Hi Kathy, thank you so much for your response, I'll try to answer all your questions, hopefully this will clarify :0)
"The first thing I always recommend is to be sure your lo isn’t ill."
She may have had a small cold/congestion, but nothing major, although you never really know what's going on inside, she definitely seemed 'herself' in every other way. This is a great thing to keep in mind though, and has been the case in the past, so thank you.
"It sounds like you’re doing ok but the experience at daycare may be impacting her."
I agree and have always kept in mind what I've learned on these boards about 'how to give a BF baby a bottle' etc, even made my mom (watches her 2 x days a week) the handout from kellymom. I would say this might be the issue, but she only goes 3 days a week to daycare and yesterday, they did write on her sheet that they left an oz. at the end of a feeding, which makes me feel like they aren't forcing it as much as I thought. Also, her primary DC teacher is back from a month long vacation, I think she's more in tune to how to bottle feed a BF baby. I love her for that!
"It’s not uncommon for babies, especially easily distracted babies, to prefer the faster flowing bottles and begin to spend less and less time at the breast."
Yes, I have kept her at medium flow only b/c she was consistently not finishing her bottles at DC and I thought she would prefer the medium flow to slow flow (we were doing better with nurisng at the time). This was also during a growth spurt, she was actually taking about 3 oz more in her bottles overall than she does now, I reduced after seeing she wasn't coming close to finishing.
"Are you pumping? Is all her milk ebm? Is she taking lots of solids?"
Yes, I pump at work, twice a day in a 9 hour total day. I get roughly 12 oz, and that's what she gets at DC. 3, 4 oz bottles of EBM. She has never had formula. On the weekends since she started refusing to nurse during the day, I try not to give her bottles at all. I pump once in the middle of the day on Sat/Sun just to keep from getting too engorged. This seems to be working okay. As far as solids, it's the same on the weekdays as the weekends. She gets fruit and oatmeal in the morning, usually the fruit is homemade peaches, pears or apples. She gets a green veggie in the early afternoon, then since stopped nursing in the evenings, I added in a solid meal before bed, which is usually us playing with finger foods and/or me trying something new like last night it was black beans and cous cous. yummmm. I only added this third meal in to supplement her lack of nursing. She also gets sips of water or watered down juice with her meals at home, out of a cup, not a bottle. She is definitely into her solids. I have taken it very slow. We didn't start until she was a week shy of 6 months, then I progressed very slowly due to an immediate issue with constipation. She's absolutely in love with the solids though. Shows an interest she never showed for nursing, bottles or breast. I try not to give too much into it and I always offer the breast before any solid meal.
I also wanted to chime in on the other post you gave me the link to, as far as visualization and breathing techniques. This has definitely worked for me in the past. In fact, I attribute yoga breathing and visualization to my somewhat easy labor. Also, closing eyes, deep breaths and visualization is also a HUGE part of what helped with her initial nursing strike at 11 weeks. I did so many of the things you mentioned. Maybe even from your exact post, it all sounds so familiar. I did deep breathing, visualized flowing milk, waterfalls, milk geysers, etc. I also sometimes picture her at other ages, as a toddler, a little girl, all the good times we'll have, etc. Sometimes it's just enough to distract me from the stress/anxiety of it all and elicit the let down. I am VERY aware of how my body responds to stress and like you, I would get more and more worked up the more frustrated she gets at the breast. I've learned not to do that any more, as much as I can control it. Part of that for me is allowing her to come out of nursing position when she wants to, b/c I don't want her to associate those positions with frustration.
Another poster also asked me if she'll nurse in a quiet, dark room and unfortunately no. This used to work, but since she's a bit older, she still won't relax or 'turn off' in this environment. I've tried humming, singing, talking to her, but if she's not into it, she'll sometime suckle through, but not suck vigorously enough for a let down.
For now, I've allowed her to continue nursing at night on demand and waking her up in the evening for a dream feed. Not sure what else I can do at this time.
The most important thing is that she's happy and healthy and that is definitely the case!
Thanks again for you advice and support!
