Combination Feeding

R&GNYE08

Hello.  My LO will be six months on Saturday (I can NOT believe 1/2 a year has gone by!)

I currently pump at work and nurse (pretty much) exclusively on nights and weekends.  This was going great for a while, but I am finding that I am no longer pumping enough to meet her needs.  It looks like I'm going to have to start supplementing one bottle of formula a day.  Does anyone else do this? 

If so, do you have enough to nurse your baby exclusively on the weekends when you are with him/her?  I'm just wondering if I will have to give her a bottle of formula on the weekends as well - I mean my body won't know its the weekend right?  Why would it make enough when I'm home with her, but not when I'm at work pumping? 

 Any info would be great.  Thanks.      

brewcitybride

I combo fed DS and DD after I went to work. It worked great! I liked doing the combination, as I felt it took some stress off of me at work, as I often had trouble fitting pumping into my schedule.

 

SuperSuz

When I went back to work after DS I fed him a combination of BM and formula.  It eventually got to the point where he refused to nurse and would only drink from a bottle.  At that point I weaned and we switched to exclusively formula. 

I would have kept pumping/BF-ing if DS would have nursed.  My supply was fine and definitely regulated. 

TMWarren85

I didn't have enough supply from the beginning with DD so I was supplementing from about three weeks out until my supply pretty much dried up at three months... I mixed formula and BM together early on and didn't have issues; if I would try to give her an ounce of BM and turn around and give an ounce of formula she wouldn't take the formula. For us it was important for her to get as much food (BM or formula) since she had lost quite a bit of weight early on, and didn't have any issues with waste because I would make a little less than 1/2 the anticipated bottles worth of formula, I always had formula pre-made in the morning so I could just warm up some more if she would take it.

CrawltheWarriorKing

Just because you aren't pumping enough for her doesn't mean you don't have enough for her when nursing.  You can keep pumping during the week and keep nursing on the weekends exclusively.  Unless you start noticing she's not getting enough, or hungry more often you'll be fine.  Babies are much better at emptying the breast then a pump is...oz pumped does not equal what you are capable of producing.

I supplement one bottle a day with formula for both DD and DS and it's the bottle they get right before bedtime.  I'm a few days ahead pumping wise but I don't like to stress when I'm starting to run low so I rather just keep giving them that 1 bottle.  If/when they wake up in the middle of the night and are hungry I'll also give them formula since they sometimes just want a an oz or two and I rather not waste 4 oz of breast milk!

MrsWindyCity

I had to do this with DS, also right around 6 months. He was taking about 15 oz. at DCP (over 3 bottles) and I was pumping about 12, so what I did was send 2 bottles of BM one day and he'd have a bottle of formula and then the next day I was usually able to send 3 BM by combining the 2-3  oz. "extra" from the 2 bottles. 

If you baby seems satisfied at the breast, then I would continue exclusively BFing on the weekend. Generally, babies are more efficient than the pump so your LO is probably getting more than your pump output. Also, daycares/caregivers sometimes tend to overfeed, so she may not really NEED all the oz. she is getting, you know? If she still seems hungry after nursing, I would just follow up with an additional ounce or two of formula (rather than replacing a whole feeding with formula).

Sonadora

I combo fed from 4 months until I gave up nursing at 8 months. At work I pumped 14-16 oz if I was lucky and she usually ate 20 while I worked.  I continued to nurse her on the weekends and would only give her formula if it seemed like she was still hungry. Sometimes she needed it, sometimes she didn't.  My supply never seemed to go down because of the formula, though I never really had enough to begin with, which is why we started to combo feed at 4 months.

Angela814

There were points with both girls that I was taking milk from my freezer stash to use during the day because I wasn't pumping what they needed. I nursed exclusively on the weekends, which actually helped bring my supply up a bit by Monday. The pump doesn't empty your breasts completely, so your baby is always getting more from you than the pump is. As long as you keep pumping on your baby's nursing schedule during the week, then I'd keep bfing exclusively on the weekends.