Breastfeeding has been considered the best source of nutrients for the newborn.
Do I have enough breast milk?
This is the main question that every mother asks herself from the moment the baby is first put to the breast.
Does he or she have enough milk – is everything okay…?
In the first days after birth, the amount of colostrum that your breasts produce is completely sufficient for the nutritional needs of the baby. In the next few weeks after birth, the babies need to nurse very often because their stomach is small, they get tired quickly and cannot take large amounts of breast milk to satisfy their needs for long periods of time.
In the beginning, it can be difficult to know if the food is enough for the baby. The simplest rule to help you is to keep track of diapers. During the first month of a child’s life, stools are an extremely sensitive indicator and can guide you when everything is fine and when you need to seek for help. It is known that sometimes bottle feeding can cause the baby to wean, and nursing mothers are often warned against using bottles.
But there are situations when complementary feeding is expected to be a long-term and essential part of the feeding plan, or the baby is in a more serious condition that requires feeding to take a minimum of effort, then parents choose the bottles. However, since bottle feeding does carry a risk to breastfeeding success, it is important to do it in a way that closely resembles and preserves breast feeding skills.
We will focus on several important points when choosing a bottle and teat:
The bottle — The only important thing when choosing a bottle is the material from which it is made. Because of serious doubts about the health risks of BPA, it is preferable to choose plastic bottles that have been proven to be free of BPA — or glass bottles.
The teat — The success of combining breast and bottle depends to a large extent on two things: The strength of the stream and the speed with which the milk is poured into the mouth. How similar the position of the baby’s lips and tongue on the teat is to the breastfeeding position.
Carefully monitor your baby’s pacifier for the following: How big an angle is achieved in the corner between the baby’s lips — sharp or obtuse?
When breastfeeding, we aim for the lips to be wide open with an angle of more than 120 degrees, and it is important that the same happens on the bottle. How do the lips lie on the teat – are any of them pressed and sucked in? Are there holes in the corners of the mouth where milk leaks out? The answers to these questions will guide you to what extent the pacifier you use allows you to mimic breastfeeding as well as possible.
The goal is for the baby’s lips to be wide open, without being tense and without the upper one being bitten inward.
The vacuum they create around the teat should be good and there should be no leakage of milk from the sides. Rubber or silicone? It’s a matter of personal preference. Rubber teats made of natural material are softer and may be more comfortable for a newborn baby. Their disadvantage is that they wear out quickly. Silicone is a harder and fully synthetic material, but it is significantly more resistant, which — combined with its attractive transparency — makes it a favorite of most mothers.
