Transition from breast to bottle

Breastfeeding is best for your baby, but there is always a time during the breastfeeding stage when you will need or want to transition from breastfeeding to bottle-feeding. Each case is unique, and your moment will be your moment and we will give you the best solution. Therefore, to give you the best evidence and recommendations on how to do it, our team of Happymami midwives have prepared the following post especially for you, transition from breast to bottle.

When to switch from breast to bottle-feeding?

To give you the answer to this question, several factors must be taken into account. First, the current recommendation of the World Health Organisation and clinical guidelines is to offer exclusive breastfeeding up to 6 months, supplemented by breastfeeding up to the age of 2 years. Another very important fact to bear in mind is that exclusive breastfeeding is considered the container and not the form of breastfeeding.

What are we talking about? For the World Health Organisation as well as for clinical guidelines. Exclusive breastfeeding consists of offering your breastmilk either directly from the breast or, as is also considered exclusive breastfeeding, expressing it and offering that expressed milk to your baby in a bottle.

Finally, if a bottle is used, it is recommended that it be removed between 12 and 18 months of age so as not to interfere with oral and dental development. As recommended by Dr. Varela and the Spanish Society of Paediatric Dentistry.

Therefore, after this information and bearing in mind that each case is unique, as a mother, it is up to you to decide when to make the transition from breast to bottle. Adapting this transition to your needs and offering the best solution for your baby to make the transition from breast to bottle as successful as possible.

How to make the transition from breast to bottle?

In this section we must take into account the moment when we need or want to make the change from breast to bottle, and for this we are going to divide it into stages. Generally speaking, our recommendation is that you use a bottle that is as representative of your breast as possible, because your baby is used to breastfeeding.

It has internalised the stimulation of the palate that it gets from the mother’s breast, the speed of ejection of the flow, etc. So, on many occasions if we try to offer a generic bottle, totally different from the breast, to a baby who is well established in breastfeeding, we may find that our baby becomes overwhelmed with the bottle, and rejects the bottle.

This is an example that happens very often when mum has a short nipple. Your baby is totally accustomed to this small palate stimulation, and when we introduce a generic bottle with such a large teat, your baby becomes overwhelmed, gagging and retching, picking up a negative association to the bottle and generating a rejection that will not get him to take the bottle.

The solution, as we mentioned, is to use the bottle that is most representative of your breastfeeding.

This is why our Happymami project was born, we are mums and midwives and we understand you perfectly. We developed the first bottle custom-designed by each mother for her baby. This way, you can design the bottle that is most representative of your breastfeeding, considerably increasing the acceptance rate of our bottles.

And once your baby is bottle-fed, we will follow the weaning guidelines offered by the AEPED on how can I wean progressively? This refers to an older baby, but we must adapt it to the stage at which we are going to make the transition from breast to bottle.

• Do not offer or refuse. If your baby does not ask to breastfeed, do not offer it, but if he does ask, do not refuse to give it to him.
• With older babies, space out feedings. Distract your baby in other ways. Playing with him, reading a story, lulling him to sleep in your arms…).
• Before he gets hungry, offer him a bottle of milk or other food if he is older. This is how we anticipate their need to eat.
• For older children who already understand. Tell her “only at home”, “only 3 minutes”, only one breast”, “only for sleeping”, etc.
• When the baby is older and understands, we must talk to him and “negotiate” weaning. It will help to explain that “mum doesn’t want to breastfeed any more”.

And bear in mind that if there is pain, periodic extractions should be carried out to avoid complications such as mastitis. If weaning is well tolerated, it will not be necessary.

And which milk should I buy?

This section is a whole world of its own, and we will soon do a post on it. There are countless brands of milk, and each seeks to be the best, but there is one thing to consider.

It may be the formula milk that most closely resembles breast milk chemically in its composition. But the taste of your breastmilk is unique, and finding the one that most closely resembles your own will be very important.

Therefore, our recommendation is to buy the breastmilk that you are most confident about, or that you want, but buy the smallest bottle, so that you can try it first, and if your baby doesn’t like it, you won’t have spent more money than you need to.

There are many pharmacies that have samples of formula available, and it can be a good option to save you from spending money on a brand that your baby may not like.

Transition from breast to bottle with babies under 3 months of age

If you have a baby less than 3 months old and you need to stop breast your baby, for example because of an incompatibility with any medication you need to take.

Remember that the website www.e-lactancia.org has real evidence for all medications as to whether or not they are compatible with breastfeeding. The best way to offer this change to your baby is to take into account the newborn’s reflexes.

Keep in mind that babies have reflexes, and we will rely on them to teach them. If you stimulate your baby’s palate area, he sucks your finger (sucking reflex).

