I am going to start giving my 10week son ceral.How do I do it? do I make the nipple in the bottle bigger?

Question

How much should I give him? He wakes up every 2 hours starving. I breast feed him at night, but I give him a bottle before he goes to bed. I dont' like him eating in the middle of the night cause he had acid reflux and its hard for him to go back to sleep. He sleeps with me cause i will feed him than prop him up on a pillow. can anyone help. thaks

Answer 1

He's very young to start on solids. Talk to your doctor or health care adviser.

Answer 2

You are doing many things right, but don't rush things. The short shift at night is definitely a down side to breast feeding. The bottle at bed time is definitely tempting, but probably a bad idea. The problem at the night feeding is that you just want to get him back to sleep, so you don't spend enough time with him. (I know it is difficult) Often the mother is such a light sleeper that the child doesn't have time to get totally mad before she wakes up for a night feeding, but it sound like you might be a sound sleeper. I strongly advise against the young sleeping in the same bed. It is too possible to harm the newborn. So- take a bit more time to calm him down before the middle of the night feeding, cuddle and comfort him a bit before placing him back to sleep. If it is time for cereal, and we started ours on cereal at about 10 weeks, I am told that rice is best, as it is least likely to cause food sensitivities. We just worked with a spoon, and it did have the advantage of lengthening the nightime naps. I am told that there is a close correlation between starting a child on solid food early, and later food sensitivities. Our baby had colic. I learned later that this is usually a function of a nervous mother, but in a pinch, we gave the mother a weak alcoholic drink, she breast fed the baby, and we all got a good night's sleep. Perhaps not the ideal solution, but probably better that the patent medicine the dr. would prescribe.

Answer 3

For babies with reflux, doctors will often okay adding cereal to the bottle. There's also formula specially made for babies with reflux. It's called Enfamil AR. You have to make it with cold water, and then it thickens as soon as it gets to the stomach. When we were using that, my daughter seemed to stay fuller longer.

You should talk to your doctor about the cereal. Mention that you heard it might help the reflux.

If you do start cereal, use rice cereal (the least likely to cause allergy problems) and keep it very, very thin, like you can't even tell there's cereal in the bottle. You can poke the nipple a bit bigger, but be really careful that he doesn't start choking. Some babies have more of a gag reflex than others, and if the bottle flow is too fast, they'll start spitting up.

Answer 4

Don't listen to these other people, my sister had to put her baby on cereal when he was that old because he wasn't getting enough out of his milk. Yes put the cereal in his bottle, just about half a teaspoon at first. If that doesn't fill him up then try a little more until it's enough for him. If he has acid reflux keep an eye on him to see how the reflux is reacting to the cereal. Good luck!!!

Answer 5

If you are going to give your son cereal you should make sure that it is alright with your Pediatricion first, and make sure that it is rice cereal and know that he will also become more bound up because of the rice cereal. Not saying that he will get constipated but, he could. I know that my kids did once I began cereal. You should start off with giving it to him in the morning and you could give it to him at luch or dinner or both and his right before bed bottle to help him get filled up a bit more but, you shouldn't give it to him in the middle of the night because you won't be able to watch him if he were to spit up or get a stomach ache. You can always give it to him in a bottle but you have to make it very watery and know that he can get to much from the bottle and gag. I have always given cereal to my kids from the baby spoon even at that young of an age. It is a bit messy but it is better for him. Just pour some cereal into a bowl and add your breast milk or formula which ever you using until it is to the consistancy that you want it which should be a bit thicker not much but a bit thicker than your breast milk. Then, just put some on the spoon and put it to his mouth and he will open up and you can give it to him . Believe it or not that is the best way to do so. I have four kids and another one on the way and I tried cutting a small hole in the nipple and it would clog or the hole would be to big and it would pour out so that is why the spoon is much better..Good luck to you.

Answer 6

Don't start the baby on cereal this young. It can cause digestive problems and cereal in the bottle has been linked to childhood obesity since it hides a large amount of extra calories. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends not giving any solid food before 6 months and their previous recommendation was 4-6 months so if you feel you have to give solid foods wait at least another 6 weeks. I know it's not easy being tired all the time. I had those issues with my daughter who is 3 and my son who is 9 months but it will get easier as your son gets older. Best of luck.

