Formula Feeding General Chatter

[Trillian]

Welcome to the Formula Feeding general chatter thread. This thread is where you can talk about formula feeding your baby/ies with other Mums who formula feed.

Your Moderators for this forum are
MistyFying
MantaRay
Pony
Jennifer13

Your Administrator of this forum is Rouge

If you have any questions or concerns, or you would like to make a suggestion, please do not hesitate to contact them.

[Trillian]

Just bumping this - use it or lose it ladies!

[Party-of-five]

Oh yay just in time
will be great to chat to other mums ff sometimes i get a bit jealous of all this BF talk but i know im doing the best i can.

I only fed DD for one day and then we started FF.I started her on Nan ha gold pro but have only today changed to Heinz gold because she didnt seem satisfied on nan and after all the unsettledness im willing to try anything

Look forward to chatting

[Jakabella]

Hey Lucylu!

I know exactly how you feel! I wasnt able to BF DD as all as I didnt get any milk! I also get pangs of jelousy about the BF thing and DD is 14 month old now!

Hope that your FF journey goes well! Your DD is just gorgeous!!

Kate

[butterfly_warrior]

I have days where the guilt still overwhelms me... and my son is only a little bit younger than Jakabella's daughter.

Most days I'm fine...

Is there anyone still FFing an older child? Sam's been on Nan HA since birth with very few issues, but we seem to be having no success at all in getting him on to cows milk. If he has cows milk on his cereal he will spend the day puking, yet he can have cheese cooked into his dinners and be fine.

BW

[Party-of-five]

Butterfly+ can sam eat other dairy like yogart?? DD1 only drinks 100mls of cows milk a day but eats alot of other dairy

[CrazyLady]

Is there anyone still FFing an older child? Sam's been on Nan HA since birth with very few issues, but we seem to be having no success at all in getting him on to cows milk. If he has cows milk on his cereal he will spend the day puking, yet he can have cheese cooked into his dinners and be fine.

BW

I read somewhere cheese and yogurt are lactose free and that's why you can give them to babies under 1 year. Tried lactose free milk? it's in UHT milk sectionthat I couldn't breast feed

I had a prem baby and she was weak to suck but on top of it had silent reflux and would want to snack every 45 mins including in the night. Charlie couldn't build supply and I felt a nasty pressure. After 6 LC trips, over 100 motillium tabs and 3 months my supply STOPPED because i was so stressed. i had lost all my prego weight plus 8 kilos and I felt ill because of lack of sleep and constantly seeing Charlie get all screamy after a very thin milk feed. Charlie started losing weight so i cracked it and got a tin of formula. We have both been happier since.

That said i do have the odd guilty pang that I couldn't breastfeed consistantly.

[FabFiona]

Thanks for the feedback. I'm thinking I might slowly move him to 3 hours and see how that goes.

As for sterilizing, I have a microwave one that works well for me. I wash first then pop it in there. I don't have much room so it's just as easy to do it in there.

[Life is Good]

Fionaw - how is his sleeping? You didn't mention it in your initial post. Just be aware that if your baby is used to taking 4 hours to digest his formula (like many are and which would explain why he only demands his food at that interval), that popping fresh formula on top of partially digested formula can cause bloating, tummy stretching and additional possetting. I found this out from a nurse when I asked her about feeding our little man more frequently because I thought he was hungry all the time! Just passing on this info, I cannot confirm its accuracy though, as we have a happy chucker anyway!

Welcome Daytonas Mummy Sorry to hear you have had such issues with bubs vomiting. Glad to hear things are on track now.

[widdly]

welcome Daytona Sorry you had troubles with bfing, it is fantastic to hear she is thriving on the formula though. You gave her 2 weeks of pure gold, just remind yourswelf of that whenever you feel guilty.

[Party-of-five]

last night Milly settled really well and slept for 5 hours...today she has started spewing :wall DD1 was happy chucker so im used to it but it still sucks

[FabFiona]

How are we all going? Been a bit quiet lately so I thought I'd pop in.

DS11 wks has been doing some weird things with his feeds lately. He will suck pretty intently for a very short period of time. Then seems "finished" and isn't interested in any more. However this is normally only after 30 or 60 ml. I try and keep offering over the next hour and he will drink but is also squirming and playing with the bottle at the same time. He is particularly bad during his morning feeds.