On the other hand, if you touch his tongue, he will stick out his finger (extrusion reflex). These reflexes are normal and will disappear with time, but that is why we must try not to stimulate the tongue, the bottle towards the palate, looking for that sucking reflex and that when it does, your baby will feel perfect milk falling into his mouth.

Also, your baby is used to your milk and, like you, does not like all types of milk, so our recommendation is to use your own milk for the first few times you offer a bottle.

In the case of the above example who cannot breastfeed because of taking an incompatible medication, you cannot offer breastmilk in order to offer a bottle. So first try the formula you are going to use, but offer it with a spoon and we will assess the reaction it generates in your baby.

Why is this? Imagine that you are given a strange glass, which you have never seen to drink, and they put coffee with salt in it, how disgusting! And every time you see that glass, you will remember how disgusting it made you feel and you will not even want to see it.

The same goes for the bottle, we know your baby loves your milk. That’s why that guideline, but if you can’t take it out, try if you want the bottle then with water first, so as not to generate that rejection, and if not, try first the milk you are going to offer him but with a spoon, to make sure he likes it. And once we get him to take a bottle, switch from breast feeds to bottle feeds.

Transition from breast to bottle in babies between 3 months and 1 year of age

At this stage, your baby obviously has breastfeeding well established, the baby’s reflexes are probably less reactive, and they are starting to learn about things, so we have to play our cards right.

In these cases, we will rely on the basic guidelines to increase the likelihood of bottle-feeding first.

Use a Happymami representative of your breastfeeding, offer the first feedings with your own milk, with the guidelines you receive after the purchase of your Happymami bottle to get your baby to take the bottle. And once the bottle was firmly established, we began to switch from breastfeeding to bottle-feeding, following the recommendations of the AEPED.

Be patient, and above all, never force. A baby who doesn’t want a bottle, who is crying, if you insist, he will probably become averse to the bottle, so the next time you try to offer it to him, he will cry as soon as he sees it.

Weaning or Transition from breast to bottle for babies over one year of age

This is the stage when your baby is already breastfeeding with food, and at this stage your baby, who are now older, does two main things when he/she wants to be breastfed, one to feed and the other to feel mummy and relax.

Especially when the baby is over 15 months old, or even 2 years old. These cases may require a little more patience, if not a lot more. If you are thinking about weaning, so that you can sleep without your baby wanting to take night feeds, here’s what I’ll tell you.

If your baby is already bottle-fed and you only intend to wean, be patient and follow the AEPED weaning guidelines described above. Do not offer or refuse. If your baby does not ask to breastfeed, do not offer it, but if he does ask, do not refuse to give it to him. Space out the shots.

Distract your baby in other ways. Playing with him, reading a story, lulling him to sleep in your arms…). Before he becomes hungry, offer him a bottle of milk or other food if he is older. This is how we anticipate their need to eat. Tell her “only at home”, “only 3 minutes”, only one breast”, “only for sleeping”, etc. We must talk to him and “negotiate” weaning. It will help to explain that “mum doesn’t want to breastfeed any more”.

If, on the other hand, he has never taken a bottle, we must first get him to take it, then do not hesitate, we will design the Happymami bottle that is most similar to your breast to start with the best proposal and obtain the best result. A

Now that you have your Happymami bottle, we first need to get your baby to learn to use it, not with milk, but with water. This way your baby will learn to use this new “utensil” that he has never seen before, and thanks to using it with water, it won’t be a struggle to learn. It’s simply “honey, do you want water, here it is” and when he wants to, he’ll take the bottle and you explain to him how it is and it’s perfect.

Once he has learned to use a bottle with water, we try to offer him a bottle with milk. Like the guidelines you will have received after purchasing your Happymami bottle, follow them without skipping any steps to get the best results.

Remind you never to force so as not to make any false steps and so that it does not have a negative association with the bottle.

After getting him to take a bottle even with milk, we are now looking for a milk that he likes.

As you will have read above, try the spooned milk first and assess your baby’s reaction, if he doesn’t like it, don’t insist again, if he likes it and tolerates it well, then perfect, we have found the milk.

After the baby drinks milk from a bottle, we can try to change breast feeds to bottle feeds. And we will start to carry out the guidelines mentioned above from the AEPED.

Conclusion transition from breast to bottle

As we always say, every baby is unique, and we must adapt to the circumstances of each case in order to provide the best solution.

The key to success is 3, a good bottle, without a doubt your Happymami, good guidelines, in this post you will have them, and after buying your Happymami bottle, you will get guidelines on how to offer the bottle to get the best result, and finally lots and lots of patience.

These are the 3 points that will help you to make the best transition from breast to bottle.