At what point did you give up nursing a baby who prefers a bottle?

[Anonymous]

My 9mo has mostly developed a preference for the bottle over breast. I wfh and we have a nanny here- I usually nurse her when she wakes up, then she gets a mid morning bottle from our nanny while I pump and work. Was taking a work break to nurse her in the afternoon, and then before bed I nurse and she gets a pumped bottle for the rest.

Recently she just has no interest in nursing and pulls of very fast. I know she’s not full because she will take a bottle after. I exclusively pumped for my first who refused to latch, and this is not that. My supply is going down because she isn’t nursing enough so I feel I need to either switch over to predominantly pumping (or formula.)

Has anyone been in a similar situation? A baby who’s just over breastfeeding and isn’t a very small infant anymore?

[Anonymous]

I stopped nursing when this happened. For my first, I felt guilty (DO NOT FEEL GUILTY) and I pumped for 3 more months and it was hell. I wish I'd just stopped. For my second baby, once we had a solid week or so of refusing to nurse, I weaned entirely and went to formula. It was incredibly freeing and easy.

[Anonymous]

9 months is a really solid amount of time. Do what works best for both of you! Decide to pump X times a day or just use formula. You will be at milk before you know it.

[Anonymous]

You need to cut out the bottles and just offer breast until your milk returns then stick to 1 bottle only. They should be ready for solids soon

[Anonymous]

I would stop nursing at times the baby isn't interested. Either add a pumping session to replace (if you want/that fits with your work and life schedule) or more solids or introduce/add more formula to your feeding schedule. At 9 months you're pretty near being done with needing to breastfeed, so I wouldn't keep trying to nurse an uncooperative child.

[Anonymous]

The bottle is easier for babies. You could try a slower flow bottle nipple and pump for a minute before you put him on the breast so he gets milk faster. Also massaging your breast helps the flow. He’ll settle back into nursing In a bit.

[Anonymous]

Yup, this happened to me. This is my post: https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1029282.page

Basically, it made nursing so, so un-fun. I ended up moving to exclusively pumping with the Willow (rather than weaning over to formula), mostly for my mental health. The immediate switch to exclusively pumping was awesome. After so many stressful, crappy nursing sessions it was nice to just pump and be done with it. However, over time the pumping started wearing on me too (eventually I was pumping 6 times a day and not nursing at all). I went from 6 to 5 to 4 pumps a day without losing much in the way of supply. But dropping to 3 pumps a day at 10 months plummeted my supply. I'm down to just a pump a day now, baby turns 1 this month, but she's been 90% formula since 10 months. Last pump in the next couple weeks.

If I were you, without the mental health concerns that I had, I'd wean to formula ASAP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You need to cut out the bottles and just offer breast until your milk returns then stick to 1 bottle only. They should be ready for solids soon

Maybe you meant .."You could consider cutting out bottles and just offer breast milk..." It is one of many options. At 9 months, I would assume they have started solids.

[Anonymous]

Yes! This happened to me when he was about 7 months and I stuck with exclusively pumping until my milk dried up when he was 11 months.

Looking back, it was so miserable and I would have stopped sooner. Maybe pumped a little bit just to give him some breast milk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:9 months is a really solid amount of time. Do what works best for both of you! Decide to pump X times a day or just use formula. You will be at milk before you know it.

+1

[Anonymous]

Do you mind pumping? I work from home and didn’t mind pumping at all. I’d just pump for another 3 months and be done with nursing. Make sure you give her as many feedings with bottles as you did nursing however. And start using a cup with breast milk in it now if you haven’t already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you mind pumping? I work from home and didn’t mind pumping at all. I’d just pump for another 3 months and be done with nursing. Make sure you give her as many feedings with bottles as you did nursing however. And start using a cup with breast milk in it now if you haven’t already.

Op here. I don’t mind pumping. Just don’t want to do both! Am a little sad to give up nursing - it’s just a situation where sometimes she’ll nurse and sometimes she won’t and in that case I’ll either have to nurse and pump or my supply will tank.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you mind pumping? I work from home and didn’t mind pumping at all. I’d just pump for another 3 months and be done with nursing. Make sure you give her as many feedings with bottles as you did nursing however. And start using a cup with breast milk in it now if you haven’t already.

Op here. I don’t mind pumping. Just don’t want to do both! Am a little sad to give up nursing - it’s just a situation where sometimes she’ll nurse and sometimes she won’t and in that case I’ll either have to nurse and pump or my supply will tank.

Is there a particular time of day that she reliably nurses? One of my babies was similar to yours at that age, but almost always nursed happily first thing in the morning. So that's all we did. I continued pumping at other times, but only because my baby seemed to have some issues with the formulas we tried. But I just added one pumping session after baby went to bed in addition to my workday pumping. Has your baby ever had formula? If she likes/tolerates it well, I would recommend slowly weaning off the pump. If your baby will continue consistently nursing at a particular time of day, there is a decent chance that you will maintain enough of a supply for that even without pumping.

[Anonymous]

Wean! You will be so glad. It feels like a huge decision but three months isn’t a big deal over a lifespan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you mind pumping? I work from home and didn’t mind pumping at all. I’d just pump for another 3 months and be done with nursing. Make sure you give her as many feedings with bottles as you did nursing however. And start using a cup with breast milk in it now if you haven’t already.

Op here. I don’t mind pumping. Just don’t want to do both! Am a little sad to give up nursing - it’s just a situation where sometimes she’ll nurse and sometimes she won’t and in that case I’ll either have to nurse and pump or my supply will tank.

Is there a particular time of day that she reliably nurses? One of my babies was similar to yours at that age, but almost always nursed happily first thing in the morning. So that's all we did. I continued pumping at other times, but only because my baby seemed to have some issues with the formulas we tried. But I just added one pumping session after baby went to bed in addition to my workday pumping. Has your baby ever had formula? If she likes/tolerates it well, I would recommend slowly weaning off the pump. If your baby will continue consistently nursing at a particular time of day, there is a decent chance that you will maintain enough of a supply for that even without pumping.

Thank you, yes this is what I’ve been doing. My dd will reliably nurse in the morning and usually a bit before bed + bottle. I’ve been pumping the other times. My nipples just keep cracking from the pump, so it’s pretty uncomfortable.