Feeding so confused

[Emma04]

My little boy is 13 weeks old. I’m so worried that I’m not doing the right thing with his feeding routine. I’m sure my anxiety is heightened due to lockdown and not being able to get him weighed to check his progress too.

He’s currently taking 4ozs every three hours, is this too much or not enough?! Sometimes he’s screaming after two and a half hours so should I then feed him earlier? When will I know to up his feed to 5ozs I tried this once or twice and he doesn’t take more than 4ozs.

He’s also waking every three to four hours during the night for feeds.

Is this normal do I need to change this? Anyone have any advice for a very confused first time mummy?

[stephkp]

Hi.

If you have some scales that you can weigh yourself on at home, weigh yourself and then weigh yourself and your baby and then take off your original weight. It may not be perfect but it will give you an idea on weight gain.

If he seems hungry at 2 and a half hours, feed him. My midwives were really good at telling me my son had to be fed every 3 hours without fail, but sometimes he wasn’t hungry then, sometimes we only got to 2 hours and he was hungry again. Follow the cues he gives you and you can’t really go wrong.

As with the night feeds, that’s a completely normal time frame for his age. Some will sleep right through at that age but I think they are few and far between. Their tummies are also still really small so they do need feeding more frequently.

I think the rule of thumb for increasing the amount, is if they finish a full bottle regularly increase the amount. I always made more and if he didn’t take it, I got rid of it.

It’s all a massive learning curve and sometimes we don’t get things quite right, but we learn for next time. It’s a very worrying time but I’m sure you are doing a fab job xx

[Seb9]

Just follow his feeding cues, if he's crying and will take some milk let him. I breast feed so couldn't tell how much my daughter gets, so I just let her feed whenever she wants too, sometimes it's a quick snack and sometimes a full meal.

If you look up pace feeding so that you get him to take the milk slowly like if he was breastfed so he can stop when he's ready, bottle feeding is so easy for them, they can chug down a lot more milk than they need.

I'd say try not to worry about guidelines about how much he should be drinking, like I say with my own I've no idea how much she takes during the day, but I know she's doing OK as she has plenty of wet nappies and lots of poos so I now she's getting enough.

My little girl is 8 months and still feeds from me twice in the night, I don't think you've anything to worry about, they all have different routines that they'll get into. No babies come out the same, and anyone who is smug about their baby sleeping, remember it's nothing to do with them as parents and that they're just lucky that their baby sleeps xx

[Hidden]

I was always told that when they drain the bottle you need to up the ounce of bottle x

[Annh17]

Go by what your baby is telling you. Try giving him an extra ounce at last feed of day, that’s what we done and she then woke once a night, for a week, then slept through.

Every baby is different, our LG was sleeping through at 6 weeks, at 4 weeks we put extra ounce in last feed, she woke once during night for 1 week then slept through, at 13 weeks she was having 5 6-7oz bottles a day. x

[Emma04]

Thank you all so much for taking the time to reply I feel much better having read these. Thank you!

[Hidden]

My babies could only drink small amounts but would be hungry again sooner so I changed formula to hungry baby so they ate the same a as mount but would fill them up more.

[Eme3sh]

All sounds perfectly normally and like you’re doing great. I’m on baby number 2 in 2 years and still feel like a first time mum - I have those ‘but it’s only been 2 hours!’ moments, but just remind myself that he doesn’t have a clock! My little one is 7 weeks and can sometimes do five hours apart at night, sometimes three. They’re just sporadic for the first bit I think. And you unfortunately can’t force them to drink more however much you try! If he starts emptying bottles, just up them an ounce is how I do it. Baby number 1 started to settle into a more set routine around 4 months I think, but naps still took a lot of work to get into a set schedule. It really is just trial and error I think. More error in my case atm haha!

[Emma04 in reply to Eme3sh]

That’s reassuring thank you! Naps I really haven’t got the hang of yet so that’s made me feel better too. Just having a week of doubting myself.