I did a search and didn’t really find anything. We’re planning to start the baby on pumped breastmilk in the next week or so, since breastfeeding has been going extremely well, and it would be nice to be able to leave him for more than half an hour. I have a very nice handheld pump that works beautifully, and have started pumping and storing. He’ll be three weeks old next week.
I know nothing about baby bottles, types, dangers, or anything. What worked for you? What brands would you recommend or recommend against? We’re planning on exclusively breastmilk-feeding until at least six months.
Sorry. This is discombobulated because I have a two-week old.
Well, first they recently put out a warning against using plastic bottles because heating them up can release stuff where as glass doesn’t.
I did use plastic for awhile (ones we boiled to clean) until I got tired of that and ended up with the Playtex ones with inserts, because you can just toss the inserts and put a new one in (obviously not the most planet friendly). When you’re discombobulated it’s easier to handle.
I have heard of bottles where the nipples simulate the breast, which you would probably want to look into. I had trouble with breastfeeding, so I ended up pumping as much as I could and supplementing with formula, so it didn’t matter too much to me to find them.
Uhm… not sure what else to say, except there are others who know more than I do around here and I’m sure they’ll be around.
My advice is don’t make a huge investment in bottles - buy one and give it a shot. My daughter went through every bottle and nipple at daycare before choosing the one she’d drink from (at eight weeks - at eight years now she hasn’t changed). So don’t invest in a whole “system” until your baby determines they agree with your choices. Little dictators they are.
Oh, and don’t sweat it too much either - bottles that were the BEST POSSIBLE THING when my daughter wouldn’t use them became “HORRIBLE CHILD ABUSIVE ILLNESS VECTORS” by the time she was two. Nipple controversies (plastic vs. glass controversies, supplimenting with what kind of formula controversies) exist to give you something to do until they get to toddlerhood - when you won’t have time to worry about whether or not they survived the day.
I used the Avent bottles that went with my hand held pump.
Well, I say “used” but not so much. The girl took a bottle about three times, and after that absolutely refused. She was strictly a boob girl til she weaned herself at 9 1/2 months.
(all the stored breastmilk that I’d pumped got used in cereal once she started solids, so it wasn’t a total waste.)
My middle child was pretty picky too. We went through an impossible amount of different types of bottles, until she too chose the Avent. Luckily we were able to give the Little Guy the Avent and he wanted nothing else.
And by the time we got around to the Little Guy, the Dr.'s were recommending that all milk, whether breast or formula was to be given at room temperature. So we never used the bottles for warming. But I did have canning jars that were sterilized for frozen or refrigerated milk. I didn’t use a thermometer or anything to check the temperature, but it was usually slightly warm. YMMV.
My favorite nipple is the BreastFlow by The First Years, because it makes the baby chomp at the bottle like she chomps (gently) on your breast. Of all the “most like the breast!” nipples they sell (and almost all nipple say they’re most like the breast), this is the one that made my daughter’s speech therapist gasp and clap her hands when she saw her drinking from it. Her speech delay was just phenominally improved after just a few weeks of using this nipple instead of the Playtex nursers.
The only drawback to it is that I’m not sure if the plastic of the bottles is the same plastic that recently became a concern. Since I never stored or heated milk in them (I stored the milk in the zip top bags and I heated them by putting the bag in hot water, then poured the warm milk into the bottle) I decided the benefits outweighed the risks.
It’s not quite heating the milk in them that’s the problem - it’s running the bottles through the dishwasher. I’d used Avent with my twins and loved them. It infuriated me to read that clear plastic bottles “throw” PCBs or PCBs or PDAs or whatever it is.
Same problem with other kids plastics, like those bathtub books. Some have been recalled.
I think the Gerber bottle is supposed to be safer, but don’t quote me on it.
And, as others have said, it’s hard to predict which one they’ll like.
Our first daughter would only take the Playtex Vent-air bottles that have the screw-on bottoms with the little valves in them. They’re easy to find. No drop in liners to buy, and they have a really wide “Natural Latch” nipple that she could latch onto more like breastfeeding. All the other bottles had too fast a flow, even using the newborn nipples. Breastfed babies are used to really working for their meals.
