[blumom2boyz]

Okay all you momma's, I need some advice. I am going through a little bit of a rough time here and I really don't know what to do. I apologize in advance if this gets too long! I am currently exclusively breastfeeding my son who is now 7 1/2 months old. I tried to intoduce solids a little while ago and he just really doesn't want anything to do with it. I can accept that, however, I am still nursing every 2-3 hours a day and at least 2-3 times a night. I am completely exhausted and am literally withering away! I have always had an incredibly fast metabolism and have been thin my whole life, but now I am having a hard time keeping up with the demands of my baby. I am at my thinnest I have ever been since probably I was in junior high (5'8 and 103 lbs!). My friends and family are worried over my appearance and frankly, I am too. I know that I am not making the best choices as far as food goes, but when you have 3 kids under the age of 4 to take care of, I just tend to grab what I can. Anyways, everyone (except my hubbie) thinks I should at least supplement one bottle before bed and that should, in theory, eliminate 3 feedings and allow my body to get some rest. My husband, on the other hand, thinks that there is other alternatives besides giving formula, but just doesn't know what. So I guess I am asking, what would you do if you were in my shoes? Mind you that since I have never had the need to give him a bottle, we would also have to introduce him to that as well. I don't want to completely wean him onto formula, just one bottle a day. I just don't know what to do.

 

[TurboClaudia]

when your baby is nursing at night, is he nursing for a full session or is it just a few minutes of comfort nursing and then back to sleep? if nursing for a full session, it honestly sounds like he still needs the nutrition and food and although breastmilk is by far the best choice for his nutrition, it sounds like your health may be suffering right now as well and considering other options is valid. formula is more protein rich so it will take a longer time for his system to digest it (it will actually spend more time in his stomach with stomach enzymes helping to start digest it) whereas breastmilk is more easily digestible and is probably the reason he wakes to eat so often and eats so often during the day. introducing an alternative baby milk like formula may not work because your baby will not like the taste, introducing a bottle may not work because he will want his milk "straight from the tap" and introducing an alternative baby milk will also change your baby's gut flora because it contains molecules of unfamiliar to his body substances. if members of either of the parents' families have a history of food allergies, this could increase your baby's chances of developing food allergies as well.

if your baby is just comfort nursing for a few minutes and then falling right back to sleep, you might consider finding alternative ways of comforting him. the most successful might be to have daddy get involved in the night time parenting more for a week or more so your baby knows that comfort can come from a non-nutritive source. bouncing, rocking, shushing, cuddling, etc. are all great alternatives for a baby who is looking for comfort but not needing to eat.

my instinct is that at 7.5 months old, he is probably still nursing for nutrition and not just for comfort and that he actually needs food during the night. if daddy can be more involved in the night time parenting for your baby and be the one who gets up from bed to fix a bottle of alternative baby milk and you can actually rest during this time AND if your baby is amenable to a change like this (making a bottle takes time and some babies are impatient and get more upset and more awake in the waiting), it might be an option but i personally would have a hard time resting while my babe was crying or upset or even just awake so rolling over and nursing him would have been the easier choice.

it sounds like you are very mixed in your feelings and i wish you peace and wisdom in your choice...

~claudia

 

[kezoo]

OMG, been there done that! With both my kids, I was at my thinnest when they were about 9months, for the same reasons you mention (add in illness, food poisoning to my situation), and while I wasn't as thin as you (I'm 5'6", 118lbs at my lightest), I was thin enough to have people comment (e.g. "are you okay?" - which was the worst one of all!). I was also catching every little illness going around, since my immune system was so low (due to lack of sleep, primarily). I personally don't think introducing formula is the answer - there have been several studies (sorry don't have the references off-hand) that show "sleeping through the night" is not affected by feeding choices. In my entirely unscientific personal study of two children (both exclusively breastfed), one started sleeping through (6 hours +) around 3 months, the other still doesn't consistently sleep all night (at 13 months).

