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weaning baby from breast to bottle???

hey, (also posted in BIJuly and Breastfeeding chats)



due to the HV's all promoting breast feeding i am finding it hard to get advice on how to do combine feeding. I am hoping to wean my DS onto bottles by 6 months so am starting slowly now, he is on 3 bottles a day and the rest of the feeds are from me at the moment.



My question is... he is in no pattern at all with feeds - should I now try to 'make him' get into a feeding pattern, or just go with him and feed on demand as i did with breast feeding???



It's tricky as on one day he'll have a bottle at say 11am, then the next day he's hungry at 9am so then my boobs have no idea when he'll be needing food... is this a problem or will my body just get used to it???



I am finding it all a bit mind boggling... any tips/advice on weaning baby from breast to bottle very welcome.



xx

Replies

  • its a supply demand thing, try to keep the amount of boobs the same each day, say morning, afternoon and evening... thats what i did.



    also the formula packet will tell u how much they can have, so just make sure you kinda follow that for when he has a feed from the bottle.



    i was told not to introduce a bottle for 4 weeks and then my baby wouldnt take one till 7 months!!! nightmare when i needed to go out.



    how old is ur little one?
  • he's 16 weeks. We gave him 1 bottle in the evening from about 4 weeks but I now want to reduce the no of breast feeds and increase the no of formula feeds. It's just hard to know which ones to replace first, today we did...



    6.30am boob

    10.30am bottle 5oz

    12.30pm boob

    3pm bottle 6oz

    5pm boob



    He feeds quite frequently, am hoping he'll settle down as he learns to take more formula.



    My left boob has hurt today though. I guess it is my body getting used to not needing to produce as much milk.



    thanks for advice x
  • Hi roo,



    I'm looking to stop breastfeeding soon too. My LO is used to taking EBM from a bottle, but I want to introduce formula soon - I've decided that I definitely want to have stopped breastfeeding by Christmas.



    I've read that you basically replace 1 feed per day with a formula feed, every 3-7 days (so it should take a few weeks to eventually have repalced all breastfeeds with formula feeds). They advise that you do it quite slowely so that your body has time to adapt, and to express a bit of milk from your boobs if they are becoming too engorged - just to release the pressure.



    Hope that helps x
  • thanks, thats exactly the kind of advice i was after - so every 3-7 days replace a feed. fab! thats what i will do. thanks. he's doing really well so far. x
  • glad hes doing ok, stopping bf-ing is so tricky and no books seem to contain any information do they?

    xxx
  • Yeah, I couldn't find any advice in my mummy baby books for how to do it and the health visitors 'advised' me to keep going with breast feeding because of all the benefits. I just have my own reasons for stopping, it is the right time for me and my baby boy.



    Last night has made me realise I need to stop too, he had a bottle at 6pm, then slept in his cot till 10pm and had another 6oz, then slept till 2am which is when I usually feed him. So from 2am he fed for 40 mins on my left, then 40 mins on my right and was still whinging for more so fed him again from my left then my right - he finally finished at about 5.30am...! He obviously isn't getting enough from me any more. So i think last night was the last time I will be feeding him from me at night. Strange! This first 4 months has whizzed by!



    Bottles are SO much quicker. He's just had his 9am feed, downed 6oz in a few mins and is now soundo! Amazing, totally different and less time consuming than breast feeding!



    I have loved doing it and am pleased I could do it with no problems however bottle feeding does seem to have rather a lot more perks!!!



  • Hi hun, when I cut dd1 down I did it slowly cutting out the feed she got around 4pm first and left it for 2wks before I cut out the next feed which was her lunchtime feed, then left it a week before doing the dinnertime one, then the 8pm one the next week, the last ones to go were her 6am and 8/9am feeds. I found cutting out feeds that came one after the other together worked well, so at one stage she was being breast fed morning and evening and bottle fed in the afternoons so my boobs knew what to expect if you know what I mean lol! I did get sore but found wearing breastshells helped relieve the pressure without stimulating them too much.



    I'll be doing the same this time, hth x
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