Breastfeeding
supplementing schedule help?
My 2 1/2 week old is still not back to his birthweight (9lb 6oz), so his pediatrician is requiring me to supplement with atleast 6 oz of formula daily. I'm going to start taking Fenugreek and try to increase my supply and hopefully will get back to breastfeeding/pumping only.
If you've had to supplement , what did you find to work the best? Did you supplement after breastfeeding or did you supplement a full feeding (while pumping to keep supply up)? Did you use a bottle or some other method?
TIA
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Re: supplementing schedule help?
I supplemented after a feeding the first few weeks of DS life. It seemed to work for us without effecting my supply too much. (But I also added a pumping session to help increase my supply about an hour after the feed..) We now no longer supplement with formula. We just BF and pump. HTH. We use a wide neck bottle with the slow flow nipple. (Born Free) Good luck to you! Hang in there!
When we were supplementing (no more, yay!), we just added an ounce of formula to each feeding throughout the day.
I strongly suggest seeing an LC now - the pattern of supplementing gets really old really quick. I would see an LC before jumping to formula depending on how much weight your LO has actually lost. I wish I would have contacted one quicker than I did. Sometimes doctors recommend formula before exhausting other options. I finally saw an LC and she had me pumping after each feeding and then supplementing with bm, which worked out better in the long run to help supply. Our LO didn't re-gain birth weight until he was a month old! You can also look into an SNS instead of bottles to help with supply if you end up using formula.
In the end, after weighted feeds confirmed low supply all around, I started taking domperidone and we were done with supplementing!! It is a big sigh of relief after three months of constant worry about weight gain.
I hope it all works out for you and your LO! I know how stressful it can be!
My LO is a month and just about back to birth weight finally (two ounces to go). I was just adding one pumping session a day to increase supply but it didn't help, she is only gaining 3 oz a week consistently.
My ped nurse told me to feed both sides, then pump both sides to make sure they are empty. I then supplement with any milk I pump. Then last resort, I offer formula. It is alot to do but hopefully it will be short term and increase my production.