Any thoughts? His day sleeps have always been terrible so I'm not sure if this is a follow on.

Cheers, Fiona

[CrazyLady]

I had the same issue with Charlie but she worked herself out. She was gaining weight perfectly and MCHN said that it seems something is going right. If you're really worried go get him weighed if your child health centre has open clinics and maybe pick the MCHN's brains. Charlie was also really horrid with day sleeps.

[Life is Good]

I know that there have been some questions surrounding the minimum amount of formula required once solids have been commenced. I asked my paediatrician today and thought that I would relay what he said for those interested. Obviously I could only really ask him questions in relation to our boy, but it should give people an indication, anyway. I just want to preface the following by saying that our bub's height and weight are in proportion (albeit both in the 100th percentile!!) and he got a 100% bill of health. Different weight vs height issues or dietetic requirements could result in the following being inaccurate:

Firstly he said "always ignore the can - that is for babies who are not on solids"

Secondly he said that once baby is on established solids and having a balance diet, i.e. 3 meals per day, they require 800mg of calcium per day which is derived from the formula (particularly for my bub who is milk protein intolerant and cannot ingest calcium any other way). So I suppose that can be reduced if your bub is guzzling yoghurt, cheeses etc.?

Thirdly he said that the absolute minimum for a bub on established solids is 500ml per day BUT that you should be aiming for between 600 and 700mls.

I hope this helps - it sure put my mind at ease

BW - I asked him about bubs having formula beyond one year and he said that it is 100% fine. He even said that they can have formula for as long as they like (obviously within reason, in moderation and not as a food supplement). He said that once babies move onto cow's milk you need to supplement their diet with iron as cows milk contains little or no iron. Even at this stage, all of the iron-fortified cereals constipate our boy, so this is definitely something I will offer him beyond 1 year. I hope this helps.

[butterfly_warrior]

Thanks for that, Sambo. We got some lactose free milk for Sam to try, but then he got sick so the UHT carton is still sitting in the cupboard despite the fact that he's been well again for over a week! Formula is still just way more convenient when out. We still have issues with Sam getting constipated really easily, when the paed suggested we put him on pentavite I made sure to get the one without iron! Poor kid seems to have his mother's slow, sluggish digestive system.

BW

[volcomkitty]

Thanks for that info Sambo.

DD isn't quite having 3 meals a day, just random solids when she's interested, but I was wondering how much milk she should be having/balancing it out with. Now from reading that I've got a bit of guideline to go off.

[Arimeh]

Isn't it funny - I actually asked for this thread to be made, and then bloody forgot about it and never posted in here..

I have formula fed all three of my kids - DS from day 3 in hospital because of some wicked attachment issues, and not very helpful midwives! The experience scarred me so much, I put DD1 on formula from birth, and had a much more enjoyable experience with her as an infant because of it. Then I was determined with DD2 to bf - and then she arrived, and fed for 2 hours immediately, my poor nipples didn't know what hit them, and she was still screaming for food at 10pm that night (she was born at 6.15pm!) so we dropped into KMart on our way home and picked up bottles and formula for her. She also had reflux, was a "happy starver" so wouldn't wake up for feeds, so I would assume she was getting enough from the breast when we eventually started bfing again. And of course, because she wasn't demanding it, I didn't think to give it (cos I thought she was satisfied) so my milk supply dwindled, she never emptied the breast properly because of a lip issue (she couldn't flare her top lip out, so wasn't sucking effectively and emptying each feed) so with all these issues - finally when she was a month old we turned to formula full time. I did express as much as I could (but didn't get much out) but it wasn't fair to my other kids because they were missing out on mummy time. So we made the educated decision for our family and put her on formula. And to this day (she is 6 months) she STILL can't flare her top lip around the bottle teat.

Anyhoo - thats my journey - how is everyone going?

[Mrs P]

Hi Rhichichi
Thanks for the idea. The thing is, she's already loving the bottle. She gets very excited and she loves to hold it herself. And afterwards she is so happy too. She was never like that with an ebm bottle. I guess I'm just a bit lost, she was such a booby girl (5 feeds a day) then suddenly stopped. She did have a blocked nose but she is better now, I think maybe she's just not interested in booby anymore.