HELP! My baby won’t latch to the breast after a bottle, WHY?!?

It is more and more common that Mom’s are choosing to breast and bottle feed.

Having a backup option so someone else can feed the baby while you're gone to get groceries or at a work out class. Whatever it might be. 

More and more I am hearing that this is the norm with Mom’s and personally I was there too. It felt so good to be able to get away for an hour or 2 without having to haul the heavy car seat out the door, and the car seat to take up half the grocery cart and end up with no room for groceries. 

But what happens when you’ve fed that first bottle and now the baby does not want to go back to the breast?

Why do they do this? 

What can you do? 

We use to think that babies got “nipple confusion” that babies didn’t know how to adjust their suck based on the difference between bottle and breast. 

BUT now we know that babies AREN’T confused at all. 

In fact, they are smart!!

Of course they are your child right?

They aren’t confused that a rubbery, hard, silicone nipple is ANYTHING like your nipple which is soft, warm and comforting. 

But they are SMART!

Bottles pour freely when tipped upside down. 

There’s no consistency or quality control between 1 bottle nipple to the next. 

1 might barely drip the other leaks like a siv. 

So it’s a FLOW issue, not a nipple issue. Check out my recent reel on Instagram about this.

A bottle offers a streamlined flow with very little effort. 

The breast requires a little work, they need to withdraw the milk from the breast. 

For some Mom’s the milk flows quite easily initially, noted as breast leakage but eventually they need to do some work. 

So now we are clear on why this happens, what can you do? 

Paced bottle feeding is essential to learn if you plan to bottle and breastfeed to avoid the issue of baby preferring the bottle over breast. 

What is paced bottle feeding? 

Stay tuned, in my next email I will be sharing how to smoothly transition from bottle to breast and back using paced bottle feeding. 

In the meantime, I would love to hear how your transition from bottle to breast and back went.

What issues did you struggle with? 

If you are currently having challenges with this and would like to get baby back to breast, please reach out. 

Go to my services page and book a virtual consult, helping Mom’s anywhere.

Chat again soon Mama!

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