What to go on to?

[Coffeecake]

Hi Becky! If you don't mind me asking, why do you want to stop breastfeeding at 6 months? When you decide to start weaning you can carry on breastfeeding while slowly introducing pureed fruits and veg. You can also pump if you prefer to feed from a bottle.

I'm planning on breastfeeding for one year, exclusively for 6 months and then gradually dropping feeds as I introduce solids. I don't plan on ever using formula, I hope I'm not wrong in thinking this as it's still just an idea. I haven't discussed it with a HV or anything lol.

Hiya It's not that I want to stop breastfeeding, my original plan was to breastfeed till Lizzie was 1, but unfortunately she has been on pretty much constant nursing strikes since she was about 3 months old. She won't latch on, will scream at the boob etc, and it just makes breastfeeding too much of a struggle. She also started gaining weight too slowly for my liking so we pretty much bottle feed now using expressed milk.
However, I am finding it pretty hard trying to express every 4 hours or so and it'll be even harder when I go back to work so I'm thinking ahead if I really feel like I need to go onto formula. I am gonna try my hardest to keep on with the breastmilk but it's knackering!

I'm gonna use this time to just vent a bit about midwives/HV's telling you how easy it is to breastfeed when you're pregnant. I know it's their guidelines or whatever to push 'breast is best', and I'm not disputing that, but I was told the entire way through my pregnancy that breastfeeding was natural, easy, baby would automatically know what to do etc etc.
Lizzie hardly got any food in her first week of life because we both didn't know what we were doing, and I felt such a failure because it was presumed that it would come naturally. I wish I'd been told that actually it's bloody hard work, and lots of women struggle.
When I went to an antenatal class we did the pros and cons of breastfeeding. The midwife spent about 20 minutes on the pros and then just said 'and there's really no cons to breastfeeding' and glossed over the whole thing!
Rant over

Aww that makes sense, I'm so sorry it's been hard breastfeeding. Good luck switching to formula! For what it's worth I hear a lot of great things about Aptamil.

 

[xxbeckyxx]

I hadn't really thought much about combination feeding, but that does make a lot of sense so I think I'll try that first, thanks!!

 

[GemmGirl]

Good luck with it. Please let us know how you get on. X

 

[bethanyann]

Becky, after a month of struggling, I exclusivly expressed for 2 months because Eva was an awful bf'er too, it's exhausting isn't it?? Looking back, I have no idea how I did it. I started buy introducing one bottle of formula a day at her 6pm feed. Then after a week or so, I added another bottle of formula as her first feed of the day too because I could express so much in the mornings. She was on just the two bottles a day for a month, then I gradually swapped another feed to formula until now she is exc. formula (and tw) I felt like SUCH a failiure, because like you, I'd always been told it's natural and easy, and it's bloody not!!! Eva has jumped from 9th centile to 25th centile since swapping over, and it makes me feel pretty crap, but I think part of that is because she is having solids too, and tbh, I still feel I made the right choice, because I now have time to enjoy her and engage with her more, without constantly expressing!!

 

[sexyamy2005]

i only bfed for 5 days because i didnt get any milk in, due to strong steriods to get rid of bhronchitis at 30-39weeks it stopped my milk supply, but my midwife n health visitor wanted me to continue even tho she was only getting about 3 drops of colostrum an hour n was screaming blue murder cos she was so hungry, gave her a bottle n she had 5oz in one feed n then 4oz 2 hours later!

Layla had aptamil til she was 12 weeks then i changed it to cow & gate, partly because of the money, (im ashamed to say that) but she was gettin quite constipated on it and was havin about 6oz of water a day to try n solve it, but after chatting to HV before we did it, she said that the only reason aptamil sell it as "closeist to breastmilk" is because they marketed it first, like heinz' daddys sauce,
i spent ages in boots looking at the tins and the different levels of vitimins & minerals etc and to be honest there is less than 0.2 difference on some random things that id never head of, (i cant remember what they were now - sorry)

but what im trying to get across is that aptamil, cow & gate, & SMA are all really the same milk just in a different tin, hope this helps a little bit

the big tin at the moment lasts us exactally a week, based on her having 3 8oz bottles n a 9oz bottle at bed time, so 33oz a day & 2 meals, but HV said that they need to b having about 18-20oz a day once there weaning, shes greedy, lol

xxx

 

[xxbeckyxx]

Thanks everyone, I kind of feel better about expressing now that I now I can stop at 6 months if I need to.
Although I tried to explain to OH today how hard I'm finding it and how I might try using formula after 6 months and pretty much got a flat 'No'. All very well for him to say isn't it...