Advice - BF baby won't take a bottle

[Mel's Belle]

I would like to give my 10 week old DD a bottle of EBM when I'm out or when the grandparents babysit however she puts on such a tantrum when ANYONE tries to offer her the bottle! She acts insulted and cries until it is taken away. She would rather have 10mLs out of it and wait until she gets the boobie rather than have a feed out of a bottle :confused: .

Does anyone have any ideas for getting their baby to take a bottle without causing distress? We have tried my DH and mum giving her the bottle, but she seems to take more from me than from them which I was told wouldn't work because she'd be able to smell the milk on me...

We have tried the Avent and Nuk bottles.

Any advice would be appreciated :)

[jacks mum]

my ds didn't take to the avent teets. We bought one of those pigeon perilistic???? (sp) ones and he is fine with it. He has a bottle of EBM twice a week, I have heard that if your dh or grandparents wear a shirt that you have worn, it might help because your smell is around.
Hope this is of some help

[Brooksy]

Hi there,

I had similiar problems but mine was DD wouldn't take a bottle from me, only from dh and her nana. I was told to wait til DD was really hungry and then she would drink from the bottle. Also we tried three different types of bottle and dd didn't like the tommy tippee ones she would drink from the nuk ones, but on the weekend I went out and bought the advent ones and she now will take the bottle from me, so try to find a bottle that she will drink from. Although they are expensive to keep buying.

Also have you tried the different teats on the bottles?

Goodluck with the bottles

[MrsMiggins]

I had to start giving DD a bottle almost as soon as we got home from the hospital. I wasn't able to feed her due to a few different problems, so I had no choice but to get her to take the bottle. I was still breast feeding ocassionally, but needed to cut right back.

We only had Avent bottles & teats at that stage. I thought she looked like it was all a bit too much hard work for her & that was why she was getting frustrated, so I switched from the No1 teat to the No2 teat to make it easier for her. She got the hang of it real quick then & I changed back down to the No1 until she was about 1m old.

After she was able to take the bottle, she had no problems with mixed feeding.

[Goosie22]

baby1205,
You can give the EBM in a cup, some babies especially Breastfeed babies prefer it? My boys would not have a bar of bottles either.

This article explains the concept and has a few photos they are of premies but the concept works well with term babies and older also.

http://www.ccmckids.org/programs/breastfeeding_cupfeeding.asp

Hope you work it out:)

There might be something on this sheet to help you also?

http://www.kellymom.com/bf/pumping/alternative-feeding.html

[Mel's Belle]

Thanks for all your helpful hints!

Goosie22 - I'll have to try the cup feeding :)

[Hukuna Matata]

We had similiar issues when DS was the same age. Really had me worried cause I was due back at work 3 weeks later!

We used pigeon peristalsic (?sp) teats and bottles. I think DS took to them because he had to work to get milk (like at the breast) instead of there already being a flow (I found the other teats would drip a bit when turned up-side-down).

Also, DH and my mum (who was going to be his carer) would feed him the bottle. I would try to time his feeds so that he would be hungry when someone offered the bottle. I would definately not be in the room, and would sometimes leave the house and go for a walk. Surprisingly, that is when DH and my mum had the most success!

Also, my DH would often say to DS "please have a little bit of bottle, it'll will make your mum happy" (cause I was stressing...) and for some reason this worked too. DH also sometimes sang to DS while trying to give the bottle, to provide a bit of distraction.

So, we tried a lot of stuff and eventually it started working. We would generally only try to give him the bottle for anywhere btw 10-30mins at least once a day, and depending on how DS was responding, and if it wasn't working, we stopped. No use torturing the kid!

[lil monkey]

Hey Mel's belle.

You need to find a teat that best represents your milk flow and dare I say it, nipple! - I had a super strong flow that spurted out like a fountain. I found that the Avent teat was small and the flow even on the 1 & 2 hole flow was just like my flow too.

I have heard of trying a cup but also trying a baby spoon and little bits at a time.

As per the other suggestions, try other bottles - it might cost you a bit though but maybe buy the teat as most of them fit each others bottles.

[Baby Girl]

My DD1 first took to a bottle with NUK orthadontic teats - they are apparently shaped like the nipple when it gets sucked in by bub ie. they follow the shape of their mouth but are a fixed shape not a soft teat - IYKWIM. They didn't fit in the avent bottles so I got some cheap tommee tippee ones from big W to try it and whammo she finally took it and from me too - although I did have to put her in her bouncer because if I held her she would root for my boob and ignore the bottle completely.

Also the shirt idea worked for when DP had to feed her the first couple of times until she got used to having the occassional bottle.

Good luck.

[kuz78au]

my ds didn't take to the avent teets. We bought one of those pigeon perilistic???? (sp) ones and he is fine with it. He has a bottle of EBM twice a week, I have heard that if your dh or grandparents wear a shirt that you have worn, it might help because your smell is around.
Hope this is of some help

This is great advice. Worked for me too! Those teats are expensive but well worth the investment! And you can pop them in the wide mouth bottles for most brands too! The smell thing is a great idea too! :p