Introducing bottle

Hey everyone, I've starting expressing breastmilk today to my partner can start doing the night feeds with a bottle from next week. My little boy is 5 weeks old, has anyone got any tips for introducing a bottle, or best brands for combi feeding.

I'm really worried about him not being able to go back to the boob. I absolutely love breastfeeding and don't want to stop but the sleep deprivation is really starting to affect me so think having a couple of nights a week where I can sleep through would really help me.

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I’d also really love to introduce expressed bottles too (same age & for same reason) but have read you still need to wake up when they feed to pump, do you know if that’s the case?

We’ve been doing husband replacing 1 x feed a night (at 11pm/midnight ish) . That way I only miss 1 feed and pump 1 x per day to level it out. I do find my boobs leak and do struggle with missing the feed, so sometimes I do end up giving him a little top up then too.

Hey there! I am a huge advocate of the Evenflo Proflo Venting Balance Plus with a WIDE NECK nipple only! My credentials are that I have a preterm severely growth restricted baby with a tongue tie who is now 16 weeks old still benefiting from this bottle. We had to start supplementing with formula at less than two weeks old and she took it immediately as its build and texture is very similar to latching on a breast. I feel like if she had success with it, then any baby can!

I’ve just started doing the same for an evening bottle! I’ve found the Lansinoh bottles are great, took to them straight away and were easy to pace feed with. Pace feeding will also help reduce the chances of bottle feeding being the “easy” way for them so they don’t get a preference (which was also a big fear of mine!!).

We're using the lansinoh bottles and our baby has a great wide latch on them, been using for a week and he still breastfeeds great, prefers the boob and takes a minute to get round to the idea of the bottle but takes them fine once he gets started 😅

Mam size 0 teats worked well for us

https://youtu.be/hqIMuoRiRiA

The paced method tends to prevent bottle preference because the flow isn't too much faster than breast letdown would be

I’ve offered bottles since day 1 (1 bottle a day sometimes more if I want a night off) with mam bottles and my baby still loves the boob ☺️
Btw a ‘night off’ isn’t really a complete night off for me as I wake up around 2/3am engorged and need to pump!! But my body is slowly adjusting and going longer as baby is.

I mostly breastfeed but we give baby a couple of bottles if I need a break. I’ve been super worried about baby not wanting boob but he has been ok.

We make sure that we touch the teat on his top lip to signal it’s there and then wait for him to open his mouth. This helps to get a good latch still, similar to what he gets on boob ☺️

We use mam with size 0 or size 1 (if he is super hungry) size 0 is extra slow so baby doesn’t get too used to quick flowing milk and reject boob

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