Any tips for mixing breast and bottle?

[izzy29]

I was warned not to do it as if confuses baby and i think that is exactly what i have done!I thought she wasnt taking to the breast cause i had put nipple cream on so substituted that breast feed with a bottle,and would do the last feed at night with a bottle too to give me a break. It is now a real struggle to get her to feed from me, she only sucks really gently, and then starts shouting and squirming cause she isnt getting any milk. maybe she is just being lazy or I have confused her. Have I ruined all my breast feeding plans?the midwife had put in so much work helping me get the latch and position right!

 

[marley2580]

It does sound like a bit of nipple confusion, if you're wanting to continue breast feeding, you need to ditch the bottles completely. Try expressing a little before you try to latch her on to get the milk flowing. How old is she?

Another thing you can do is to take her to bed with you for the day and just strip off, get loads of skin to skin and let her latch as often as she wants.

 

[Fossey]

I do both but have done since she was a couple of days old. My issue was with her staying on the boob and the midwives were concerned she wasn't getting enough so advised I could try topping up with formula. She doesn't seem to mind at all, she asks for boob all the time but still doesn't stay on long so when bottle comes in she can't wait to get it in her mouth.

I use tommee tippee closer to nature teets, they are supposed to be close to a nipple. It may be that not sure or the fact she has done it from an early age. She too gets in a paddy when on the boob, HV said its because she has to work harder on the breast than she does the bottle, I just tend to stroke her head talk calmly to her and keep putting her back on and eventually she will stay there until she is ready to come off calmly.

 

[jenstar]

I used NUK bottles as I was told these are very close to breast-like. I was also advised not to let the baby get a bottle straight after the breast because they will soon learn that there's no point working hard on the boob cos there's a bottle coming anyway. So I'd say stick with the bottle times you have (or lose them completely if needs be) but don't introduce more until you're sure they can switch easily between the two.

 

[princessellie]

ive got NUK, closer to nature and also a breastflow bottle, they are really good, they are the closest to a booby apparently, they are like £6 in mothercare

x

 

[Freya]

Hi Izzy, I introduced a tommee tippee CTN bottle for the last feed of the night to give me a break too. Gracie is fine with it now (at 13 wks), but it caused nipple confusion at first as she was 4 weeks old when I started...... for me it led to some painful latches again as she just wanted the nipple in her mouth (ouch), but bobbing her off and re-latching her did the trick as she learnt the difference.

Good advice to stick to the same feed everyday so she anticipates the change. A good bottle to mimic the breast. And also... if there is difficulty now, definitely a day in bed all snuggled with bub will get her used to the boob again (if you can spare a day that is LOL). Be strong, bub will take to breast again, but all are 'lazy' and want an easy life (dont we all) and they know a bottle is quick, easy and gets the job done quicker than boob.

You've done fab.

xxx

 

[Pyrrhic]

How old is she? Niamh had a very bad case of nipple confusion and stopped BFing totally. We had to reintroduce her from scratch.

They say you should only introduce a bottle to a newborn once BFing is established, though not everyone agrees. Have you tried feeding with nipple shields? They will give her a similar feeling to a bottle teat, and in a few day you can take them off and she should latch back on. Also be careful about what bottles you use. I use www.breastflow.co.uk which you can get at Mothercare.