You may be wondering why I, as a professional doula, am writing an article about bottle feeding. It’s because – as a postpartum doula – my job is to help growing families come up with plans that work best for them. Breast feeding is best for some, but bottle feeding works best for others. And my job isn’t to add to the voices telling someone what they’re doing isn’t enough – because I don’t get to decide what is enough for them. But we do have a lack of resources and a lack of supportive voices for some, especially those who choose a bottle for any reason, and hopefully this article can help with that.
Are you feeding your baby?
If your answer is yes, then you’re enough and a great parent! Believe it or not, you don’t have to breast feed your baby in order for them to get the necessary nutrients to grow and thrive. You can choose to feed either breast milk or infant formula in a bottle, and both will be enough for your baby. Breast milk does hold a lot of extra benefits, but you aren’t depriving your little one of anything they need to thrive if you choose formula.
There are plenty of valid reasons to choose to bottle feed your baby, including going back to work, trauma, low milk supply, baby’s food intolerances, or just because that’s what you want to choose. If you’re someone struggling with an anxiety disorder, you may find the added bonus that you don’t need to worry about how to cover up or what people are thinking of you if you have to feed your baby when you’re out and about.
3 Bonuses to Bottle Feeding
We hear a lot about the cons of bottle feeding – carrying bottles around, buying bottles and keeping them clean, and on and on. But there are plenty of benefits, and you don’t have to compromise! In fact, one of the most common things I see listed as a con to bottle feeding is formula, but there are options for donated breast milk out there. And formula does, in fact, provide all of the nutrition your baby needs if you choose to go with formula. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!
1. Shared Responsibility
It’s no longer only one person’s responsibility to feed! Now instead of all of the weight falling on one person’s shoulders, we can spread it out – mom, dad, older siblings, grandparents, family friends, postpartum doula, aunts, uncles, and the list goes on. It can be incredibly difficult for some to bear the weight of being the only responsible person of something as important as feeding, so why not let everyone enjoy it?
2. Bonding
Anyone who’s feeding the baby can bond with them (not to say it’s the only way to bond with baby). Grab a bottle, snuggle up with your cute baby, and give them a warm bottle of breast milk or formula. You can even feed them while having wonderful skin-to-skin moments, which is what some parents worry about when not breast feeding. Like I said above, even if you choose to bottle feed in a way that doesn’t necessarily include any specific bonding activities, you can have extra skin to skin time planned to intentionally bond.
3. Specialized Diet
For some babies, bottle feeding is the only way that parents find to decrease acid reflux, projectile vomit, or horrible gas. No, you and your baby don’t have to live with them having constant digestion problems. Some of these problems may be solved by you removing certain foods from your diet if you’re breast feeding, but for some people food just isn’t something they can give up. By bottle feeding, parents gain the option of going to formula or donated breast milk that doesn’t contain the food triggers.
Just because you’re bottle feeding (even if it’s combo feeding – some bottle, some breast) doesn’t mean that you’re not doing enough. You are. Bottle feeding is hard – it includes extra prep and clean up time! If you choose to pump, that’s another time resource. Just because you made one choice for your family doesn’t mean that anybody else has the full facts of why. It’s not selfish, and it’s not going to inherently cause problems for your little one. So go ahead and bottle feed if that’s what you feel is best for your family!
If you’re looking for further resources about bottle feeding, I highly recommend the book Guilt-Free Bottle Feeding, by Madeleine Morris (not an affiliate link, just a link to a book that I love on this subject).
In addition, to create a personal plan and realistic goals for yourself an your baby, reach out! I’m an infant feeding specialist, as well as a postpartum doula, and I would love to work with your little family.
About the Author
Hi! I’m Liza, the owner and founder of Cache Valley Baby & Family. I do a lot of different things, including postpartum doula support, fertility awareness instruction (with a focus on conception), infant feeding support, and perinatal class instruction. I have a passion for working with families and women.
In my perinatal classes and postpartum support, I’ve worked with families from all walks of life, supporting them through their unique journeys. I particularly enjoy watching people become more confident in their own abilities as they go through my classes.
I love teaching fertility awareness. Because of the rest of my services, my focus is mainly on charting for conception, but I’m also experienced and happy to teach those charting to avoid pregnancy or to track their health. I have experience helping people chart with PCOS, thyroid disease, and more. I trained as an instructor through NFPTA.
All of my classes can be taken online from anywhere around the world, and I also hold local classes in Cache Valley, Utah. If you’d like to work with me, go ahead and reach out!
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