been combo feeding since day 3 with super slow dr. browns premie nipple. babe is now 7 weeks and still sometimes favors the bottle over boobs but also can and will breastfeed. any reason to size up nipples and if so when?
Hi Mommies
A FTM here. Please help me out.
Just completed 3 months and have experienced a real time dip in my supply. It’s not easy to witness this happening as exclusive pumpers and really hurts.
There has been some extreme stress around my Dad’s health, extreme mental and physical fatigue, and several missed sessions lately. I understand this must’ve contributed to the dip.
But now I need help/advice/suggestions as to what can be done in order to gain my supply back and is it really even possible?
I am ready to put in all efforts as I need to feed my child and I need some desperate support here.
Please help and share some insights.
Hi all, my 2.5 month old is EBF currently but I need to start transitioning her to combo feeding as I need to return to work in 2 weeks.
What is the best bottle for making this transition as easy as possible?
I’ve tried the Phillips advent anti colic bottle but she’s not really into it. Is there anything else you would recommend instead?
FTM. Breastfeeding journey is not quite going as I had imagined and may have to start supplementing with formula or combo feeding. I have no idea where to start with the different types of formula out there.
Where do I start looking? What do I look for?
I really hope that this does not come off as judgemental because I am genuinely trying to understand other people’s perspective and not offend anyone. I have a few new mom friends who currently pump and bottle feed breast milk and recently started talking about combo feeding. I literally just met these people and in the context of the conversation it didn’t feel appropriate to ask them why they were thinking about making that choice but I honestly can’t get it out of my mind. For context, I am a stay at home mom and exclusively breast feed from the boob. I enjoy my feeding experience and am very grateful to have had an easy breastfeeding journey from the start (I know that that is not the case for everyone) so I think I am having a hard time relating to or understanding their experience and I would really like to. Thank you in advance for sharing your experience. And if this post is not allowed in the community, please let me know and I will remove it.
I’m feeling really guilty because my baby gets mostly formula due to low breast milk supply.
Are there parents here whose babies were primarily formula-fed and are still healthy with good immunity? How often do they get sick?
I’d really appreciate hearing your real-life experiences. ❤️
Of course some of us can’t breastfeed at all, others only a little, combined feeding and whatnot. But how long was right for you ? Weeks? Months, years?
Love to hear your experiences
I've been breastfeeding exclusively for 3 months with an occasional pumped milk in bottle when I'm out or want a break. She has no issues with taking my pumped milk from the bottle and will suckle it down happily. But I want my husband to start giving her one formula bottle a day so I get a break and don't want her to be so reliant on breastfeeding so it becomes harder to wean when I get back to work.
We've tried for two days now and she scream and cries and spits it up till I give up and give her my boob. First time we did just formula, she cried but drank about 50ml in between the screaming. Second day I mixed 60ml breastmilk with 30ml formula and she screamed and cried for half an hour and drank maybe 10ml only. (Im so annoyed at the wasted liquid gold!!!!). I know the bottle and teat isn't an issue because she has pumped milk in it! Ive been trying Kendamil because I heard its best accepted by breastfed babies.
Any ideas on how to get her to accept just one bottle a day, which doesnt include wasting pumped milk? ChatGPT said to just keep trying for 5 - 10 mins everyday and if she cries then stop and try again next day. Is gentle exposure the way to get to accept formula?
Also: she did have 2 or 3 formula bottles when she was a newborn with no issues on the days I had supply issues. I used Cow and Gate then. But I think she didn't protest as much because she was just a sleepy newborn and now she's an opinionated 3 month old with very strong lungs!
Hi! I am brand new to this page so I am sorry if this question gets asked a lot. My almost 5 month old has always been lousy at nursing. He never had a good latch and it has always been painful and a struggle for him and for me. And I feel like I haven’t been able to really take the time to figure things out because I also have a two year-old and a three year-old and I just don’t really have the mental capacity that I used to have when I was nursing them. My brain is just being stretched in 1 million different directions right now.
This past week, I seriously have hit an all-time low with my mental health. There have been a lot of outside factors that have contributed to that, but I think one of the main reasons has been feeding my baby. He also has just been extremely fussy the past few weeks and so feeding has been a total nightmare and sensory overload.