We continued to use that kind for the second daughter. My only compaint is that you have to make sure the valve is properly seated in the bottom, otherwise it will either leak (common) or vapor lock (uncommon).
My experience is that breastfed babies often like the Avent bottles, but I agree - buy one or two and give them a try before you make a big investment.
We exclusively nursed for about 9 months, but I pumped n froze for those times I wanted to sleep in, go out etc.
We went with the Avent line. It matched my hand pump and I got the store n go cups with it too. (I think it’s the VIA attachment to the pump, so I could pump right into it and freeze it.)
About pumps…because I wish I had found this out sooner
About 6 months of using the hand pump (which literally sucked - not good at all), we decided to spend the money on an electric one. We were going on a 2 week trip to the in laws and I had lovely thoughts of handing the lil one to the grandparents with no problems. HAH. I took about 96oz of frozen milk with us, and the pump - and our daughter would only drink from ME. No one else, not even my husband. (We were still exclusively nursing, but there were times visiting I didn’t want to go public.)
We bought a Medela pump in style for significantly cheaper than what you find in the stores by going through a medical supplier online. A nurse friend of ours suggested it. You do have to email the merchants to find the price because they won’t advertise online. We ended up paying $200, for a $350 pump. It was SOOOOOOOOOO worth it. Even though we were exclusively nursing, 30 mins of painful handpumping vs. 10mins of ‘milking’ on the machine was way worth it for those last 3 months!
Good luck and don’t spend a fortune on nipples at first. Dr. Brown’s is supposed to be nice as well. Nipple confusion is a rarity too - contrary to popular belief, but I’m not a professional
What hand pump do you have? If you have a Medela, you can just use the bottles that come with it – they have nipples for them, and the bottles are BPA-free. We started with those, because we had them.
Does Gnat use a pacifier? If so, does he use a Soothie brand? If so, you might want to try a bottle from the same people – it’s not BPA-free, but the familiarity might set you up for success with bottle feeding.
If you really, really care about the whole safe-plastic thing, you have some more options: use glass bottles, use bottles with liners (such as Playtex drop-ins), or use Born Free brand bottles. They’re a little on the pricey side, but they are BPA-free. Here’s information on the whole bad-plastic issue, and here is some info about what the various bottle-makers are doing about it.
In terms of general stuff, we were told that the best time to try a bottle is 5-8 weeks old. That way, you won’t mess up the whole breastfeeding thing, but they’re still (theoretically, at least!) open to a bottle. It’s probably best if you’re out of the home when he tries a bottle for the first time, because he might object to a substitute if you’re right there. Also, get “slow flow” nipples, so he doesn’t get a fire hose in the face. And yeah, don’t buy lots of any one kind of bottle/nipple until you know he’ll take that kind – they can be picky little buggers!
If he resists taking the bottle from one person, try another – try someone who has lots of experience with babies. My friend’s baby would NOT take a bottle from her husband (he got really tense and didn’t know any “tricks” to try and gave up really easily), but would take one pretty easily for me (I didn’t take it personally, knew what to expect, etc.). And if he really won’t take one, you can try a spoon or a little cup – bottles are not your only chance for freedom!
I kind of ‘fire-hose’ him all on my own- I’ve got a great supply so far. I have the Avent pump, and it does come with two bottles. So far I like the pump, and since I’ve got so much milk I can probably manage without an electric one, at least for a while. I don’t want to go far away from him for more than an hour or two, but when he’s awake, he wants to eat every thirty minutes to an hour.
We don’t have a dishwasher, so I’m boiling and doing the hot soapy water cleaning. I’m not sure if I’m going to get upset about the plastic leaching- can anyone give me an idea of how dangerous it could be? My natural cynical Research Causes Cancer In Rats side is fighting with my overprotective new mother side.
Well, here’s the actual final expert panel report (pdf), if you want the raw numbers. The summary of developmental findings is on page 254 - the only positive finding was
And yeah, don’t buy lots of any one kind of bottle/nipple until you know he’ll take that kind – they can be picky little buggers!