breastfed babies, daycare, bottles?

[NaturalMindedMomma]

I have a daycare provider I am happy with. I start my job Jnauary 18th. I am really concerned because my baby has been EBF. SHe HATES any artificial nipples. Besides the fact that I moved into my new apartment without my girls dad a couple of days ago. My two year old is adjusting really well to her new bed time and routine. The baby on the other hand is a mess. She is 5 months old, has never taken well to artificial nipples so she has really seldomly been away from me and when she has it is no more than 2 hours at most.

I NEED to work. I HATE the fact I have to, but I am the only income and I need to do this. She is a BIG baby. I am starting to wonder if my breastmilk isn't enough or something? She seems to be teething too. My family keeps telling me to wean her onto formula and I just hate to do that, but I am wondering if she is going to get that breasts are only at night and bottles are daytime??

Not sure if I should X post this in breastfeeding...

What bottles do you use? Any tips on making a smoother transition? Wondering about solids. She is swallowing tylenol and really interested in my food. Maybe some solids and really working on taking a bottle.. HMMM

[ChetMC]

Really Quick

Some bottles to try : Avent, Born Free and Dr. Brown's. They aren't cheap, but the tend to be more readily accepted by breastfed babies.

You could also try a sippy cup (with the valve removed if necessary) or a straw cup.

As well, read up on reverse cycling. It is possible for a baby to do all of their nursing at night and to have their long stretch of no nursing during the day. You pretty much need to co-sleep for this to work though. I've never reverse cycled a baby as young as five months, but it's very possible.

[rlmueller]

May not be the nipple

My son HATED breastmilk in a bottle and REFUSED to eat. That took A LOT of figuring out. I cried when the sitter patiently suggested formula in a bottle, but he ate it like he had never eaten before--I cried some more--and we weaned him onto breastmilk in a bottle by slowly mixing formula and breastmilk.

Go figure--kids are crazy. Note: He breastfed for 1 year and 3 days total.

[NaturalMindedMomma]

Well she seems to be interested in food, so I am going to get some Rice cereal for this month to try a little of. She no longer ejects things like tylenol.

I am going to get a few bottles and a sippy today. I have been trying to transition her into her own crib too. But I would continue to cosleep if she needed to. Not sure I want to reverse cycle though. I have bi-polar disorder and need more sleep than most and not sure I want to mess with her sleep schedule (she sleeps from 11 pm to about 3 or 4 am generally. If I have bi-polar episodes I will have to wean her completely to formula. I have gone through that before with an older dd and it was not good.

Thanks for the advice ladies. I just have to work at it...

[TulsiLeaf]

Originally Posted by NaturalMindedMomma

Well she seems to be interested in food, so I am going to get some Rice cereal for this month to try a little of. She no longer ejects things like tylenol.

I am going to get a few bottles and a sippy today. I have been trying to transition her into her own crib too. But I would continue to cosleep if she needed to. Not sure I want to reverse cycle though. I have bi-polar disorder and need more sleep than most and not sure I want to mess with her sleep schedule (she sleeps from 11 pm to about 3 or 4 am generally. If I have bi-polar episodes I will have to wean her completely to formula. I have gone through that before with an older dd and it was not good.

Thanks for the advice ladies. I just have to work at it...

work with one thing at a time. work with her getting to the bottle. Leave teh co sleeping alone for right now.

[azmomtoone]

breastflow bottle

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000BK8RHM/...l_64eypbu6bc_e

Maybe try this too, it was the only bottle my son would not refuse after being ebf for 5 mos, and I've recommended it to several other moms since then, when LO's would not take a bottle and several of them would take this. The two-part nipple system makes a baby "latch-on" in the same manner they do when nursing, so it's more familiar to EBF babies. (It has an inner, stiff (not hard, just firmer than normal bottle ones) nipple that is shaped like Mom's breast when compressed during nursing, and the outer nipple is soft, and fills w/ milk when you tip the bottle up, so that it ends up being warm to touch too. If you see the pics of the babes drinking from it on the amazon link, you'll see how much more it looks like it mimics bf'ing than other bottles.

