Successful combi feeding stories?

[mimmi91]

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone would be able to share a successful combi feeding story?

My DD is EBF and is 11 weeks. I have noticed in the past few nights that a shift has slowly occurred ; and she is now sleeping much better at night.

What I mean by that is that she will fall asleep "drowsy and awake" in her own bed at around 9pm (although it can take her 1/2h to do so lol, while I stay next to her to pop her dummy back in when it falls out) and that she will mostly go back to sleep after her nightly feedings (2am and 5am).

I am however still knackered from these nightly feedings, and I value my sleep almost above all else. I get so cranky when I'm tired, and feel like it impacts my mental wellbeing, and my daytime mothering also suffers... :(

Hence I think I would like to start introducing a bottle of formula for her 8pm feeding, to see if she can go longer stretches at night ; and maybe only wake once at night, instead of twice...

I know this is no guarantee ; but this is why I'd love to hear success stories from you :) Also, how to deal with the silly guilt I'm feeling about contemplating introducing formula?! :(

I used to give a dream feed of formula at 10.30 and it’d get DD through to 4amish for a breastfeed and then she’d go through until 7am. It meant that DH could do that feed so I could go to bed early. It worked for DD who was a relatively good sleeper but not for my DS who was not a good sleeper

I introduced a bottle of formula at around 2 weeks with dd, initially at 10-11ish (whenever we went to bed)then at 7 ish when she was around 6 months and had a 'bectime'. It worked really well for us.

Another vote for a formula dream feed from DH at 10-11pm.

Interesting! I have attempted BF dream feeds at around 11pm and it has made no difference whatsoever haha. So I find it interestingto hear that a bottle of formula as a dream feed has worked for some of you! I guess I could even get DH to give it.....

I am actually enjoying BFing her at her 8pm bedtime, so that sounds like a potential good plan...!

Definitely give bottle dream feed. It’s not necessarily what’s in the bottle (expressed breast milk or formula), but the fact they will take much more from a bottle as it’s less work. If you’re worried about interfering with breast feeding use smallest teats/ look at paced feeding, but hopefully at 11 weeks you’ll be ok

Oh and how do you I know how much formula to give her for this dream feed? I’m obviously completely clueless as to how formula works haha

DH learned to latch a baby onto me, so I only had TK wake properly for one night feed. He dealt with the other one while I was snoozing.

It's an option if your baby turns out to be a bottle refuser like mine was.