Transitioning to bottles

oakley325

Hi everyone! I am returning to work FT in three weeks and am having difficulty getting my 3 month LO to take the bottle. When I try to give it to her during the day she looks at me with this skeptical expression for 15 minutes while chewing the nipple or giving a half hearted suck every now and then until she gets tired of playing and cries. At night she just looks at the bottle and screams inconsolably. I always end up BFing because she will just keep crying. I have tried different bottles and nipples with different flows. Any tips or tricks you have used?

Avion22

FTM here (and LO isn't even born yet!) but I went to a BFing class a few nights ago, and the LC said that sometimes it's easier to have someone else try to give bottles.  The baby is used to your breasts and knows that you're holding out on her :-)  Maybe try having your H (or someone else) give her bottles while you're out of the room.

oakley325

DH has tried both when I am out and when I am in a different room and it has not been pretty. He also works FT and is only able to bottle feed at night when she is going to bed and is pretty tired so full meltdown occurs.

djm31012

In addition to having DH or someone else give it to her...I would try different bottles.....babies can be picky!

oakley325

I actually had minor success today, sitting in the backseat with her in her car seat in a parking lot. She played with it a little but ate about an ounce!!

VitaLuna

My LO played with it the first 5 or so times that I tried, and that's ok. They're working on having a new sensation in their mouth. I also had to try a couple different types. She finally went for a lansinoh momma nipple on a dr brown wide neck . She would only take bottles for daddy or grandma.

aglenn

Ditto the very warm.  DD never was very good at taking bottles but she would take them better if they were really warm (like, warmer than I would think she would want them).  Also when we were having trouble with DD we were advised to quit trying different bottles and nipples because that can be more confusing.  It seemed to help her once we got more consistent with it.  We used the Medela bottles and nipples, FWIW.