Feeding Baby with NO BOTTLE – Avoid Nipple Confusion
If you need to supplement your baby with breast milk or formula, a bottle isn’t your only option.
Let’s explore some alternatives to the bottle including cup feeing, syringe feeding and using a supplemental nursing system.
Bottle Feeding Alternatives
Cup Feeding
One of the easiest way to feed a newborn especially within the first few days of life is with a cup. You can even hand express a few drops of claustrum into a small cup and then feed them very easily.
(Hint) Sometimes you can get a softer cup from the hospital, but a regular medicine cup will work if you are already at home.
You simply hold the baby and feed them one drop at a time. They will probably lap it up. They are not going to latch on like a breast or a bottle. This works best for small quantities of milk. You would not want to feed 5 ounces this way, but this is great for newborns especially within the first month of life.
Syringe Feeding
(Hint) You can pick up syringes at your local pharmacy. Sometimes they come with liquid medicine you get over the counter or your hospital should have these as well.
All you do is pump some breast milk to a container, draw it up in the syringe and then feed it to your baby. This seems to be a little easier for new parents because you can push the milk into the babies mouth as they suck and is a bit easier to control than the cup and a little less messy.
Spoon Travel Feeder
(Hint) This is a fun little tool that I found on Amazon.
This little bottle/spoon is a great way to feed your little one on the go. Gravity will allow a few drops out at a time, or you can squeeze it for a quicker flow.
Basic Supplemental Nursing System
This is one of my favorites. This is a way to get the baby at the breast so they are still stimulating all your hormones and helping you will make more milk.
(Bonus) They are also getting some breast milk from your breasts because if you are lactating, your breasts are never totally empty, even if your milk hasn’t come in yet or you are having problems, so this is a great way for baby to latch on the breast while also getting the supplement that maybe your health care provider recommended for you.
This system comes with instructions and is fairly easy to put together. It has a back flow protector that will only screw on one way so you can’t mess that up.
(Hint) This is VERY important! You will want to make sure that the tubing is clamped to stop the flow of milk until you are ready for it.
Next, you will use expressed breast milk or formula and pour it into the bottle and screw the top on. Next you flip it upside down and start priming the tubing. Again, it’s important that you have clamped the tubing so the milk doesn’t start running all the way down.
Once you have milk in the reservoir, you can go ahead and attach it to your shirt. It’s important that it’s higher than the breast because this system uses gravity as well as suction to get the milk from the bottle to the baby. Next you are going to fasten the tubing to your breast. You want the tubing to be about the same height as the nipple.
(Hint) You can use a little piece of tape to secure it to the breast so that the tubing stays on and you’re not having to fiddle with it much while you are also trying to latch on the baby.
You want to get the baby latched on first before you open up the milk flow. So paying attention to that tube there, you will go ahead and latch your baby on with the nose to nipple technic.
(Hint) Adjust the tubing on the middle of the baby’s lip or a little to the side. Having the tubing on the corner of the mouth is not ideal because they are not going to be able to suck enough to do much good.
Once the baby is on the breast and suckling, you are going to want to open that milk flow. You will notice that the milk will start to flow down with just gravity, but as the baby sucks, the amount will increase just as it was coming from the breast. The baby won’t be able to tell much difference here, so that makes it a great system to use because you are getting the stimulation at the breast, the baby learns how to breast feed and latch on appropriately so there is no nipple confusion, and they are also getting the added benefits of a supplement or extra expressed breast milk, donor milk or whatever you choose to use.
Advanced Supplemental Nursing System (for long-term use) is a great system if you need to supplement for longer than a day or two.
Good Luck!
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