Hungry Baby

[poorlittlefish]

Hello! I am hoping you can all walk me through this, reassure me or offer any advice.

As a little background, my first DD has never been an eater.  Her entire year of bottles at daycare, she only took 4 3oz bottles-in 10 hours.  She never asked for more and never needed less.  She was also not very into solids.  I started her slowly on solids after 6 months, never increasing to more than 1 icecube of solids until she was 9-10months old so as to not interfere with breastfeeding.  Even now as an almost 3 year old, she is not into food.  She is tall and very lean. 

Now, after I think I had it all figured out, I have DD2.  She was born a big one (9lb 9oz) and has been a hungry baby ever since.  She is in daycare for the same hours as her sister was. I sent 12oz and that lasted about a week.  She now is 5months and 3 weeks old and I send 14oz plus she takes 2-4oz extra from the frozen stash I keep at daycare.  I 100% trust that my daycare provider is not over feeding.  It just seems like this baby wants to be full—she won’t be satisfied with a little more milk, she wants a lot more!  She has been waking up more, being kind of crabby and increasing her milk consumption and nursing so I decided to start her on solids a week early.  We started with 1 icecube of avocado on Sat, Sun and Mon.  She loved loved loved it.  She swallowed it right down and kept grabbing at the spoon trying to put it in her mouth.  I guess she threw a big fit yesterday at daycare when the food was gone. 

I am torn because I would give her more solids but I don’t want to interfere with her breastmilk consumption BUT I can’t continue pumping as much milk as she is asking for.  We nurse in the morning, we nurse twice between 5:30 and 8pm when she goes to bed and we co-sleep for half the night (after her first waking).  I travel for work so I need at least 2 full days of frozen milk in my freezer for that and it I am dipping into this emergency stash.  She is milk intolerant and I really don’t want to give any formula (I am not at that point yet but I will be in about 3 weeks).  So, is it ok to add more solids?  Make her meal 2 icecubes for example?  I don’t want to encourage early weaning or anything like that but I also want her to get as much food as she wants.  She is still so young, I just don’t know.  I don’t have any room in my day left to pump.  I do add a pump each day on the weekend to store some but I don’t have any room in my work days as I am pumping 4 times at work already and nursing practically the whole time I am home.

Anyone else here have a hungry baby that can offer any thoughts?

[SeattleRain]

I would follow the lead of your baby. If she's hungry, she's hungry! I don't see what the harm is in giving her more food, especially wholesome food like avocado. It sounds like you're doing all you can. You're breastfeeding her when you're home, cosleeping with her so she gets milk then and pumping her a nice amount of milk. Unless you can find more time to pump (which you said you can't) you can either supplement her with formula or give her more food. There are pluses and minuses to both. On one hand, I'd be tempted to supplement with formula since babies under one still need to get most of their nutrition from breastmilk/formula. On the other hand, I'd be tempted to avoid the use of formula by giving her more food  since its totally developmentally appropriate for your baby to want to eat at 6 months. If she's really that hungry, it's not going to affect your breastfeeding relationship. I'd try giving her another cube and see what happens.

It's also possible that she wants to play with the spoon or likes the act of eating. Maybe doing something like baby led weaning would be good for her, or a mix of spoonfeeding and chunks of food. Have the daycare feed her the cube of avocado (how big is this cube, btw? 1 oz? 2 oz? I'm pretty sure babies at 6 months eat around 4 oz of food per day as a general rule) and then give her something cut up on her tray like sweet potato or squash. 

In any case, if she's still hungry, you feed her, whatever way you choose.

[poorlittlefish]

Thanks for the reply.  I think that I will just add in some additional solids.  The portion size she is getting right now is 1oz.  I make homemade food and just freeze it in ice cube trays so that is what I gave her.  I will up it to 2 cubes if she wants that. 

[SeattleRain]

Yeah if she's only getting an ounce, she could definitely be hungry. It sounds like your previous DD was an anomaly in wanting so little food. My 5 month old eats more than an ounce of food a day. Like I said, typically the standard amount per day is 4 oz for a 6 month old, but even adjusting that for a more AP approach, you still deifnitely have room to increase feeding.