baby's bottle/breast preference

Jaci - posted on 06/26/2010

Thank you all for your recommendations and advice. Tonight my son latched every time I nursed him, and only had to have one 2oz bottle because I was taking a nap and his daddy was up with him.
I took a lot of the advice and put it to use tonight and it worked great. thank you all so much!

Natasha - posted on 06/25/2010

My baby girl did the same thing, was attaching and feeding perfectly at the hospital, as soon as we got home, a few days later, wasn't attaching properly and would only feed for a few minutes at a time. I did the bottle then breast fed after and then she started feeding a bit better on the breast. Good luck :)

Heather - posted on 06/25/2010

When my daughter was born it took forever for her to really eat because she would fall asleep, linger, play around etc. We gave her a few bottles when she was young, but only so I could get some sleep, since she was up all night. She will still at night give up on the boob when she is really tired and keep eating from a bottle until she is really full. When babies are super young, they don't have very big stomachs, so they eat small amounts frequently. For now, just feed on demand, and he will gradually start to be more efficient. Be careful how much you give him the bottle, so he doesn't start rejecting thge breast, and as long as he gains weight and has wet diapers, he will be fine.

Jennifer - posted on 06/25/2010

all babies will prefer the bottle when they are so little because it is much easier for them to drink from. i'd suggest not giving him the bottle until he is closer to 6 weeks old, when you have established a better nursing relationship.

Tiffany - posted on 06/25/2010

You need to realize the nipple in the bottle is WAY smaller. You have tons of holes like that in your nipple, so the baby gets food MUCH faster- which in my opinion is a really good thing!

Stop giving that baby a bottle til he's one month, too- it is much easier to nurse from a bottle than it is a boob, so if you keep offering the bottle he'll not want your boob anymore. Warm milk, the smell of your skin, you holding him- that's what he really wants. Persist with the nursing, it's better for you and him. If you go to pumping solely, your milk supply will dwindle to nothing and you'll be on formula soon. This comes from experience.

*Fluffy Bunnies - posted on 06/25/2010

If your breasts are too engorged for him to latch you could try expressing enough milk to make them softer so he can latch. Be careful with the bottle right now. It's recommended to wait until breastfeeding is well established (usually 4 weeks or so) before introducing a bottle to avoid nipple confusion. Milk comes out of a bottle much faster and is less work for baby so sometimes they begin to prefer the bottle and refuse the breast. Don't put a time limit on nursing. Let him nurse one side as long as he likes then offer the other. He may be a snacker where he wants to eat for short periods, but frequently and that's ok! Milk is good in the freezer for 6 months (just don't keep it in the door of the freezer). If you end up pumping a lot and having extra you can donate it. Although milk has to be less than 3 months old to donate. More info on milk donating if you live in the U.S. or Canada: http://www.hmbana.org/

It sounds like you're doing great and you have lots of milk. Nurse on demand and don't worry about the length of time he nurses. There's a breastfeeding moms group here with tons of info: http://www.circleofmoms.com/breastfeedin...
Good luck!

Kim - posted on 06/25/2010

It could be nipple confusion- getting the milk from your breast takes a different sucking action than it does from the bottle. I'd stop using the bottle for a few weeks and let him just take it from your breast until breast feeding is well established (that can take up to 4-6 weeks). :) Good luck

Jaci - posted on 06/25/2010

He does okay on the breast as long as I'm not "too full" where i'm just too engorged for him to latch on properly. But when it comes to pumping all the time, I dont want to completely empty myself out in case he chooses to feed off the breast instead of taking the bottle. I'm afraid I will have too much pumped out and it will spoil. I know about putting it in the freezer but what if we just never get around to using it? We usually keep about 2 bottles of milk in the refrigerator just in case my fiance wants to feed him before i wake up. I'm just afraid since I have to pump SO much that I'll have too much pumped out and not enough to feed him when he decides to latch properly.

Lacye - posted on 06/24/2010

good for you for breast feeding! i breast fed my little girl for only 2 weeks. wanted to go longer but i couldn't because i had gotten sick because of my gall bladder (which had to have surgery to be taken out!) and wasn't able to eat for 2 weeks, so my milk had dried up when i was healthy again.

but like you, when i was at the hospital, Lily went for it. she did very well but when we had gotten home she wouldn't latch on right. i had called the health department in my town and the lady who is over the breast feeding moms came out to my house. she showed me a few other positions of breast feeding and one of them worked really well. it's what she called the football position. but if you think he would do better on the bottle, you can pump the milk and put it in the bottle for him. if you still want to try to convince him to take from the breast, call your hospital and ask if they can give you a name of a breastfeeding instructor, that's how i found the lady at the health department. hope it all goes well!

Kira - posted on 06/24/2010

hmm the only thing i can think of is it might just take some time for him to latch on properly. Practice makes perfect You may have been a bit more relaxed in the hospital, and perhaps nerves flared up when you went home? Which would make him a bit un easy. My little guy took forever to learn how to latch properly. I always had to adjust and he would get fed up with me moving him around. Just take a deep breath, pull him away then try again. But you are the mommy, so if you think he latches onto a bottle better than the breast and youre comfortable with it, then go with that :) Alot of people will say breast is best! which it is of course but when it comes down to it, its all about what youre comfortable with. I only breast fed for the first 3 ish weeks and then my little one would get tummy aches and colic which stressed me out thinking it had something to do with me. It spiraled into a big stress-fest and i ended up drying up due to stress and not enough sleep. ( can you tell im a first time mom? lol) So we decided to put him on formula! He took to being on a bottle perfectly and i relaxed. So everyone is different, know what you want and whats best for him, deep breath and try it :)