Answer 7

they used to make infa feeders. I'm not sure if they still do. Popular opinion is that a baby before 4 months old should not have anything but breastmilk or formula. I'm sure your pediatrician will say the same. My pediatrician is a little "old school" and said that it was ok for a SMALL amount of RICE cereal only, because my son was the hungriest baby she & I'd ever seen(breastfeeding almost continually-every 1hour). I got a stage 3 nuk nipple for a regular 4 oz bottle made 3 oz of formula and added about 2 tsp of rice cereal to it. (enough so that when he drank it, it wasn't choking him from flowing too fast) But if the baby is not ready, he may get constipated, which will cause gas, etc.... (a whole other set of problems) Have you tried to give him a little water at night to "pacify" him & get him through?

Answer 8

I have a 14 week old son. I have not started him on cereal yet but I have got him to pretty much sleep through the night. I am using the Enfamil AR formula that has rice in it. I also breastfeed at night and then he eats about 2 oz. of formula. I use the Dr. Brown's bottles and they work wonderful. Before I found them he had gas so bad from the other bottles. I also put an extra scoop of formula in his bottles to make it thicker and that really helps.
I used to put my baby in bed with me because I was afraid he would spit up and get chocked and I would not here him. I never slept very well because I was afraid to move with him in bed with me but I found a bed at babies r us. The bed is made so that your baby can sleep with you it also has an incline so he is elevated. It is wonderful. I hope this helps.

Answer 9

He is pretty young to start on cereal. Sounds like you only want him to sleep more which is rather selfish of you as a mother. Just to let you know my kid is 2 and you will never sleep again. I dont think the doctors liek you to start kids on cereal until like 6 months? I cant even remember. But not 10 weeks. Although..you said somethign about reflux..my son had a problem with reflux and he could not keep a bottle down hardly. At about 3 months of age I DID start putting rice cereal in my sons bottle. DO NOT BUY THE Y SHAPED NIPPLE!!!!!!! It WILL send yoo much formula out and choke your baby do not listen to those who tell you to. They have stage 2 nipple from playtex with a little bit bigger hole in them. BUT what I would do is for ever 2 ounces of formula I took the scooper out of an emfamil can and put in one scoop of the rice cereal into his bottle. Shake it very well and try it. Too much will choke him too little wont help. But those Y cut nipple are for much older babies who are drinking more and sucking faster. Make sure this is all ok with your doctor first. If tis just to get him to sleep then you are selfish and you dont need to do this. But if its really somethign to do with his reflux then talk to your doc and go for it.

Answer 10

He is quite young but a lot of mothers do put cereal in their babies bottles, with acid reflux it makes the formula thicker so it stays down better.

I suggest using rice cereal. and you need to use a Y cut bottle nipple, Playtex Ventaires are expensive but that is the only bottle I know of off the top of my head that has a Y nipple.

I would definitely check with your pediatrician... I am not sure what the ratio should be for milk to rice


By the way, the woman who said you will never sleep again is wrong. My 3 month old son is sleeping 12 hours straight at night (and he even gets breastmilk exclusively) Not all babies do this, but you might get lucky!

PS I think it's GREAT that you are breastfeeding! Keep up the great work!

Answer 11

Giving a baby solids this early is a bad idea -- it can lead to allergies and obesity and such.

If it seems like a change that he is more hungry, it might be because of his 3-month growth spurt (arriving a little early). At that time (as well as 3 weeks, 6 weeks, and 6 months), he will be eating a lot more because h's growing so fast. Luckily, this kind of period only lasts up to a week (and sometimes less).

Unfortunately, breastmilk is digested fast (because it is so much easier to digest), so breastfed babies will eat more often, especially at first. As their stomachs get bigger, they need to eat less often, so you should get more sleep at night (though maybe not much more). So hopefully you can stick this out a little longer, because it sounds like you're doing things right.

Good luck.