Water between feeds?

[Louise N]

Do you offer your LO cool boiled water? and if so how much / how often?

 

[OmarsMum]

If ur LO is having wet nappies, not constipated & there r no signs of dehydration, u dont need to offer water as it would replace feeds. Formula is 70-80% water which is enough. xx

 

[littleblonde]

I dont as she would probably not drink her milk. She is 4 months old

 

[Kelloggz187]

We didn't give Mia water until she started weaning xx

 

[Missy86]

I have been giving Rhys cooled boiled water this week cos its been so hot, it has helped

 

[Mynx]

I didnt even try and give Evie water till we started weaning her - even then, she still wont take it lol! I was told by my HV that water in between feeds is really not necessary (unless she was constipated) as there is enough water in the formula to keep her hydrated

 

[shamrockerjo]

I give Maya water on hot days as she sweats quite a bit. She has anything from 20ml to 100ml depending on how thirsty she is and it's never affected her appetite. My GP recommended this.

 

[Windmills]

I give her 2oz of water every day because she's on hungry baby milk and it makes her constipated.

 

[Lara310809]

I would argue that it is necessary to offer water... we have really long summers here (it's like a UK heatwave from April til the end of September), so if it's hot outside and my LO is sweating, I'm not about go give more formula when she only had a full feed an hour ago, and I'm certainly not about to let her go another 3 hours without fluids until her next feed is due

Water doesn't have to take the place of a feed if you don't give them too much. I may give LO an ounce of water (normally in the form of camomile tea), and she will still happily take a full feed almost straight afterwards. And remember that while LO may drink a couple of ounces of water, it's water, and therefore they don't need to digest anything and it goes straight through them, so pretty soon they will be hungry again. It's like staving your own hunger with water. You can do it for a while, but you're still going to need food at the end of it.

And even if your LO takes too much water and doesn't have an entire feed, nothing bad is going to happen if LO misses an ounce or two, because as long as you're not constantly swapping feed for water, they're still going to gain weight as normal.

 

[IvyBaby]

Lexi does not like to drink water, I offered her a couple times, but she made a disgusted face and refused lol GP recommended to give her water for her poo troubles (sometimes she won't go for 8 days or so, but is not really constipated).. I agree with the poster above that water won't cause any problem with eating as it is quickly absorbed and baby won't drink it if it does not need any- it just replaces what is lost because of heat or some other reason. If baby seems thirsty and drinks happily then offer it, by all means.

 

[jk28]

I've just started to give Oliver a bit of water now & again as not only is it boiling here, I've also noticed he's struggling a bit to poo!!

Jayne x