Congratulations for exclusively breastfeeding your baby for three months. That's terrific! And your baby is obviously smart — she knows there is magic under your shirt, which is why she isn't settling for a bottle. However, the reality is you have to go back to work, and what are you going to do if she still isn't taking a bottle when that fateful day comes?
Here are a number of suggestions. You may already have tried many of them, but in case you haven't, let's start at the top and work our way through them. First of all, have someone else give her the bottle while you're out of the house. Babies can smell their moms from a distance of at least 20 feet, and she may know you're around even if you're in another room. Offer her the bottle when she's not dreadfully hungry, rather than waiting until she's starving. If she takes a pacifier, try a bottle nipple similar to the pacifier she uses. For example, if she sucks on a latex pacifier, use a latex bottle nipple rather than a silicone one and vice versa. If she just chews on the nipple and plays with it, let her. She may actually start to suckle on it.
Make sure you have a lot of time to put your feet up and relax during this process. If she starts crying and pushes the bottle away, back off, comfort her, and try again. The last thing you want to do is get in a battle with her over the bottle. If you've tried three times and she refuses all three times, then call it a meal. Do not breastfeed her immediately. Wait five or 10 minutes, and do something else entirely different before you put her to the breast so she won't associate her refusal to bottlefeed with immediate gratification.
Some mothers have induced their baby to take a bottle by holding the baby in a totally different position than they would when breastfeeding. Try putting her in an infant or car seat so she is semi-upright, and then feed her the bottle while facing her. Once she is used to taking a bottle, you can hold her as you usually would for feedings. One enterprising father put on his wife's bathrobe and tucked the bottle under his arm while holding the baby in a breastfeeding position. That won't work for you, but it might work for Daddy!
I'm sure some people will tell you that if you just wait her out, she'll eventually be hungry enough to take a bottle. That's not necessarily true, and I don't think it's a good practice for either one of you. Starving a baby into submission is not a good idea. We never want to make mealtime into a battleground — now, when she's 2 years old, or ever.
Keep in mind that back in the 1940s, mothers were advised to have their babies feeding from a cup by 2 months of age (and potty trained by 6 months, but that's another story!). If all else fails, you can feed her using a little cup — a shot glass or small see-through plastic juice glass works well. Put her in an upright position in your left arm and bring the cup to her mouth, tilting it gently until a wee bit goes in. She'll actually begin to lap and then to drink it. I'd practice this with a bit of sweetened water until she gets the hang of it, as you don't want to waste any of your precious expressed milk! You can even use a hollow-handled medicine spoon to do the same thing.
Often after you've tried this, the baby will go ahead and take a bottle because cup feeding isn't familiar and it doesn't satisfy her urge to suck. Once she can cup feed fairly proficiently, then you have an alternative for when you are at work — either cup or bottle — and her caregiver can try either.
Some babies don't eat very much when Mommy isn't home, and since they have been separated from her all day, may begin waking a bit more frequently at night simply to touch base, so to speak. So don't be surprised if your baby awakens a couple of times at night to feed after you return to work. Treasure these quiet and intimate times that you have to reconnect with your baby. If you nurse her lying down in bed, you will probably be able to doze off.
I've heard many moms in your situation say things like, "It's my fault. If I had only given her a bottle a day from the beginning, this wouldn't be happening." Please be assured that this isn't true.
Many babies who have been getting bottles all along will suddenly decide at about 3 months that they don't want to take a bottle anymore, that they simply prefer breastfeeding. And why not? It's warm, cozy, sweet-smelling, relational, and done their favorite person — Mommy. So while starting an occasional bottle when the baby is ready to take one (once she's gaining weight and latching on well, and your milk supply is established and your nipples aren't sore) may smooth the process later on, it isn't necessarily an ironclad guarantee that your baby will take the bottle when you really want her to.
Good luck!
Thursday, August 26, 2010
How can I teach my breastfed baby to take a bottle?
Jan Barger, lactation consultant
(this excerpt was taken from babycenterblogs from a mom who was having troubles getting her 3 month old baby to take a bottle. Jan Barger is a well known lactation consultant and author and the following is her response)
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Monday, August 16, 2010
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Monday, August 9, 2010
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Breast Milk Sugars Give Infants a Protective Coat
August 2, 2010
By NICHOLAS WADE
A large part of human milk cannot be digested by babies and seems to have a purpose quite different from infant nutrition — that of influencing the composition of the bacteria in the infant’s gut.
The details of this three-way relationship between mother, child and gut microbes are being worked out by three researchers at the University of California, Davis — Bruce German, Carlito Lebrilla and David Mills. They and colleagues have found that a particular strain of bacterium, a subspecies of Bifidobacterium longum, possesses a special suite of genes that enable it to thrive on the indigestible component of milk.
This subspecies is commonly found in the feces of breast-fed infants. It coats the lining of the infant’s intestine, protecting it from noxious bacteria.
Infants presumably acquire the special strain of bifido from their mothers, but strangely, it has not yet been detected in adults. “We’re all wondering where it hides out,” Dr. Mills said.
The indigestible substance that favors the bifido bacterium is a slew of complex sugars derived from lactose, the principal component of milk. The complex sugars consist of a lactose molecule on to which chains of other sugar units have been added. The human genome does not contain the necessary genes to break down the complex sugars, but the bifido subspecies does, the researchers say in a review of their progress in today’s Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The complex sugars were long thought to have no biological significance, even though they constitute up to 21 percent of milk. Besides promoting growth of the bifido strain, they also serve as decoys for noxious bacteria that might attack the infant’s intestines. The sugars are very similar to those found on the surface of human cells, and are constructed in the breast by the same enzymes. Many toxic bacteria and viruses bind to human cells by docking with the surface sugars. But they will bind to the complex sugars in milk instead. “We think mothers have evolved to let this stuff flush through the infant,” Dr. Mills said.
