Question: I’ve read lots of your stuff about breastfeeding. You often tell moms not to supplement if they want to breastfeed but I thought I read somewhere that you supplemented with your younger three? Can you explain when it is okay and not okay to supplement?
This is a really tricky question to answer because each individual situation is different. Let me preface my answer by saying that I believe that moms need to do whatever they need to do to get the baby fed. That sometimes includes supplementing with formula. However, let me say that supplementing is not the ideal situation.
Why Supplementing is “Bad”
Supplementing with bottles of formula is generally a one way street to a very short breastfeeding relationship. Furthermore, studies show that just like even a small amount of breast milk is helpful in building immunities in a newborn, a small amount of formula will also has an affect on the baby’s immune system.
Supplementing Causes Supply Issues
Supplementing your baby will almost always cause supply issues. Breastmilk is very easily digested by a baby. Therefore, when a baby is fed exclusively on breastmilk, nursing every 1 to 2 hours is ‘normal.’ And if you’ve learned anything from reading my blogs, you know that the way to build supply is to nurse, nurse, nurse! However, because formula is digested more slowly. . .it keeps the baby fuller for longer. Therefore, it isn’t uncommon for a baby to not want to nurse for at least two to three hours after a formula feeding.
What a lot of moms try to do is then pump. One of the most common reasons that I see mothers supplement for is a bad latch. They are in pain and the baby needs to be fed so they give just one bottle. To make up for that they pump. Then they get hardly anything so they think they’re not making enough and thus sets in a cycle of nursing, then bottle feeding, then pumping. Poor mom is exhausted and then assumes that she must be one of those women who ‘just doesn’t make enough’.
In my next blog, I’ll address why I supplemented and when I would consider it to be “okay” to do so.