any good tricks for the bottle???

[tzs]

ugh! i listened to everyone's advice and kept ada away from bottles and pacifiers for 6 weeks and now she is so non-nipple confused that i can;t get her to take a bottle for the life of me! funny because now everybody's advice is to start them with a bottle early. funny guys.

i've tried the straight up born-agains, playtexs and then the MAM and the Breastflow nipple-within-a-nipple. i am trying to remember to attempt the bottle once a day. i've gotten her to take 3 total...in like 6 weeks. usually she takes it timidly, gets a little milk, then her face contorts like she's just realized something horrible, and then cries (from whining to outright shrieking.)

it's not the end of the world, i'm at home, but would like to know that if i left for a few hours or if she needed a bottle for any reason she'd be ok. and ok...it's sometimes really convenient. my friend can literally reach around the carseat and feed her screaming babe right in the carseat. how awesome is that??? her husband can do a nighttime feeding!!!!!

are there any tips out there? should i keep trying? should i give it a rest and revisit? can i hide it in peanut butter...oh wait...that's the dog...

[cristeen]

You shouldn't be giving her a bottle at all. Make daddy give it. If you're holding her against your chest, why on earth would she want a plastic nipple when the real things are *right there*? Hand daddy the baby and the bottle and walk away so she can't see you. He'll probably have a bit more luck that way.

Oh, and mine's been almost exclusively on a bottle for 6 weeks now... still won't take a paci. He hates the things. So long as she takes the bottle when she needs to, the paci doesn't matter.

[Julia24]

Cristeen has a good point She can SMELL the goods, she won't take that thing from you

How about that Adriri one - it LOOKS like a boob. I'd have dh try some of the others you have first though...

I'm having the same problem with Charlotte and her newborn bottle - she won't take ANYTHING but that stinkin' bottle (which is really not suited to the way she sucks anymore, imo) nor a binky nor the boob. Does that same thing where she'll drink a little bit, like maybe an ounce (enough to take the edge off) and then start contorting and shrieking - the kid would rather go hungry at this point than use a different bottle or suck on a binky or me!

[tzs]

oh yeah, i should have mentioned that. i've had other people try...including a mother to 11. i'll have to check out that "boob" one.

[KayleeZoo]

men. i wouldn't have any women try. babies are smart little buggers and they can detect milk on a mama even after she's weaned her last baby. other than that, try every bottle out there. fun, huh?

i see so many people have trouble because of starting bottles too late w/dd #2, ds, and camry, i started at 2 weeks and haven't had any trouble getting them to go from boob to bottle to binky. i'm so sorry you're hitting a brick wall with this

[HarperCait]

I'm in exactly the same sitation. Exactly.

[Julia24]

I also want to add, I have a good girlfriend who had this trouble with kid #3, and she basically just gave up and resigned herself to being available to her baby every couple of hours until she weaned. She said it helped her mental health tremendously when she just accepted it, trying to keep in mind it really is just such a short finite amount of time.

Just another option.

[cristeen]

Originally Posted by tzs

it's not the end of the world, i'm at home, but would like to know that if i left for a few hours or if she needed a bottle for any reason she'd be ok. and ok...it's sometimes really convenient. my friend can literally reach around the carseat and feed her screaming babe right in the carseat. how awesome is that??? her husband can do a nighttime feeding!!!!!

are there any tips out there? should i keep trying? should i give it a rest and revisit? can i hide it in peanut butter...oh wait...that's the dog...

I missed that the first time through. Honestly, I would not worry about it. Like the pp said, I'd resign myself to being available. Coming from someone who's been bottle-feeding for almost 2 months now, and really wishes I could breastfeed - there's no comparison. I really wouldn't mess with it if I didn't have to if I were you.

Are you pumping? If you have an excess of (frozen) milk, I highly recommend looking into milk donations - that's what's keeping my little guy alive at this point... the kindness of milk donors. Milkshare.com is a great place to find someone who needs milk, or you can contact local doulas/lactation consultants and ask if they know anyone local who needs milk.

[KayleeZoo]

Cristeen, thanks for the link. I don't have a big freezer supply, but could easily pump a ton to share (now that I know that I'll get mastitis whether I pump or not ).

[BeanSprout Mama]

DD never took a bottle. We introduced a sippy cup at 11 months and she did fine with that. When your baby is a little bigger maybe introduce a sippy cup? Avent makes some with soft spouts (at least they did when DD was a baby) and that might work.

I also agree that she probably won't take one from you ever because you've got the real thing. DS2 is very happy to take a bottle so long as it's daddy who is giving it. If I try he screams his head off.

[cristeen]

Originally Posted by KayleeZoo

Cristeen, thanks for the link. I don't have a big freezer supply, but could easily pump a ton to share (now that I know that I'll get mastitis whether I pump or not ).

I've gotten a couple donations off there, including a full month's supply from a mama with highly allergic twins (so they couldn't eat what she'd frozen). I also have a couple mamas from this DDC who are pumping for me, a one-time donation from a mom at LLL with an allergic babe, and a daily donation from a mom at LLL with lipase (so it has to be drunk that day), I'm getting a month's supply today from a mom I connected with through my LC, and I have the daughter of a friend of my grandmother's pumping for me. So just pass the word in your community, you'll find someone who needs your excess. Or you could always PM me.

[KayleeZoo]

PM for ya, Cristeen