4 month old does not want to take to me anymore

jodya22

please help me! I started working a month ago. He will not take me during the day or before bed. In the middle of the night he will. How can I get him to take me when ever I am home. I already feel disconnected and this is adding it to it.

butchmum

Hey there! Your situation sounds stressful, hang in there. A couple of comments: My son is now five months, but around four months he got so distracted by the big wide world that the only way I could get him to nurse was to go into the bedroom, lie on the bed--in the exact same spot each time--with the blinds drawn. I'm home with him full-time but even now, a month on, he rarely feeds when we're out of the house. He'll eat for a minute or so if he's starving and then pull off straight away. When we get home (and retreat to our dark, quiet, same as always place), he'll tank up again. I know a lot of full-time breastfed babies are the same around the same age, and I've heard a lot of stories of 4m olds who only feed at night--both with those who have gone back to work and with those who are still at home. So don't panic, it's not just you who is in this boat!!

My other thought is just whether your little one might have eaten a lot just before you get back to him? If you know when you're likely to be back I would try to get your caregiver to be sure that he's really hungry when you arrive. Then, if you retreat to the bed I think you've got a good chance of him latching on to feed.

Typically the milk/formula comes out of the bottle much faster than the milk comes out of the breast, and for a distracted "my-brain-is-growing-so-fast-look-how-interesting-the-world-is!!" 4 month old, that quick fix can seem more appealing than settling in to feed. Personally, based on how much my son eats first thing in the morning and last thing at night vs during the actual day, I wouldn't worry too much if your caregiver gave him only a minimal amount for the time that you're away from him.

I would also suggest that you look into your "magic number" (if you haven't already!) so you know how often he needs to feed, and then try and get as many of them in while you're together as possible.

Good luck with it all, and don't worry if he doesn't seem that into you--the truth is that he takes you so much for granted that he doesn't know how much he needs you. xx

marinaburke

I noticed that this weekend for the first time my son is about 4.5 months. I've been back to work for 7 weeks now. This weekend it seemed like he was distracted every time I breast fed and he would only nurse long enough to do one boob when usually he eats off both. But at night he was nursing like usual.

I felt like he was totally dissing me during the day! Lol but butchmoms comment makes sense and made me feel better about it. I may just pump during the day on weekends and nurse him at night so he eats enough.

Knottie96900102

Hello butchmum... Your comment really helped me... I'm going back to work in a month when my baby will be 6 months... And this scares me... The feeling of not being needed by my baby... But what do you mean by by "magic number" what is it? How do you find it?

butchmum

The magic number is the number of feeds your baby needs to get sufficient milk. It's based on the theory that most women produced approximately the same amount of milk, but that what varies greatly is the "storage" capacity of each breast. Therefore, if your breasts are made up of loose tissue, you can store a lot of milk at a time, thus the baby gets more milk each feed and will feed less frequently; if you have more dense breasts, you store less milk, and your baby will feed more frequently. One baby might feed 6 times a day only one boob at a time, another might feed 12 times a day doing both boobs each session, but both will be getting more or less the same amount of milk. The idea then, is that in order to maintain your supply when you're away from your baby you have to pump the number of times and as frequently as the baby would have fed. So, if your baby would have fed every hour and a half, you pump every hour and a half; etc. etc.

So, if you know that your magic number is 8 (that is 8 times emptying both breasts each day) (and just to pick a number at random, each woman will be different, sometimes different with different babies, too) and you're with the baby all day, you might do the first feed at 6am, the last around 6pm, and feed every 2 hours or so in between--and if you're lucky, sleep 12 hours through the night!!  If you're at work during the day, though, the baby might start waking twice in the night to feed, you might feed him/her first thing at 6, again before you leave at 8, right when you get home at 6pm--that's 5 feeds already, so you only need pump and have your caregiver feed them 3 times during the day. Does that make sense?

I read about it here:

https://www.nancymohrbacher.com/blog/2010/8/13/the-magic-number-and-long-term-milk-production-part-1.html

butchmum

Also, regarding the fear that baby isn't that into you:

With our older child, my partner was home full time for a while and then when she went back to work she was part-time and we alternated days home with the baby for quite awhile. Whichever mother she'd been with during the day was the one she turned to for comfort in the evening--even though my partner was breastfeeding. It was very easy to feel (for both of us!) rejected on the day that we'd been at work, rushed home to see the baby, and then have them want the other mother, even if the previous day we'd been the wanted one. Ultimately what consoled me was the realization that our daughter's equanimity at our respective disappearances and reappearances was a very good thing--demonstrating her certainty that we'd be back, and her absolute faith that we were part of her life. Had she seemed clingy or upset on our return it would actually have been a sign that she thought she'd been abandoned. For all babies lucky enough to be born into a stable, loving household they know no other state of being than love. Their continued interest in the rest of the world is not a sign that they don't need you, it's a sign that they take you for granted and that is exactly what you want them to do! They take you for granted when they literally cannot imagine their life without you, when it doesn't even occur to them that you're not going to be there for them. And that means your baby is happy. And that your baby loves you. So don't forget it!!

Knottie96900102

Thanks butchmum

andikay92

Hey butchmum! I have a 4m lil one who's been doing this exact same thing! Thank you for answering this question and settling my worries as well

danyellaa

If it's due to the introduction of bottle more often try pace feeding, making it difficult to feed from a bottle helps them go back to the boob.