For those who had babies too sleepy to get enough milk breastfeeding, when/were you able to transition to BF only?

[l2e]

I have a 1 week old (38 +4 so a bit early) who was a bit jaundiced and unable to nurse more than a few sucks even with a shield until recently so I've been attempting nursing (she's built up to 10 min w/ shield), giving her a bottle of pumped milk from the last session, followed by pumping every 3 hours. This whole process is lengthy as you can imagine so I'm just super sleep deprived. For those who had similar situations, when were you able to build up to breastfeeding only? Any tips?

She basically falls asleep at the breast after 10 min (sucks about 20 mL of milk, I rented a baby scale ) and is too tired to continue. She was losing too much weight, so the doctor instructed us to feed her bottles of pumped milk or formula too.

 

[vee78]

@l2e We went through the same thing. Baby born at 38+2 and was jaundice. Trouble latching, tongue tie, and sleeping in under 7 minutes of breastfeeding. Lost tons of weight. Bilirubin levels went up instead of down. After 4 days, we did combo feed with half formula half breast milk in bottle after each breastfeeding session. 1.5 weeks later she gained a ton and bilirubin issues resolved. We stopped the formula feeding. We went to lactation consult to correct the latching issues, and after that we were successful in transitioning to EBF.

 

[pioneer3mm]

@l2e my milk took about a week to come in and my LO was jaundiced so I would offer boob and then top off with formula while pumping to establish my supply. I wasn’t stopped giving her formula by around 2 weeks but I was still pumping and offering a bottle because she never seemed to be satisfied at breast. around 5 weeks is when I was able to switch to EBF and we are still going strong at 13 weeks though I will need to go back to work in 2 weeks so sadly will need to go back to bottle feeding during the day

 

[chrisnm]

@l2e I’m currently in the same boat as you! LO was born almost a full month early (35+6. While in the hospital we were told that “early” babies tend to be sleepier. This means that any extra energy they spend trying to BF basically wears them out too much, so we were told to time our BF.

• So we attempt to BF for only 5-10 minutes, then switch to the bottle feeding while I pump also. This helps to make sure she isn’t wasting all her energy before eating and that way we can guarantee she’s getting food in, as well as making sure I have a supply. We can slowly transition that 5-10 minutes to 10-15, then maybe 15-20, but we’re advised to take it slow and gradually increase it, not just switch to straight BF in one or two days. Right now we are at the 10-15 minute mark and hopefully after Xmas will try the 15-20 mark.
• we were told to feed every 3-4 hours, with 4 hours being an absolute max she’s allowed to go without eating. She generally won’t sleep more than 2 hours regardless so we don’t have to worry about this lol. The NICU nurses said to wake her up to eat in the middle of the night, even if she was resting and sleeping fine.
• I also use a shield and there’s no way with her being as little as she was would she have been able to latch. We still use the nipple and have used it for 3 weeks now. I was told it may be a few weeks to a few months before we can drop using the shield, if I wanted to stop using it at all.
• Changing her diaper halfway through a feeding absolutely wakes her up so we try to do that if we can too, since she’ll finish the rest of the bottle now and sometimes ask for more!
• It’s taken almost 3 weeks but LO has now finally hit birth weight! She dropped 8%-12% body weight after being born for the 6 days she was in NICU and was only gaining 10-20g of weight a day at home afterwards. In one week (this past week) she gained over 50g a day! So slowly her body has figured it out.

So although I’m still working on it, it does get better! Hoping by end of January to be BF only with the occasional nighttime bottle for DH to take over a feeding while I sleep

 

[l2e]

@chrisnm Congrats on hitting birth weight! Yeah we were also instructed to not go more than 3 hours between feedings which is rough since each feeding + pumping takes an hour. I'm hoping once we hit birth weight they will relax that a bit for night time. Thanks for the diaper tip, I was changing her before each feed to wake her up, but it may be more effective to try that in the middle.

 

[jonmaths]

@l2e Similar situation, her transfering got a lot better at 5 weeks and I stopped pumping. We continued to top up with a bit of formula until 12 weeks but honestly I think we could have stopped sooner. 7 months and going strong with EBF. It was hard, but it was worth it. Good luck!