I guess what I’m asking is how do I go about drying up my supply, and how do I overcome that intense mom guilt that comes with not breast-feeding anymore? I guess part of me just feels that because I physically have a good supply that I should be able to push through and feed my baby, but also the rational part of me knows that my mental health is way more important than that.
Also, we have started supplementing with formula when I feel like I just can’t handle nursing or pumping. And I just feel like he gets stomach aches when he has formula. I imagine he is going to do a lot of combo feeding as I am weaning and so do you have any advice on how to do it so his stomach can adjust to it better?
I’ve been very lucky to have a great supply (even leaning towards oversupply) and have been nursing and pumping since birth. I’m at 3 months now and preparing to go back to work and decided to wean so I could combo feed- ideally I would be pump morning, formula during the day, pump/nurse at night. Unfortunately I’m at the end of wearing and my supply doesn’t even seem like it will be enough to combo feed now and I’m really sad- I want to go back to pumping/nursing more often and will pump at work! But my supply is so low now! Is there any way to get it back to where it was? For reference I weaned for about 10 days and was down to pumping 3 times a day/nursing one. I went from about 6-8 oz in a pump session to 2-3 :(
I have a 5 month old and she has been EBF since birth. However, my freezer stash is finishing up soon and I was wondering whether introducing formula here and there would be okay? This will only be occasionally when I have plans and won’t be able to feed her. As it won’t be a regular occurrence, I’m worried whether this will affect her.
Hey everyone!
I just had my little guy about 2 weeks ago. I have only been formula feeding right from the beginning and everything is going great so far! No regrets at all and baby is doing great with it (as of now, although he is still young and things could change).
I have never had a desire to pump or breast feed, which was a big factor in my choice for formula feeding but now that baby is here, I am wondering if it is possible at all to just breastfeed only at night? I’ve been drying up my supply so I’d obviously probably have to pump to get it going again (I’m still leaking)… but once the supply is there again is it possible to breast feed at night or would I have to pump regularly to keep my supply going? Not sure if that makes sense at all? If it comes down to having to pump all the time to keep the supply going I will just continue to formula feed but I just thought I could at night time if my supply came back. I’m not sure if it is possible at all but thought I would ask.
Hi! Baby’s 9 months and has been only on breast milk for his whole life. Wanted to start weaning a bit and introduced him to Bobbie a couple days ago and he refused to drink it except for a dream feed. Even then, he left an ounce at the end. For the awake feed we mixed 50/50 and he only drank half the bottle because he was hungry and then rejected the rest.
Should we:
- continue with Bobbie for another week or two?
- try Kendamil
(I bring up these 2 options because they’re easily available unlike HIPP and I’ve heard most taste like BM)
- any other options?
Thank you!
Hi everyone, I wonder if anyone is giving bub a bottle before bedtime but not pumping, and if it will impact supply negatively? My baby is now 5 months. I used to go through the pumping and triple feeding hell for the first 2 months to get my supply up, and switched to breastfeeding in month 3. After the 4 month sleep regression, I’m losing my mind again. I feed her every 2 hours during the day, and at night Im usually up every 2-3 hours, and she would actually eat. I’m introducing more formula (120ml) this week instead of just breastfeed before bed to try and give her a fuller feed. When I pump, I only get 50- 60ml in 20mins during that 8-9pm period and I honestly just want to sleep. Can I skip pumping and still make enough milk for beb? Ive been getting cloggrd ducts after pumping even though I changed the duct bill valve, used right sized. flange eyc. She also doesn’t really take the bottle from anyone but me, so husband doesn’t do bedtime routine, and I end up co-sleeping with her. Thank you in advance!
I have a 3.5 month old who has been EBF since birth, but I would like to start supplementing with formula to take some of the pressure off me.
Breastfeeding has been going fine, despite that when we first started, lactation consultants said she had a shallow latch due to a tongue tie. They recommended a frenectomy but she's been feeding fine, gaining weight, and I just got used to it, so we didn't do it.
We have Philips Avent bottles from our first baby, who never had any issues with a bottle. We started him earlier with it though. Now when we try introducing it, she just seems... confused, and doesnt take it. I'm wondering if its in part due to her shallow latch and if there's other bottles that would be better.
