Topping up with formula?

I am considering giving a formula feed to my twins as they are having slow weight gain and plunket beginning to get worried about the wee girl in particular.

Feel like I have given bf my all and seem to spend all day doing it and supply/weight gain a constant worry for me. I have tried lots of things they think my supply is okay but that she is only getting the foremilk... I have tried lots of skin to skin, 3hourly feeding (which I found to hard to sustain with two) also she doesn't seem that hungry if I wake her that early.

Ilysa started small is 3rd percentile for weight, height, head etc she was following their growth chart curve fine but today for the first time she has dropped down a bit which she can't really afford to do... DH really wanted me to keep bf and i did also but when he came home at lunch and I was so upset again he suggest that we give them one feed of formula a day.

We've bought the formula now and the lactation consultant said it was up to me her only point was that its supply and demand and may be a slippery slope to formula bottle feeding (which I don't want to do). i express once a day and get enough for a feed for 1 baby so can mix some of that with the formula or give one formula one day and ebm the next.

I'm wondering if others think supplementing some formula resulted in them ending up formula feeding their babies more and more?

i had the same thing with the formula/reflux thing but i had supply issues despite meds, homeopathic, herbal stuff etc...

i reckon it could have been possible to keep up the BF but my supply was so crap once i started formula i found it so much easier. i was topping up after every feed and expressing though so it was a hell of a process and so time consuming. if you have the mental power and really wanna BF i reckon it will be fine as a top up just express while DH does the feed or something so your supply doesnt decrease

the problem with plunket and the weight charts is that they are not based on fully breastfed babies, who do not gain as much as fast as formula fed babies....

It did for us and DS1, though it did take a while. The top ups started 'small' when he was 4 weeks old, but within weeks were significantly larger than they were and he was on formula full-time during the day at 4.5 months. This was NOT my intention when I was basically forced into topping him up in the first place because he was gaining so slowly. Wish I had listened to my gut. Looking back now, nearly 7 years later the poor boy had horrible reflux (could spew with the best of them) and colic for 3 months....no wonder the poor wee thing was having a hard time.

Then DS2 was born and though he was larger at birth, he followed a similar weight gain trend as his brother and well....I refused to listen to Plunket about 'fattening him up" and looked at HIM. I then refused to take him for weigh ins because despite me explaining that I was fully ff as a baby and didn't weigh alot and find it almost impossible to gain weight......all she cared about was that he wasn't gaining enough according to her.

DS1, who was 'small' as a baby is now at the top of the charts for height and weight for his age, DS2 who was off the bottom of the Plunket charts (but interestingly never off the height for weight WHO bf charts) for more than 8 months is now on the 50th centile for height/weight his age.

Considering we talk about how 'fat' our population is becoming, when we see babies who don't weigh that much that is seen as worse somehow than if they were 'fatter'. Weighing less doesn't necessarily mean that they aren't healthy or that something is wrong.........just as them weighing more doesn't mean they are healthy and that something isn't wrong.

Have a look at Kellymom, they are a great source of information about what is normal and things you can try and do to boost weight gain etc. Hang in there, you're doing a great job and do what you feel is right for you and your family not what anyone else things you should do.

we started Luke and Zavier on a formula bottle at night and they still continued to BF during the rest of the time up to 10 months, so I would say why not give it a shot? They slept through the whole night too once they started having the bottle as the night feed.

Thinking about my wee girls weight gain I am going to see how the next couple of weeks go. She was born 2.3kg and now at 10 weeks is 3.72. Twice now she can gain really well one week then the next just 40g. I think I just need to be really careful that she gets the hind milk and get used to that both are slow feeders. She doesn't act any different in the weeks she gains well and the weeks she doesn't.

Last night DH gave our boy a bottle and I gave her both sides. She is not all that keen on the bottle at the moment where he takes the bottle really well. He settled well after the bottle and so did she after both sides (normally can only get one!) so think maybe mixing it up a bit will help stop any preference.

The night before they both had some formula and it made settling them really easy it was fantastic.    I need them to be full and have a good sleep at night and am thinking that if only using a small ammount of formula that can get away with it not affecting supply to much.

I just don't have enough time to express more than once a day,

I will have to be tough with my DH too, he tends to think the cause of any unsettled baby is must be hungry! and wanting to help out to give them a bottle. I have told him we can't give them more than one bottle of either emb or formula a day.

You need to do whats right for you and your bubs. If that means having a FF then thats whats right. I think you are amazing for BF twins, it would certainly be a challenge.

i am having the same problem with my son who is 20wks today, he hasnt put on much weight since 8wks, b4 that he was fine, i held out giving him any top ups as his lack of weight gain wasnt picked up til after 12wks. he seemed perfectly fine he was well hydrated so supply wasnt to blame, he had blood tests which showed nothing, only thing i can think of is he doesnt stay on very long, i think he is refusing the hindmilk though he hasnt a problem with foremilk nor the formula top ups. i am still doing both breast and bottle though im a little worried about supply now so looks like ill be pulling the supplemental system out,
if its an option try the nursing system i know that with twins it might not be so simple with the extra set of hands you have to fight off (the tubes become a magnet to baby hands), it will allow you to feed your babies extra calories through the formula but still maintaining supply.

I started toping DD up with formula when she was about 6wks as she was very slow puting on weight, only about 150gm above her birth weight.
Only one bottle at night time and I always BF first. I also did everything I possibly could to boost my milk supply. At about 3 months she was on two bottles a day still BF before bottle. Over time my milk supply has dropped but she is 1 year old today and I'm still BF.
Good luck! You are doing a great job feeding two, must be very hard work.