was done, I'd work on the 11/12pm bottle.

If you're planning on starting weaning soon he's going to be taking a lot in if he's having 45oz of milk plus solids.

Formula fed babies should still be fed on demand, just like breastfed babies.

The only point to note would be making sure the signs you read as hunger are hunger and not tired or something else. This is what could lead to over feeding. Given that your baby is 5 plus months though, one would assume you know his signs well, be it tired or hungry or anything else.

Also, I am assuming your DS is not completely draining the whole of he 6oz bottle every feed (if he is, you should be offering more each feed). So maybe he leaves 1oz one feed and 2oz other feeds - this means that your total over the day isn't 6*7=42oz, because there will be wastage.

I'd look at reducing the night feeds, if I were in your position. I do this by offering the bottle colder than usual (room temp rather than warmed). This makes the milk less nice and usually results in my DD drinking much, much less than if warmed.

Thanks for the advice :-)

He actually does finish a 6oz bottle. Sometimes a little is left but rarely.

We were offering more but he wasn't keeping it down. My boy would, honestly drink and drink and drink if we let him. But it would all come back up.... We have settled on 6oz as an ammount he seems comfortable with. Is that the right way to do it?

I feel quite reassured now. I think having been bf for 4 months he does still need that feed in the night as he isn't used to filling up in the day. I probably could wean him off it but I'm not sure he's ready.

Reducing the feed seems like a sensible way to do it though. Not sure he would be bothered about the milk being cold, he happily guzzles expressed milk straight from the fridge!

Just wanted to make sure it wasn't a big no-no to still be feeding him that much milk at night.

I don't think I'll worry for now, and maybe look at reducing the feed once we start weaning. We had so many feeding issues with bfing and milk in general that I'm in no hurry to start solids!!