So, that said, this is what we did with the second: around 10 months, I started reading all the sleeping books at the library (No-Cry Sleep Solution is good) and I implemented a serious nighttime routine, which included putting Claire to bed earlier. Within a week of our new routine, she was going down & staying down much better (she usually wakes once/night). We tried having Dad get up w/ her and giving her a bottle of expressed milk - well she sucked about 4 oz down in a minute and a half and resumed screaming for me - not a roaring success, LOL! She wanted the comfort, not the food. So, I guess I'm saying you need to figure out a way to let the baby soothe himself back to sleep. Being the AP mommy I am, I jumped to go get Claire the minute she even whimpered...and at one point she was waking every hour and a half, just for a small suckle to put herself back to sleep (not a full meal). So, I started giving her the chance to get back to sleep on her own (e.g. looking at the clock and waiting a few minutes to see what happens - usually she goes back to sleep on her own). At first, this is hard - now I'm not saying CIO - if baby is CRYING, go get him, but if he's whimpering, etc, let it go a few minutes and then if it doesn't abate, perhaps send Dad in to pat his back, whatever baby likes. I think the first few nights of doing this may be harder than just feeding him, but he will soon find his own method of going back to sleep (like all adults do) and you will get some healthy rest.

Also, as far as solids go, Claire didn't really get going on them until 9 months (even though we tried starting at 6 months) because she didn't like purees! I kept giving her lovely organic home-made purees and she would gag! Well, she just really likes to chew - perhaps your little one is the same way??

As for you, I know it's hard to grab healthy stuff when the little ones need you, but perhaps try and make up some healthy snacks for yourself at night after the older ones are asleep (hubby can help here) so you can just grab them. Some ideas: hard-boiled eggs, pre-cut veggies & fruit in tupperware, hummus to go w/ pita bread or veggies, whole grain granola bars, yogurt, rotisserie chicken already pulled apart and stored in bags ready to go onto salads made from pre-washed spinach.. Make sure you get plenty of protein!! Good luck!

 

[mom2owen1]

it is hard to say, since i only have one kiddo right now. that one kiddo was a very high needs nurser, every two hours day and night, so i know how exhausting it is. everyone suggested i night wean him to give me a break, but i just couldn't do it. i agree with pp, that it is most likely nursing for nurtrition.

are you cosleeping? that would be my first step in getting more rest. if you think that he may just be thirsty at night you could try a sippy of water.

other then that i would focus on nurtrition for yourself. this is something dh could help with if he is willing. like making you protein shakes and smoothies and leaving them in the fridge for you - easy to grab. see if you can find some time once a week to do some bulk cooking and freeze in individual meals. my little one loves to cook, so if yours do, maybe you can even have them help.

hopefully others will have some ideas too!

 

[hunnybumm]

I agree that at such a young age weaning is probably not the answer. All of the pps have great info. Is there anyway you can catch a couple of naps during the day? Have DH take all 3 kids out to the park or to the store (yes, it can be done dad

)for a couple hours. Or if you have a little extra money find a good babysitter or a relative who could take them to their house for a couple hours a couple days a week.

And like the pp mentioned have premade food you can nuke and eat, or pull straight out of the fridge. Including protein shakes or smoothies.

 

[skueppers]

I definitely think it would help if you could eliminate some of the nighttime feedings. While your baby probably still needs to eat at night, it's likely that he can learn to eat fewer times. As someone else mentioned, The No Cry Sleep Solution may be helpful in figuring out how to reduce the amount of nighttime nursing. It's true that working on nighttime issues requires energy that you may not feel that you have, but not all of it requires you to be dealing in the middle of the night -- my husband found that there were a lot of nighttime things he could do. For example, we established a rule that nursing at night only happened every X hours, and if our daughter woke up sooner than that, my husband tried to get her back to sleep and/or stayed up with her until that time had passed.

I've never had the wasting away problem -- I gained weight while nursing, because my body's response to sleep deprivation is to try to compensate by demanding more food. It was sort of funny, actually -- a couple of weeks after giving birth, I was back to my prepregnancy weight, and then I gained weight over the course of the next year and a half! (Then I got pregnant, a whole different ball game.)

I think if I were having this issue, I would keep energy bars or something in the places where I was likely to nurse, and make sure I ate while nursing.