Breast feeding a preemie

SoonToBeTabor

Hey ladies. I had my baby on Tuesday and now that we have her breathing under control, they are saying that she may start BF! (we're in the NICU)

The only issue that we have is getting her to stay awake. As soon as our skins touch, she falls asleep. We have tried getting her naked, stroking her, rubbing her with a wet nap and just about everything we can think of.

Her nurse said that it usually takes preemies a while a catch on. Was this true for your LO's? We're going to try for 10 minutes on each breast then give her the bottle and the rest through her NG tube.

I refuse to let myself get discouraged but wanted to know if you had a preemie, how long it took.

noah-bear

What we did was attempt breastfeeding about 6 times. He only took about half of what he needed so we decided to keep him bottle fed when he was in the NICU and work on bfing when he got home and we were more comfortable and not on a time schedule.

She will get tired a lot. Best thing is when you get it worked out, no bottles and just let her nurse whenever and how ever long she wants.

GL! 

NYCEsq.

I was you just a month ago.  Our little one was born at 36 weeks and was a sleepy baby.   It was impossible to wake her up.  Undressing her, cold water, changing positions, we tried it all.   She was jaundiced which just made it all the worse. 

Here's what we did, with the advice of some fabulous LCs at the hospital:  My husband would wake (or try to wake) her for each feeding while I pumped for 5 mins to let the milk/colostrum going and as easy for her to get as possible.  Then I'd put her to the breast and get her to suck as much as possible.  Then we'd feed her what I had pumped, in a teaspoon at first and then in a bottle as I was able to get more.  Then I would pump for 10-15 mins to stimulate the milk (because she wasn't sucking long enough to do that).   I'd keep what I pumped for the next feeding.  A handful of times when we were fighting the jaundice and before my milk really came in, we gave her formula.  To be honest, it was exhausting because  one feeding would just run into the next.  But it worked.

By the time I went home from the hospital on Day 5, we never gave her more formula.  When my milk came in around Day 4, I dropped the initial 5 min. pump.  She regained her birthweight and more by Day 10 because we were so focused on making her eat every two hours.  At that point we got the go ahead to just follow her cues and not wake her up so log as we were getting in 8 feedings a day.  Now she is a champ at eating and is waking herself ever 2-3 hours and I'm dealing with some oversupply issues.

Hang in there.   

SoonToBeTabor

Thanks for the advice ladies!

We were able to talk to the Dr. this afternoon and they said she simply is just not ready to eat...SO, what I pump will go directly into her NG tube and each feeding we will attempt breatfeeding. If she latches and sucks, great, if not, she wont be wasting too much energy since she wont be taking any more bottles.