This past week was Nina's fourth at daycare. After a couple of days of taking a "full" bottle (my full bottles these days are 3 oz since so much milk has been wasted--Elena would suck 5 oz down 4 times in a full day at daycare) once during the day, we've come to another standstill. No more smiley faces following the ounces consumed on her daily report. From what I understand, she flips out the minute she feels that artificial nipple graze her lip. On Friday it took one of the women an hour to dribble in one single ounce.
I've been a little stressed by this situation, feeling obligated to keep her with me on half days that I am not in the office, or traveling back to daycare in the middle of the day to feed her if time allows. That being said, she's goes 6-7 hours at night not infrequently, and she certainly has the fat stores to prove her staying power. As a result, I'm not too bothered by the situation since I know that the perceived problem of Nina not taking a bottle is really just mine and those that are caring for her. I asked two of them yesterday what the longest learning period was that they had seen for adapting to a bottle. They both looked at me a bit with pinched smiles and agreed: "Um, she's the longest that I've seen." Great.
Is one month of non-bottle accepting an absolute predictor of never-bottle accepting? I'm beginning to think it's a pretty strong one, at the very least. My over-analytical side has taken over a bit, and I've been doing some google searches this morning. Google searches are, after all, the best way to get the most accurate information (that was a joke, in case you missed it). So I read Dr. Sears' suggestions for getting baby to take a bottle, which, in true Dr. Sears fashion is lovely and touchy feely. But I think they've done all of that at daycare, and it hasn't really paid off. I did, however, feel deeply justified for not "training" Nina at home since that would mean me giving her a bottle--it was nice that Dr. Sears has deemed this task as not the mom's job.
I looked at some other sites, and was really looking for a blog or personal witness regarding this issue. I stopped looking after reading some unhelpful piece of garbage that basically said it boils down to a "stand-off" or the baby accepting the bottle. A little too much like cry-it-out for me, and I just don't think that provision of nourishment should be a battle or unpleasant in any way for the baby.
At the breastfeeding conference that I attended in August (with newborn Nina), Dr. Newman mentioned that the advice to exclusively breastfeed until 6 months before introducing solid foods was great as a public health policy, but neglected the needs of individual babies. If a baby has the motor skills and the interest to safely eat solids, he argued, given him/her solids! So that idea has been in my mind for some time, and I've been saying that perhaps this no-bottle issue might push us to start solids sooner. But then I realized that in doing this, if Nina wasn't ready, we'd be ignoring more of her cues. His section on feeding babies when mom isn't around really helped me with this realization, and will hopefully guide my stress levels over the next few months. I love that he opens up the FAQ on this topic by saying in bold type, "This is no tragedy."
Basically, this bottle issue with Nina has been another lesson for me in listening to my intuition, which has always been saying, "She'll be fine. The bottle is no big deal--she'll either learn, or she won't." I LOVE reading about parenting and the wealth of information and experiences that are easily accessible on the internet. I think in being raised Catholic, it has prepared me for handling this overabundance--I pick and choose what recommendations to follow as I see fit. (Half-kidding, Mom!) In all seriousness, the picking and choosing is really where that intuition comes into play. What I've learned is that the easiest decisions to make are the ones that feel the most right. It's incessant remembering of this lesson that continues to be the challenge.
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