Meg is being a stinker today. This morning, she slept til 8 (yay!), then nursed on one side. She wouldn’t take the other, because she was in such a hurry to go play. At 9:30, when she was hungry again, I decided to give her the other side, so I wouldn’t have to pump. She took it! When she was done nursing, I made a small bottle (3 oz formula, 1 oz breastmilk) to finish the feeding. She took a sip, decided she didn’t like it, and absolutely flat-out refused to drink. So I put it in the fridge and tried again a half-hour later. She twisted her whole body away and made it quite clear she WOULD NOT drink that bottle. Fine. I decided to be sneaky and mixed some of the milk with oatmeal. I fed her the oatmeal and half a jar of food. She didn’t quite finish.
When lunch came, I tried to give her the bottle first (we usually give it after her food), so she would at least have some milk. She refused. Would. Not. Drink. It. I fed her the rest of her lunch, tried the bottle again (no go), then gave up and poured it out.
Afternoon bottle – same thing. Wouldn’t drink bottle, after trying several times (over a 45 minute interval), I give up and fed her a half jar of food.
For dinner, she doesn’t usually get a bottle, just “solid food”. She didn’t quite finish it (how is she not hungry??)
Bedtime: nursed great, refused top-off bottle. I had Husband try to give it to her (maybe she just wouldn’t take bottles from me?), but that didn’t work.
I guess she’s just going through a bottle strike, but I’m worried because I opened a new can of formula this morning. What if its bad? A couple times, she took a sip of the bottle, THEN decided she wouldn’t drink it. And after that, she freaked out at the sight of a bottle. Does it taste bad? Can a sealed can of formula a year away from its expiration date go bad? After its mixed, it smells nasty, but formula always does, right? I tried to smell the powder itself and it doesn’t have a strong smell. For the afternoon and bedtime bottles, I also tried giving her straight breastmilk in a bottle, but couldn’t get her to taste it. For all she knew, it was formula. She now won’t even try a bottle at all. Its like she’s decided she’d like to go back to nursing after all. Like she’s saying: “Mom, about that nursing strike? Let’s just forget it ever happened. I want to nurse ALL THE TIME now.” Has she forgotten we switched to bottles because I wasn’t producing enough milk?
I don’t know what to do for daycare tomorrow. Send her with bottles that she’ll refuse? Today I made up small bottles for each feeding, so after she refused them, I only had to pour out 2-3 ounces, instead of 6. (I can’t save them, because I’m persistent and shove the bottle in her mouth, just to make SURE she won’t even TRY it, which leads to her sputtering and trying to spit the milk back into the bottle)
Its painful to think about sending FIFTEEN ounces to daycare and thinking it all might get poured down the drain. Plus, they’re terrible at following directions. Last week after lunch they gave her a 6 oz bottle instead of the 3 oz. She only drank half of it, so the other half had to be discarded. Then they didn’t feed her again at all, so when she got home at 5:30 she hadn’t eaten since 1 and was starving! I’m afraid if I send jars of food to be given ONLY if she refuses the bottles, they’ll get all confused and mess the whole thing up. What to do?
No comments:
Post a Comment