I hope this post makes sense, my 36 week brain is too exhausted to make words make sense.
I will be going to work about 4.5-5ish months after baby is born. I want to be 100% formula feeding when I go back to work. Because of that, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me to spend 3 months establishing enough supply to exclusively breastfeed, only to start weaning and having them adjust to bottles a few weeks later. I would like to avoid pumping as much as possible.
I would like to combo feed. Mainly I would like baby to get colostrum and some BM, and supplement with formula. If I have a great supply and they get more milk then formula, great! If it's just 25% BM and 75% formula, also fine.
So do I have to BF every 3 hours around the clock right off the rip to establish some sort of supply? Can I do every 2-3 hours during the day and go 4-6 hours at night with husband giving them formula during their shift? Or will my milk not come in that way, or will I be engorged?
What happens if you only attempt to breastfeed, say, 3-4 times a day? Does supply not come in at all, or do you end up really engorged? Or is it possible to just breastfeed sometimes and do formula the rest of the time?
I'm sure I sound naive, I'm just confused. I am open to trying breastfeeding, but I also have some mental health conditions that are much better managed if I can get 3-4 hour stretches of sleep. I will not be upset if I end up just doing formula, but I would like to at least try to breastfeed some (and not take the pills to stop my milk from coming in).
Hello,
My baby is breastfed, and breastfeeding got off to a very good start. My goal was to exclusively breastfeed, but I also needed to be able to take an occasional break.
At first, we planned for my partner to give an occasional bottle of expressed breast milk. However, I quickly realized that pumping regularly was a significant mental burden for me and was not something I could realistically sustain.
Our maternal and child health nurse suggested introducing a bottle of infant formula so that my partner could occasionally take over a feeding. Since then, my baby has been receiving one bottle of cow's milk-based infant formula every day.
I've read that, once cow's milk proteins have been introduced, regular exposure may help maintain tolerance and reduce the risk of developing a cow's milk protein allergy. However, I haven't been able to find clear information about how frequent that exposure actually needs to be.
My question is: is it really necessary to give a bottle of formula every day to maintain tolerance, or would less frequent exposure—such as every other day, every third day, or even once or twice a week—be sufficient while continuing to breastfeed? Are there any evidence-based recommendations or studies that address the minimum frequency of exposure needed?
Thank you very much for your help.
I’m looking for perspective from other moms, especially those who have been here before.
This is my third baby, so I know the benefits of breastfeeding and I’m not looking for encouragement to “just switch to formula” or reassurance that formula is okay, I already believe that.
What I’m struggling with is acceptance.
I’ve been combination feeding since birth because of low milk transfer, and over the past few weeks (after mastitis and other feeding challenges), I think I’ve become an undersupplier. My daughter is now 13 weeks old, taking more bottles than before, my pump output has decreased, and I don’t think I’m making enough milk to meet all of her needs.
If you’ve gone through something similar, how did you come to terms with it emotionally? How did you grieve the breastfeeding journey you hoped for while still finding peace with combination feeding? That’s the support I’m really looking for right now. ❤️
My baby was born with a tongue tie and couldn’t transfer milk. I started my pumping journey at 2 weeks pp and only could ever pump about 7 oz a day. There was always still milk left over when I hand expressed . Pumping doesn’t seem to work well for me. All to say, I did mostly formula and 1/3 BM for a while.
My baby had his tongue tie released at two months. After a month (3 months old) he started to latch. The problem is he still doesn’t seem like he’s transferring milk.
I say this because once he started latching I decided to just latch him full time instead of pumping (then give formula after). It’s been a month and I just pumped to see how my supply is doing and it’s almost gone now lol
So some babies just never learn to transfer milk?
Hi, I’m a FTM and currently 36w pregnant. My male friend with a kid was telling me that his only advice for me would be to avoid bottle feeding because washing bottles etc is a huge chore. We already bought a bottle washer, wearable and wall hooked pumps thinking that this would help me sleep better and my husband or my mom can help with feeds. Since I have no reference point, asking here, which feeding method would you recommend to start off with in the first few weeks after birth?