Ebf My Baby 4 Mos. and She Will Barely Take a Bottle

This will take time, you can not expect her to get it on the first day, give her a few days to adjust, she will not starve.

Just keep,offering. She will get it. She may not be thrilled but she will drink enough until you get home. My granddaughter starting waking at night to drink. She was up several times and drained Mom dry. During the day she was content to wait until Mom got home! Eventually a sippy cup worked and she drank during day, sleeping well at night.

How old is baby?
Sometimes they do get nipple confusion and can't bottlefeed. Others are willing to hold out until mom returns --even if they sound like they are about to explode from frustration.
A very skilled caretaker taught my breastfed on demand baby how to take a bottle of expressed milk in about 2 hours.

Sounds like she's been breastfed until you go back to work. It's hard, it really is.

Here are some ideas -
A nipple with a bigger hole and a half-teaspoon of rice cereal in the bottle. It will be "different" enough that she might accept it. Once she's used to accepting the bottle, don't put the cereal in it anymore and go back to the regular nipple. (This worked for my 4 month old niece whose mom thought she was going to have to quit work because my niece was fighting the bottle so badly.)

A Playtex nurser that's more like your nipple.

Don't feed her yourself - let babysitter and husband do it so that she gets used to that.

If worse comes to worse, have babysitter feed her with an eyedropper so that she doesn't get dehydrated. She WILL accept the bottle eventually. You just don't want her to end up in the hospital in the meantime. Dehydration can happen really fast, so it's very important for her to just squirt the milk down her throat until she takes the bottle.

Good luck!!

Has your baby been weaned from the breast? It sounds like she is really upset about taking the bottle. It takes about a week or two to get babies to feed from bottles if they are used to being nursed. It cannot be a sudden change....it has to be a gradual one. My guess is that baby is pretty confused and will not eat because she doesn't attribute the bottle to a source of food and mainly...comfort. My advice, use the bottle during the day and nurse at night only if possible. Make sure YOU are participating in bottle feeding as well so baby knows your smell, your feel, and associates that with the bottle feedings as well as when you nurse her. It's not easy sometimes to manage breast and bottle but with a little perseverance and patience, it will happen. No baby will ever let themselves go hungry if a meal is available. She will learn and adjust.

I would try a different bottle and also find out if she'll allow herself to be spoon or cup fed. Kellymom.com has lots of tips for bottle feeding a breastfed baby. You may also find she "reverse cycles" on you and gets most of her nutrition when you are home.

Please do not mess with the nipples of the bottles or add cereal. Breastfed babies only need slow flow nipples. We used Medela, mostly the wide ones. DD did not like Avent or Playtex. You might need to try a few.

She might also have been adjusting to a new caregiver. Give them time to find their routine.

I would try giving her bottles yourself a few times; if she takes them from you, then you know it is a problem with being fed by someone else and you can work on that. If she WONT take them from you, then I would guess nipple confusion or she doesn't like the bottles you are using, and to try using different bottles.

If the problem is that she won't eat unless you are feeding her, I would recommend that you start off the feeding with a bottle, then once her appetite is whetted pass her to Dad. Then, gradually transition to Dad feeding solo, then the babysitter.

If you are unable to get her to take any bottles, and you are worried about her health, you can resort to the dropper like Doris Day suggests... Just make sure that they don't squirt it randomly in her mouth... dribble tiny amounts in between her cheek and gums, toward the back of her gum line. This causes them to instinctively swallow, reducing the risk of choking. Although, I really doubt you will have to resort to that; lots of breast fed babies learn to fill up when Mommy is home, and don't need much from the bottle at all.

Also, my DD flat out REFUSED any bottles made for nursing moms (it's like she wanted REAL boobies only. Lol)... But had no problem at all with the cheapie old-school nipples.

Good luck!

Try different bottles and nipples first, but after all different kinds we discovered my LO would only take formula from a bottle and not breastmilk, like she knew "the good stuff" didn't come from a bottle.

All babies are different when it comes to taking bottles (and everything else) so I am sure you will hear lots of opposing info on this. Some babies prefer to nurse and will not take much from a bottle but will make up for it when mom is home. Most will take a bottle eventually. Some will never take it from mom (why would they, as they know you have the goods) so if you do try doing it yourself and she rejects it, don't assume she will never take one from others. Sometimes warming the nipple works, different shaped nipples can help. Some babies want to be in a breastfeeding position for a bottle, some like being in a position nothing like breastfeeding (facing away works for some). Bouncing or moving can work with some. The suggestion to put rice cereal in the bottle is a concern. It is a choking hazard for one thing and the current AAP recommendation is to introduce solids around 6 months, so she is a little young for rice at all.

Try not to generalize that she will never take a bottle from what happened the first day or two (some babies are like that but they are in the minority). She needs to get used to a new routine with babysitter/dad and that can take time. As long as the caregiver is flexible and will try new things it will work out. Good luck!