NICU started my LO on formula today even though I’m supplying enough breastmilk and okayed using donor breastmilk.
Is this normal? Do I have a say in this?
They told me they’d start tomorrow and would gradually introduce it, not give it all in one bolus. But they started it today at 3p in one whole feed without any of my BM, contrary to what they told me this morning.
Also, after all the crazy pressure from nurses, MDs, and lactation consultants to provide 8 pumpings a day, with 4 hr max of uninterrupted sleep, it feels like such a betrayal to switch him to formula so nonchalantly. I asked why switch him now and the nurse said “if he needs it when he’s home because I’m not producing enough, that his stomach will be sensitized to tolerating it.”
Sadly, it made him vomit and swallow more air than ever … 20ml. Later he was so desperate for my breastmilk that he tried to latch onto my husband’s nipple while biting shakily and drooling at his own wrist. We saw an aggrieved shaky side we’d never seen before after his 3p first ever formula feeding.
Is this ok?
UPDATE:
Thanks Everyone for your input!! I asked for the nurse to be removed from my son’s care after discovering there was no doctor’s orders to give him formula.
While it is standard practice to “transition” premies at 33-34 weeks off donor breastmilk and to Similar Special Care 24 ml as a backup because DBM is so expensive, she blatantly LIED about this, TWICE … either to cover up her own error, or because she straight up decided he should be on formula despite our earlier agreement to add this in GRADUALLY, and only if there were none of my breastmilk.
Is this normal? Do I have a say in this?
They told me they’d start tomorrow and would gradually introduce it, not give it all in one bolus. But they started it today at 3p in one whole feed without any of my BM, contrary to what they told me this morning.
Also, after all the crazy pressure from nurses, MDs, and lactation consultants to provide 8 pumpings a day, with 4 hr max of uninterrupted sleep, it feels like such a betrayal to switch him to formula so nonchalantly. I asked why switch him now and the nurse said “if he needs it when he’s home because I’m not producing enough, that his stomach will be sensitized to tolerating it.”
Sadly, it made him vomit and swallow more air than ever … 20ml. Later he was so desperate for my breastmilk that he tried to latch onto my husband’s nipple while biting shakily and drooling at his own wrist. We saw an aggrieved shaky side we’d never seen before after his 3p first ever formula feeding.
Is this ok?
UPDATE:
Thanks Everyone for your input!! I asked for the nurse to be removed from my son’s care after discovering there was no doctor’s orders to give him formula. While it is standard practice to “transition” premies at 33-34 weeks off donor breastmilk and to Similar Special Care 24 ml as a backup because DBM is so expensive, she blatantly LIED about this, TWICE … either to cover up her own error, or because she straight up decided he should be on formula despite our earlier agreement to add this in GRADUALLY, and only if there were none of my breastmilk.