Bottle refusal

Baby struggling to bottle feed? Having difficulty finding the right bottle for your baby? I’m not talking about exclusively breastfed babies when no bottle was introduced until after 3-4 months. Many EBF babies have nothing wrong with their mouth but may struggle to take a bottle if they weren’t introduced to it while they were still relying on instinct and reflex. I’m talking about young babies who have always been bottle fed, babies where breastfeeding wasn’t going well and a switch was made, or where a baby did fine consistently taking a bottle for a few months but all of a sudden seemed to have a loss of skill around 3-4 months and is now struggling to take a bottle. The tongue needs good range of motion to bottle feed. Some babies with tongue tie can compensate depending on the bottle system by either just squeezing the nipple or relying on the bottle having a hole with freely flowing milk. But some babies will really struggle on the bottle as well because of restriction in how the tongue can move from a tongue tie. If you have any concerns about bottle feeding, please find and work with a tie savvy IBCLC lactation consultant (yes! We do bottle consultations even with formula feeding babies!!!), or a highly skilled and specially trained pediatric occupational or speech therapist.
#bottlefeedinthebaby #bottlebaby #bottlebabies #pumpingmom #exclusivelypumping #exclusivelypumpingmama #exclusivelypumpingproblems

[@kairakatniss]

!!! Not enough awareness about this at all and how it affects more than just feeding and beyond infancy. It breaks my heart for those who's breastfeeding was suffering and/or didnt receive the support necessary to enable them to nurse. Went through it personally but was very lucky to have minor awareness beforehand and managed to nurse my first til 2.5 (nursing aversion during pregnancy) and my second is almost entirely weaned at 6 (still asks maybe once a week but going further between more often).
It was still traumatic due to pain, nipple trauma, having severe engorgement (serious oversupply that continued throughout the first year), other issues and having to manage all that comes with a newborn on top of researching tongue ties , deciding how to handle it, traveling 2.5 hours for a release, the post release exercises, having to do a second release because the first was too conservative, and on and on. I'm an extremely strong willed and dedicated person, to a fault, and is the only reason i managed to power through and nurse my first. It was horrendous at first. I cried every time. It took alot of work to get his latch good, it wasnt until around 6 months that it was perfect.
As traumatic as it all was, I met some incredible parents and babies, gained knowledge of other conditions because some of them weren't able to feed properly for other reasons. I became so knowledgeable about breastfeeding that I was able to educate others and help troubleshoot, started a support group to aid those locally with supplies for pumping and bottle feeding, and put them in touch with the correct resources when I or others werent able to help them. And in general just offer support as they made decisions about whether to switch to formula. I wouldn't trade those experiences.