8 week old with bad feeding patterm

[HettyO]

I EBF my furst son but due to medical reasons I'm having to bottle feed my second. It's all new and a bit confusing still.

Ive effectively been feeding on demand with ny son who is now 8.5 weeks old and 11lbs 2oz. He has recently been taking 4oz in a daytime feed (sometimes 5oz but I'm only making and giving him the extra if he is still hungry). I'm finding he's getting hungry less than 3 hours later and then sometimes isn't taking the full 4oz in which case he gets hungry again even sooner. Finding it very hard to establish any kind of routine as it's obviously making naps difficult. It's also making it harder to work out if he is waking in the night from hunger or for another reason. He never took to dream feeding but will wake between 11 and 12 naturally and take between 2-4oz and then again between 4 and 5.

We recently went up a teat size as had similar problem but he was also falling asleep on the bottle. He then upped his feed to 5oz consistently over 2 days before dropping back down to to the 4oz hes now taking. Does he need to go up again? He's using mam bottles and currently on size 2 teat.

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[HettyO]

Sorry, two more bottle feeding questions:

Son will normally complete his bottle within 20-30minutes but not always. At what point do you stop re offering the bottle and effectively cut off till the next feed time?

He has naturally reduced his night feeds on his own in terms of the quantity he takes (averages 2oz of a 4oz bottle). As and when he ups his bottle amount in the day do I increase his night bottles to keep inline or restrict him to this amount in the hope he'll eventually feel there's no point waking up for it anymore? I think he's getting enough calories through his dayfeeds, messy as they are.

Also, as he seems to have established a night feeding pattern do I resist offering a bottle at any other wake ups? What if you think there's a growth spurt in play?

[creations]

Hi there
Sorry you didn't have a reply yet.
I'm afraid I can't advise over the teat size but what I can say is that if he is draining the bottles and you are sometimes having to make more then it would be better to make the larger amount for every feed.  At the end of any feed the4 bottle should not be drained, there needs to be about an oz left over.  If/when they are drained it's a sign to increase the amount you make/offer even if it is not always taken.
During growth spurts the amount needs to increase quite significantly and then after a few days it will reduce back, at those times make sure you offer as much as he wants.  After the growth spurt it's probably okay to reduce back down how much you offer but always making sure there is an oz left.

20 - 30 min to take the feed sounds fine.
From memory I am pretty sure you shouldn't re-offer the same bottle when it is 1hr old (ie 1hr from the first offer as this is when saliva hits the bottle) due to possible bacteria growth.  Anything you want to offer after that time needs to be a fresh sterilised bottle and fresh formula.

Night feeds continue for a good while yet.  At least one is needed until around 8 months or so (this might be a dream feed or a night feed).
During growth spurts you might need more in the night  bottle like you do in the day. I don't think there would be any advantage to trying to limit the amount offered because they need those additional calories to grow and they just can't fit it all in during the day, after the growth spurt is over it's usually pretty obvious and the feed goes back to a more normal amount.

do I resist offering a bottle at any other wake ups? What if you think there's a growth spurt in play?

As feeds are usually 3hrs apart (and with just one longer stretch over night) if it has been say 2.5hrs and there is a NW I'd probably try a feed rather than trying to make baby wait another 30 mins.  Even during a growth spurt baby is likely to go a reasonable length between feeds, there might be an additional night feed or LO might just need more in the bottle.

If your LO can't quite make it to 3hrs it's okay. Some babies need to be fed on a shorter E time for various reasons.  If it's more like 2.5hrs and hard to stretch closer to 3hrs then I'd just go with it until he's a bit bigger.

Sorry I couldn't answer your question about teat size. Hope this is some help.

[HettyO]

Thank you so much for taking the time to respond.

We've been disposing of bottles at about the hour mark on the assumption that if he was hungry hed have already eaten it by that point and any later it would start to encroach into next feed time.

He's gaining weight nicely and is now more or less following a 3-3.5 hour feed pattern (worked hard on naps and think things helped) except at night. After bedtime at 7 he'll do a nice long stretch now till 1ish. Still only taking mostly 3oz feeds (we make up 4). Occasionally he might have as much as 6 but this isn't following a pattern e.g first feed of the day. No matter how much he eats at each feed though he is pretty much having 27oz across a day which is what is advised for his weight give or take. We're just trusting in his own judgement of what he needs.

Finally feel I'm getting used to it all and already trusting my own judgement and his. Makes it very clear when he's had enough

[creations]

Sounds like things are going pretty well