Handy Bottle Feeding Tips


Bottle feeding is a loving experience, it lets you cuddle with your baby, look into their eyes and talk to them. You must never leave the baby when you have to feed them. This way you will miss out the opportunity to bond with them and also have a possibility that the baby might choke on the bottle or slip out in your absence.  Bottle propping increases the risk of ear infections as well and it could be dangerous.

  • Babies usually prefer drinking warm milk or room temperature milk. You can warm the bottle by keeping it in the bottle warmer and check the milk by sprinkling the drops on your wrist before giving it to the baby. It should be lukewarm. If it is too warm, wait for a little while and let it cool it off a bit then give it to your baby.
  • Always use a bottle warmer while warming baby milk or food and never use a microwave as it warms the milk or food unevenly. From outside, you might feel that the bottle is too warm but the inside contents get too hot.
  • Use the right size of the teat or nipple. This is to avoid baby gagging or gulping the milk too fast. You must select the teat size as per baby’s age. If you notice that the baby is sucking too hard and is having trouble sucking the milk, this means that the hole is too small and if the baby is gulping too fast then the teat hole might be too big for the baby.
  • Angle the bottle in the way that babies do not suck any air. Give your babies burp a couple of times during the feed and also burp the baby after every feed.
  • Ask your partner to support you in baby feeding. Tell them to feed the baby late at night, while you can get some rest.  In this way, baby gets to bond with their dads as well.
  • Don’t let the baby fall asleep during the feed, because of the baby’s mouth is pooled with milk, it will cause tooth decay. After the feed, put your baby to sleep, wipe the milk residue from baby’s mouth and gums. If they sleep with the bottle in the mouth, then prefer giving them a pacifier during the sleep.
  • Before giving the bottle feed to the baby, make sure you check the milk flow through the teat.


 

Write a comment

Please login or register to comment