Breastfeeding and the occasional formula bottle?

[Sara's Boys]

Hi

I am fully breastfeeding my 6 week old and plan to continue feeding him to 12 months, I feel like we have established a good bf relationship although it took longer than with my DS1.

He has bad reflux and I am finding it quite distressing, and I am currently addrssing it with a handful of things to do. But my problem is SLEEP, like so many, I just don't get enough. He is so unsettled through the night, so I am wondering if I couls give him a bottle once every day or two with thickened formula? I have a lot of trouble expressing (ihave an elctric pump and can hand express, it just doesn't feel comfortable and with a 16 month old honestly its hard to find time)

So what I would like to know, is, if any one has any reasons to or not give an occasional bottle of formula?

Or if any one does this?

I guess my concern is that he won't want booby once he has had formula .lol!
Thanks in advance

[aardvark]

It will tatse different - he might not take the formula. And yes, he might take to teh formula and reject you. If I was going down that path, I'd have a strict rule that your partner gave the bottle, never yourself. That way baby only expects boob from you.

Have you considered co-sleeping? I co-sleep with my now 11 month old, and I have not felt sleep deprived at all. He now helps himself to the boob during the night, I often don't know he has fed or not.

[Fitmumma]

Hi, My DD is fully BF, from about 12 wks I started giving her 1 FF a day & we are still doing that at 7.5mnths, she has never rejected me & doesnt mind having a FF at all.

[sueliz]

I started giving my DS a comp FF at night around 6 mths. He loved it, he started sleeping better through the night and he still took to the breast all other times. He is starting to self wean now, but I personally do not think that has anything to do with the fact that he has formula of a night, (since he has been having this for about 4 mths now).
If you do decide to do this, perhaps try giving your DS the FF at night - do you do the dream feed? We found this was the perfect time to give it to him as DH could give him this and I could get an early night to catch up on rest, which actually helped me with my milk supply.

That said of course, this may not work as well for other mums and bubs - but it worked perfectly for us!

[Wondermum]

Hi I did this with my first DS. From 9 weeks he started sleeping through the night but I can't be certain it was because of the formula - could have been? He was slowly weaned from the breast by 5 mths - mainly due to lack of support for myself and I was always worried about how much he was getting off me. With my DS2 I had tried a few comp bottles in the early weeks when he was going through stages of constant cluster feeding and I was very tired. I would only offer him a f/b after he had a good b/f from me. It definitely settled him for the night so I could get a good couple of hours sleep. Now after 12 weeks my DS2 is a real booby boy - I have even offered an EBM bottle to him on a few occasions and he doesn't take to it much (not the real deal). So I am just sticking with breast feeding. He's still waking around twice a night for a feed too, sometimes three times depending on when he goes down and when I get out of bed :D

[Sara's Boys]

thanks for the advice, did you all use a normal bottle/teat or others?