Mel, my experience with comp feeding with Olivia as a newborn is hospital was this:

Olivia had a very low body temp, and was a very sleepy newborn, spending a lot of time under the toaster in the special care nursery for the first 3 days of her little life. As such, she had no idea what to do with the boob and it took us 3 days to get any tyoe of attachement happening. As you know, I was pretty bloody determined to BF, so I persevered with her, but I had to hand express colostrum and then BM to help my milk come in. She was formula fed through the gavage (the mix was about 10ml of fomula mixed with whatever I had expressed, fed through the nose).

Andrew was horrified at this and suggested we bottle feed, but the midwives were REALLY determined not to let a bottle or teat near her!!!!! To the point where they told him "there are no bottles or teats sterilised" to put him off!! LOL!

I was OK in my head with them being so anti bottle/formula, because I knew in my heart Olivia would get the hang of the boob eventually.

My lovely midwife Jane told me afterwards (once Olivia has established breastfeeding really well) that they pretty much do anything to avoid FF/Bottles in the early days, as it is such a crucial time for the BM, and if they let tired emotional mothers "give in" to the bottle, sometimes the mothers are regretful.

However, she did say that if a new Mum had made the choice to comp feed or to FF from birth, they fully supported that. But that sometimes in the haze of tiredness and pain of the first few days after the birth, women can make the "wrong" decision for themselves, which they then regret, hence the midwives make it really tough to get hold of bottles!!

This was just my experience in Darwin. Looking back, I am glad they were this determined on my behalf, because Olivia then went on to BF really well for 6 months........