BabyWhispererForums.com
EAT => Breast Feeding => Topic started by: jenalix on September 14, 2006, 23:29:44 pm
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Hello,
I'm a working mommy, so my husband gives our 13 week old two bottles of pumped milk per day. We've noticed something strange -- he never spits up after a bottle, but almost always makes a bit curdled milky mess after I feed him from the breast. Isn't that weird? It's the same milk, though I suppose in the bottle the fore and hind milk are all mixed up. Does anyone have an explanation for this?
Puzzled,
Miles and Pablo's mommy
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Spitting up one the way a breastfed baby prevents themselves from overeating (not that they are actually choosing to do it consciously!). If there is excess, they spit it up. It could be that he is simply taking more from the breast than he does from a bottle. The fact that it is curdled is quite normal. The important thing is does he seem bothered by it? And does he seem satisfied after the feed or hungry again after spitting up?
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He seems satisified after spitting up, so I usually take it as a sign that he's done. I always thought that overeating happened when you bottle fed them because it's easier for them to get the milk out of the bottle. This little guy is such a different feeder from his big brother -- he's still tough to latch on at 3 months, and never really seems voraciously hungry, so I sometimes find it hard to read his signs. He's also very burpy; he squirms when he's feeding and then has to be burped at least twice per feed.
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Do you have a fast letdown? If so, you might try holding him so that he has to fight gravity to get the milk from you. Either lean back or sit him up and have him face you (strattling your leg) while eating. This helped me a lot.
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Overeating is much more common with a bottle but can happen with the breast and if it ever does - spitting up is the safety valve.
You'll hopefully find the burpy thing starts improving soon as it often gets better with age.
If he's not unhappy about spitting up I wouldn't worry.
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Thanks for your responses. I won't obsess about it so much now. I do have a very overactive let-down; this caused us a lot of problems in the beginning, as he started to put his tongue up to the roof of his mouth to try to get it to stop. Lately the only way he seems happy feeding is when we're lying down. I haven't tried do feed him sitting on my lap though -- I'll try it out next feed. He get very wiggly when I do a cross-cradle hold. I've started to think I hurt his neck somehow when I do it.
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a lactation consultant recommended the sitting up feed for me at 7 weeks. It worked great. Because of my overactive letdown ds was caughing and choking a lot while eating :(