Dr. German sees milk as “an astonishing product of evolution,” one which has been vigorously shaped by natural selection because it is so critical to the survival of both mother and child. “Everything in milk costs the mother — she is literally dissolving her own tissues to make it,” he said. From the infant’s perspective, it is born into a world full of hostile microbes, with an untrained immune system and lacking the caustic stomach acid which in adults kills most bacteria. Any element in milk that protects the infant will be heavily favored by natural selection.
“We were astonished that milk had so much material that the infant couldn’t digest,” Dr. German said. “Finding that it selectively stimulates the growth of specific bacteria, which are in turn protective of the infant, let us see the genius of the strategy — mothers are recruiting another life-form to baby-sit their baby.”
Dr. German and his colleagues are trying to “deconstruct” milk, on the theory that the fluid has been shaped by 200 million years of mammalian evolution and holds a wealth of information about how best to feed and defend the human body. Though milk itself is designed for infants, its lessons may apply to adults.
The complex sugars, for instance, are evidently a way of influencing the gut microflora, so they might in principle be used to help premature babies, or those born by caesarean, who do not immediately acquire the bifido strain. It has long been thought there was no source of the sugars other than human milk, but they have recently been detected in whey, a waste byproduct of cheesemaking. The three researchers plan to test the complex sugars for benefit in premature infants and in the elderly.
The proteins in milk also have special roles. One, called Alpha-lactalbumin, can attack tumor cells and those infected by viruses by restoring their lost ability to commit cell suicide. The protein, which accumulates when an infant is weaned, is also the signal for the breast to remodel itself back to normal state.
Such findings have made the three researchers keenly aware that every component of milk probably has a special role. “It’s all there for a purpose, though we’re still figuring out what that purpose is,” Dr. Mills said. “So for God’s sake, please breast-feed.”
By NICHOLAS WADE
A large part of human milk cannot be digested by babies and seems to have a purpose quite different from infant nutrition — that of influencing the composition of the bacteria in the infant’s gut.
The details of this three-way relationship between mother, child and gut microbes are being worked out by three researchers at the University of California, Davis — Bruce German, Carlito Lebrilla and David Mills. They and colleagues have found that a particular strain of bacterium, a subspecies of Bifidobacterium longum, possesses a special suite of genes that enable it to thrive on the indigestible component of milk.
This subspecies is commonly found in the feces of breast-fed infants. It coats the lining of the infant’s intestine, protecting it from noxious bacteria.
Infants presumably acquire the special strain of bifido from their mothers, but strangely, it has not yet been detected in adults. “We’re all wondering where it hides out,” Dr. Mills said.
The indigestible substance that favors the bifido bacterium is a slew of complex sugars derived from lactose, the principal component of milk. The complex sugars consist of a lactose molecule on to which chains of other sugar units have been added. The human genome does not contain the necessary genes to break down the complex sugars, but the bifido subspecies does, the researchers say in a review of their progress in today’s Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The complex sugars were long thought to have no biological significance, even though they constitute up to 21 percent of milk. Besides promoting growth of the bifido strain, they also serve as decoys for noxious bacteria that might attack the infant’s intestines. The sugars are very similar to those found on the surface of human cells, and are constructed in the breast by the same enzymes. Many toxic bacteria and viruses bind to human cells by docking with the surface sugars. But they will bind to the complex sugars in milk instead. “We think mothers have evolved to let this stuff flush through the infant,” Dr. Mills said.
Dr. German sees milk as “an astonishing product of evolution,” one which has been vigorously shaped by natural selection because it is so critical to the survival of both mother and child. “Everything in milk costs the mother — she is literally dissolving her own tissues to make it,” he said. From the infant’s perspective, it is born into a world full of hostile microbes, with an untrained immune system and lacking the caustic stomach acid which in adults kills most bacteria. Any element in milk that protects the infant will be heavily favored by natural selection.
“We were astonished that milk had so much material that the infant couldn’t digest,” Dr. German said. “Finding that it selectively stimulates the growth of specific bacteria, which are in turn protective of the infant, let us see the genius of the strategy — mothers are recruiting another life-form to baby-sit their baby.”
Dr. German and his colleagues are trying to “deconstruct” milk, on the theory that the fluid has been shaped by 200 million years of mammalian evolution and holds a wealth of information about how best to feed and defend the human body. Though milk itself is designed for infants, its lessons may apply to adults.
The complex sugars, for instance, are evidently a way of influencing the gut microflora, so they might in principle be used to help premature babies, or those born by caesarean, who do not immediately acquire the bifido strain. It has long been thought there was no source of the sugars other than human milk, but they have recently been detected in whey, a waste byproduct of cheesemaking. The three researchers plan to test the complex sugars for benefit in premature infants and in the elderly.
The proteins in milk also have special roles. One, called Alpha-lactalbumin, can attack tumor cells and those infected by viruses by restoring their lost ability to commit cell suicide. The protein, which accumulates when an infant is weaned, is also the signal for the breast to remodel itself back to normal state.
Such findings have made the three researchers keenly aware that every component of milk probably has a special role. “It’s all there for a purpose, though we’re still figuring out what that purpose is,” Dr. Mills said. “So for God’s sake, please breast-feed.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)