No guarantees, but it certainly helped me out, and has several other women I know. =)
Good luck!!

[LilMomma83]

DS1 wouldn't take BM in a bottle past 6mos or so...it had to be formula, BM in a bottle sent him screaming - to this day I don't know why! He did ok with most bottles and nipples though

DS2 took a bottle from 2wks but didn't like it. He's 6mos and we've used about everything under the sun (including the Adiri nursers, his LEAST favorite - I guess my kids don't like to be reminded of nursing lol). We have finally settle on Playtex drop-ins with the brown (latex?) nipple (the regular one, with the dome base, not the flat base). Not my first choice...but, he likes them. I think it is because if you push the air out they can drink it without it being tipped, and that results in really slow flow...much slower than I could get with any other nipple. He also likes pushing on the edge of the nipple like he does at the breast.

[Ruthla]

Babies DO understand that the breast is available when Mommy is here, and that it's not available when other adults are caring for them.

However, 5mo is a tough age to introduce bottles- babies are generally more receptive to new nipples when they're 4-6 weeks old. In general, they're also more receptive when it's somebody other than Mommy offering the bottle or cup, preferably if Mommy isn't even there. Few breastfed babies will drink a bottle of ebm from Mom, especially when first starting out with bottles. You may be OK dropping her off at daycare with bottles of ebm and letting the DCP figure it out.

In the meantime, I'd suggest offering her bottles and/or sippy cups of water- this will give her a chance to get used to new drinking containers without the confusion of "why is the breastmilk not in the breast?"

Try to ignore the family pressure to wean. Trying to wean to formula right now would only add MORE stress and change to an already stressful and new situation. Besides, if you're weaning for reasons outside of yourself, you're likely to really regret it later. Continuing to nurse her, even when you must go to work, is a way to stay connected to the baby and to continue to feel like you haven't abandonded your "natural mindedness" with this whole situation.

I'm not sure whether to offer you condolences on your lost relationship with the girls' dad, or a hearty congratulations on getting out of a bad relationship!

[Ila]

This is my experience. My now 12 week old son refused different kinds of pacifiers and I was worried that he would refuse the bottle of EBM when I return to work. After a lot of research I bought Both Dr, Brown's bottle and the Breastflow.

One night I put an ounce of BM in the Dr. Brown's. I sat down and nursed, then I put the Dr. Brown's nipple in his mouth, trying to do it as seamlessly as possible. Viola, he started sucking the artificial nipple right away. Then I took him off that and offered my breast again!

I did that again another time and then one day I went to church and my husband managed to feed him with the Dr. Brown's. I never needed to use the other bottle. I am so happy with this success and I will return to work next week without the same anxiety I felt about bottle feeding. Prior to this I had used a syringe, a dropper and a cup but these were slow and messy.

[LaffNowCryLater]

So far the Medela and glass Evenflo bottles have been successful for my 2 youngest that had to go to daycare and were EBF. Medela ones are convenient too b/c they work with my pump.

[phrogger]

Originally Posted by ChetMC

Some bottles to try : Avent, Born Free and Dr. Brown's. They aren't cheap, but the tend to be more readily accepted by breastfed babies.

You could also try a sippy cup (with the valve removed if necessary) or a straw cup.

As well, read up on reverse cycling. It is possible for a baby to do all of their nursing at night and to have their long stretch of no nursing during the day. You pretty much need to co-sleep for this to work though. I've never reverse cycled a baby as young as five months, but it's very possible.

My son does this naturally. He nurses very little in the day time and nurses at night. I am home with him, but that is just how it ends up working out. I would try it for a few days at daycare and see how it goes. Also, just because she isn't taking a bottle now, doesn't mean she wont for your daycare person. Try not to stress too much and look at the other options like a straw or cup. And at 5 months, she might like the cup. Is she showing any signs of wanting food? By 6 months if she is ready, she might just perfer food at daycare and milk from mom, and would be basically doing the reverse cycling stuff.

[smpayne]

When we started to introduce bottle to my ds, I litterally had to leave the house. Once I was gone, dh could get him to take a bottle without much fuss, but if I was still around, he would scream.