Feeding

Wondering how twins moms fed their babes.

 

You need an all of the above choice I do breast, EBM, and formula.

 

QUOTE
You need an all of the above choice smile.gif I do breast, EBM, and formula.


Me too.
I mostly breast feed. I express when I can, but finding the time to express is difficult. I offer a bottle of formula at bedtime. I bf them for a few minutes, then offer a bottle. One baby drinks 5oz, then sleeps through the night. The other only drinks a couple of ounces and wakes up to cluster feed every two hours or so all night long. I breastfeed during the day unless I have to go out. I bf them before I go and leave bottles of ebm or formula if necessary. I've only gone out about 3 times for doctor's appointments so it doesn't happen too often. When I go out with the babies, I take one bottle since I can't tandem feed them out. I'll bf one and leave the other one in the stroller and bottle feed him. I would actually prefer to exclusively breast feed, but my boys take over an hour to feed each time and I've had to find a system that works for us. I'm still working on it, but it's getting better. Please don't feel guilty for whatever decision you make. Do what you have to do to keep yourself and your babies well.

 

for the first six months, i also did a combo of breast, EBM & formula although now, i nurse exclusively.

 

Mine were born at 36 weeks and EBF until just shy of 10 months. Have yours been born? I'm hoping your ticker is wrong and you aren't still carrying those little buggers. Either way, no guilt needed. Just gather information (here is a great spot) and make a good decision for your family. If you want to BF, I suggest committing to it for at least 8-10 weeks before deciding it's not for you because those first 6-8 weeks are hard and do not represent the rest of the time. And, beyond that time, I think it's far easier to BF than to bottle or formula feed.

 

I picked breast and formula, but and "other" would have been a good choice for me. Sydney was almost exclusively BF (and my oldest 3 kids were, too). She didn't need anything else, and was a great nurser. Sabrina was first fed EBM by syringe, then bottle in addition to nursing. Then we gave her super high calorie formula to just get her weight up. She was 5#3 at birth and dropped to 4#9 and was basically starving. Even w/ the high calorie stuff, it took her a month to get back to her birth weight. She was never diagnosed as FTT, but I'm pretty sure from things I've read since then that that could have been her issue. She would latch and just stare at me. It was heartbreaking that she just didn't seem to care. Then after we'd actually get food in her, most of it would come back up. I continued to nurse her, pump for her and mix formula into the breast milk for about 4 months. Finally I gave up on pumping because it just was one thing too many. Sabrina started nursing better and growing, but she still got between 1-3 bottles of formula/day until she was a year old. She's still really small for her age, more like a small 2 year old than the 3+ yo she is.

I think mommy guilt is far too common. I have it. Sometimes I wonder if I'd just formula fed her if she'd be bigger. Or if I'd kept pumping, etc. But she's healthy... actually less likely to get whatever cold or stomach bug happens to run through our family than any of my other children. She's smart, potty trained (which Sydney is not quite), and a vibrant little thing. So I keep telling myself that I did the best I could for them both.

I'll admit that I was a bit of a breastfeeding snob before having twins. I nursed all mine exclusively, and thought that people who didn't were short changing their children. Ug! I'm embarrassed to admit that, but it's true. I still think that all things being equal, BM is better than formula. BUT, all things aren't equal. Twins are a whole different ball game, women and their children sometimes have health issues that make BFing difficult to impossible, and it's just not the right decision for everyone. One of the things I love about this forum is how supportive everyone is, regardless of which combination of BM, EBM and formula you're giving your children. Please don't feel guilty, you're doing your best for your sweet babies!!!

 

QUOTE(miss_bossy18 @ Apr 6 2009, 09:53 AM) [snapback]1261114[/snapback]
for the first six months, i also did a combo of breast, EBM & formula although now, i nurse exclusively.

That gives me hope!

 

Boy I'd like to meet the mom whho went to 49 weeks! 41w5d felt like forever for me!

All my kids were exclusively breastfed.

 

For the first few months, DD mostly BFed, with some bottles (EBM and formula) so I could get breaks and sleep. DS hadn't figured out how to nurse yet, so got EBM and formula bottles so I could sleep. If there had been extra time in the day, I could have pumped enough for them to have all EBM whenever they had bottles, but I was just too busy.

When DS figured out how to nurse, they both almost exclusively BFed, again with occasional EBM/formula bottles.

Now they're still nursing, and eating everything in sight!

 

We exclusively formula feed. If it had been one baby, I might have tried BF, but I had one in the NICU and brought one home, and my NICU baby needed a higher calorie intake anyway...I just felt like it wasn't right for us.

 

exclusively FF here also - BF'ing is just not my cup of tea (especially with twins!!) but I bow to those of you who can!

 

:hug: I'm sorry you are feeling guilty. Please don't. How you feed your babies makes no difference in your ability as a mom. I tried bfing the twins, but it just didn't work for us. I was very upset that it didn't work out, but, I knew I was making the best decision for me, the babies, and the rest of my family.

How I WISH I would have found this forum when I was having trouble though! I am confident they could have gotten me through a rough patch, and I am also sure they would have been supportive no matter what my decision was.

:grouphug: