When to Change Bottle Nipple Flow

[Anonymous]

DS is 3 mo and EBF. We've started 1 bottle/ day and he's doing great using the nuk nipple but am looking for advice on when do you typically change to a faster flow nipple?

[Anonymous]

We never did. My son is almost a year old and we still use Level 1 nipples. He's never complained about it being too slow, so we didn't fix what wasn't broken.

[Anonymous]

I switched when my son was 4 months. It was taking him forever (30+ minutes) to finish a bottle, so I figured, why not try a medium flow nipple? He had no problems with it after the first or two tries. Later on we tried a fast flow nipple and he kept pushing the bottle out of his mouth, so I knew it was too fast. So here we are at almost a year, using medium flow nipples.

[Anonymous]

We never did. My son (10 months) is also breastfed. We use the size 1 or sometimes the size 2 avent nipples. The only reason we use/have the size 2 is they came with the larger bottles.

[Anonymous]

We also never did. I tried a faster one at ~6 mos but it seemed to choke him. I think he had a strong suck so w/ the faster nipple it was just way too fast. So I just stayed w/ the Level 1. Got off the bottle onto a sippy at 12 mos w/o any issues.

[Anonymous]

we've been at level 2 born free nipples since about 6 months (DD is now 11 months). level 3 is still waaaaaay too fast. she chokes and pushes it out if we try the level 3.

[Anonymous]

At the Breastfeeding Center they advise to stick the smallest-size nipple the baby will tolerate. I think the reason is so that he doesn't develop a preference for the bottle over the nipple. For working moms it can can also help discourage him from drinking too much bottled breastmilk during the day (and then not wanting to BF at night when mom comes home, which can lower her supply and begin the vicious cycle where mom can't pump enough to keep up with baby).

My 9 mo is still on level 1.

[Anonymous]

We never changed with either kid. Agree that if you are BFing is is best to keep the slowest flow option. We used Nuk nipples with #1 and Dr. Brown's nipples with #2. #1 BF until 14mo, #2 is 10.5 mo & BFing. Neither ever showed any preference for the bottle.

[Anonymous]

We changed when it was taking my son much longer to finish a bottle then it took for me to feed him from the boob. I didn't want him to get discouraged from taking a bottle. He's on Level 2 and has been there since about 3 months. He takes boob and bottle interchangeably with no problem.

[Anonymous]

We changed with dd #1 around 3 months because it was taking her FOREVER to finish a bottle. She took to the faster flow just fine and then three months later we switched to the fast flow. With dd#2 we tried to switch her at 3 months and she would have nothing of it so here we are at 4.5 months still slow flow and that's just fine. I would say if it's taking a long time for your child to finish their bottle, give it a try. It may take a couple bottles for them to get the hang of it but if you try a few times and still gagging..then stick with the slower flow. With our second daughter I would switch and then five minutes into the bottle I'd put the slow flow on becuase she just wasn't having it.

[Anonymous]

We changed nipples when I could tell that my son was try to suck out more than he could get. He had lots of tummy/gas issues and we discovered that changing nipples helped some because he was not sucking in extra air with each bottle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We never did. My son is almost a year old and we still use Level 1 nipples. He's never complained about it being too slow, so we didn't fix what wasn't broken.

Ditto this. My daycare stopped asking after awhile. My breasts aren't fast flow, and I didn't want any issues. We've never had a problem.

[Anonymous]

My breastfed daughter continued to use a Level 1 nipple until she bottle weaned several months after her first birthday.

[Anonymous]

I agree with a lot of the PPs above. If you want to keep the baby nursing, she might get frustrated if she starts getting a faster flow from the bottle, and go on a nursing strike. No need to change until you wean or go to a sippy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree with a lot of the PPs above. If you want to keep the baby nursing, she might get frustrated if she starts getting a faster flow from the bottle, and go on a nursing strike. No need to change until you wean or go to a sippy.

(PP again): I should note that she only gets bottles at day care, so like some of the other PPs I'm not too concerned over how long it takes her (and haven't gotten any complaints from her providers).