A couple of feeding questions

[veryfondoftea]

Hi all,

I have a couple of questions I hope you can help with - my daughter is 5 weeks old and is formula fed. I use Dr Browns bottles and she eats on average 5oz per feed, 4 times a day and then in the night has a bottle but only takes about 3 or 4oz at that feed so eats roughly 24oz per day. I havent had her weighed as the clinic has been shut over Christmas but 2 weeks ago she weight 8lb 10oz so I would imagine shes around 9lb-ish now.

So, my questions:

1, how do I tell when to move up teat size? She's on newborn teats at the moment, I tried swapping to variflow teats but she didn't seem to like them for some reason, she wouldn't put the whole thing in her mouth and would just suck the very end of it.

Sometimes when she eats she dribbles loads and is quite gulpy and makes a wheezing sound and sometimes its very quiet and smooth and she doesn't dribble at all. No problems with spit up.

2. She drains a 5oz bottle at each feed...is this a sign I should start making up 6oz feeds? I am tending to ignore the guidance on the box as she's already eating differently to what that says, but I don't want to end up making her obese!

Thank you

 

[Aoifesmum12]

Hey! We changed teats when LO started to take a long time to finish her bottle, and if baby's draining 5oz bottles I'd try offering her 6oz....you never know, if she'll take a bit extra during the day, she might go off her night feed?? I think babies will only take what they need... oh n about the teats.....we had tried them previously but found that too much was coming out and going all over her....she's nearly 7 months old now and still only on teat 2!!

 

[Jennbear]

Hi!

We use Dr Browns bottles too. If she starts to look like she's working hard to get more milk out then move her up. If you're not sure, you could try her on a level 2 and see how she goes, if its coming too quick for her, move her back down.

Is she crying for more after her 5oz or does she seem content. I would say, if she's not crying for more, leave her on 5oz and when she starts to drop down to less time between feeds or crying for more, put her up.

I always found feeding was all about trial and error which is no help!! You could put her to 6oz and she'll not take the extra if she doesn't want it or she'll bring it back up

My LO was and still is a hungry little man so I just fiddled around until we nailed it

Hope that helps
X

 

[becky011]

Hi, we use Dr Brown's too, we changed the teat size to level 2 when LO was about 6 weeks old, we did this as he was falling asleep during his feed as it was taking so long to finish his bottle, he was fine with the level 2 teats.

We have upped the amount of milk when we have noticed LO was draining his bottles.

He was draining 6 7oz bottles a day last week, but so far this week he has only taken about 5oz at a time!! little tinker swaps and changes!! lol!!

x

 

[bellaloo]

Hi, I use dr browns too I just used the new born teets until my lo wasv3 months just go by how she's feeding. If she's taking a long time to finish feeds then I'd go up to the next stage. I'd deffinatly make up 6 oz if she's draining a 5 oz bottle. x

 

[mommy0629]

If she's dribbling a lot of milk when feeding, then stay on that nipple size. Dr. Brown's bottles have a sort of quick flow because of the way the bottles are. Wait until it seems like she's really sucking on it hard (like it's not coming out fast enough for her liking) and not dribbling much to up the nipple size.

Yes, up her bottles to 6 ounces if she's draining them with 5.

 

[veryfondoftea]

Thank you all!