Breast to bottle
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Category: Have A Baby?
Forum Name: First baby? Second or more?
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URL: https://www.ohbaby.co.nz/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=19771
Printed Date: 05 September 2025 at 8:22pm
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Topic: Breast to bottle
Posted By: Troods
Subject: Breast to bottle
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 4:54pm
| Emily is 5 and 1/2 months old now and has breastfed beautifully even though she was 2 months prem. Early on she was supplemented with a few bottle feeds of expressed breast milk (which she took no problem either) to help her gain weight, but we slowly weaned her off the bottle so that she was exclusively breastfed from about 2 months old - after all the "breast is best" message was drilled into us the whole time. Now we have been trying to reintroduce the bottle to her again with expressed breast milk so that hubby can give her some feeds and we can have a few hours to ourselves and leave Emily with the grandparents. But this has been rather unsuccessful and she refuses to take the bottle to the point she will scream and get really worked up about it. So we end up having to tip the expressed breast milk down the drain and chuck her on the breast. We are using the same AVENT brand bottles and teats we used early on and assumed she would take to them again easily but sadly this is not the case. Has anyone else had problems getting bubs from breast to bottle and have any suggestions?? |
Replies:
Posted By: kebakat
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 5:01pm
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Maybe try a different brand of bottle. Tommee Tippee closer to nature ones are really good and they are meant to be most like the breast.
Also try the bottle when you aren't around. Like you don't be in the room or anywhere she can hear you. Because if she sees you she will just want boobie. |
Posted By: lilfatty
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 5:08pm
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I agree with Stacy ... we had to try to get Issy used to a bottle as I was returning to work and DH was going to be the SAHD (and he obv doesnt have boobies).
Anyway ... she wouldnt have a bar of it if I was anywhere remotely close ... so when DH was trying to feed her I would "hide" in the bedroom. We also tried three different types of bottles she ended up happy with the Nuk ones. ------------- Mummy to Issy (3) and Elias (18 months) I did it .. 41 kgs gone! From flab to fab in under a year  http://www.femininefitness.co.nz/category/blog - LFs weight blog
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Posted By: nicci
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 5:09pm
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I understand exactly what you are going through ... I was looking forward to allowing DH and Grandparents the opportunity to feed DS with a bottle of EBM but when we tried it for the first time he screamed and cried for about 1/2 an hour before I gave in and feed him myself. DS was feed with the same bottles at about a week old (for about 3 or 4 days) because BF was just too painful so I didn't understand why he wouldn't take it.
A couple of weeks ago I had a day out planned and that meant the DS had to take the bottle or go hungry. Grandma was left to babysit and feed him. I really felt for her and explained all of the difficulty we were having just so she knew what to expect. I don't know why I worried he took the bottle without a fight! I'm not sure if it was that fact that I wasn't there and he didn't have an option or it may be because I switched the teats to a larger flow ... the number 2 Avent teat..... whatever is was he takes the bottle without a fuss now, even with me in the room. ------------- http://lilypie.com">   http://lilypie.com">
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Posted By: lilfatty
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 5:15pm
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Oh yes ... Issy will take a bottle now whether Im there or not. ------------- Mummy to Issy (3) and Elias (18 months) I did it .. 41 kgs gone! From flab to fab in under a year http://www.femininefitness.co.nz/category/blog - LFs weight blog
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Posted By: fire_engine
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 5:35pm
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Maybe try a different teat before switching bottles as well - at 5 1/2 months, she'll need a different flow teat to what she had at birth.
Good luck! ------------- Mum to two wee boys |
Posted By: Maya
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 6:07pm
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I had the exact same problem with Maya! She happily took the odd formula top up in the first few weeks but once my milk settled she was exclusively breastfed. At five months I went back to uni and she went to daycare and she flat out no how no way would take a bottle. She wouldn't take EBM, she wouldn't take formula, she'd drink water from a cup but not anything resembling milk.
It took us till she was 9 months to get her to take a bottle and even then it was a battle (we had to wean at that point for medical reasons so the nurses in hospital basically force fed her with the bottle till she accepted it). At 5 1/2 mths you could try offering her a cup instead of a bottle, might not work, but worth a go. The Tommee Tippee bottles are closest to the breast supposedly but you might need to make the hole a bit bigger with a needle coz even the 6 mth+ ones have a very slow flow. -------------  Maya Grace (28/02/03)
 (02/01/06)
The Gremlins:Sienna Marie & Mercedes Kailah (14/10/06)
Lil miss:Chiara Louise Chloe (09/07/08)
Her ladyship:Rosalia Sophie Anais (18/06/12)
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Posted By: Troods
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 6:32pm
| Thanks for all your suggestions. Yeah we have been trying the next step up flow teat to what she was on as a newborn, but maybe we will try the next step up again - but the problem is she won't even let the thing near her mouth! Even dribbling a bit of the milk onto her lips and tongue to let her taste it first so she knows what it is doesn't work. Even got the hubby to try giving her the bottle but that was unsuccessful too. I guess we will just have to keep trying. I have heard that the NUK teats are good so if all else fails we might have to retire the AVENT stuff and give them and the Tommee Tippee or whatever else a go. If that doesn't work might try Emma's suggestion of a cup. Thanks again everyone. |
Posted By: lottieandharry
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 7:56pm
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We have just weaned Harry onto a bottle for is day feeds. It took 2 weeks of offering him the bottle at the same time every day before he took it. The first few times he screamed blue murder, I was worried the neighbours might hear him!! But we just kept persevering and eventually he must have decided that he would just give in.
Every baby is different though so that may or may not work. I seriously thought in the first week that he would never take it at all. My DD would never take a bottle so I weaned her onto a cup at 8 months but it took about a month of trying to get her to drink milk out of it. We did the same thing though, tried her at the same time every day and eventually she gave in too! Good luck  ------------- http://lilypie.com"> 
http://lilypie.com"> 
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Posted By: Kels
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 8:01pm
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Went thru the same thing when getting Alize to take a bottle and ended up with the TT ones. I also agree with trying different types. Best of luck! ------------- http://lilypie.com"> 
Busy mum to Miss 15yrs, Miss 10yrs and Master 4yrs |
lilfatty wrote:Posted By: peachy
Date Posted: 03 August 2008 at 8:08pm
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I had exactly the same problem here! Give Emily a bottle with the teat exposed to play with in amongst her toys so she gets familiar with it. Play with it with her, put water in it, shake it about, offer it to her to suckle and make it a bit of game.
Worked a treat for my girl who has been on the bottle for two months now! She used to scream her lungs out when given a bottle, but now she likes to hold her own bottle when feeding! ------------- http://lilypie.com">  http://lilypie.com">
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