Carol Brussel wrote:
>- breastfeeding babies should co-sleep, i am not sure that non-breastfed
>babies should although the health benefits would be good (i am trying to
>determine why i have this idea, i never need to verbalize it because i don't
>see non-breastfeeding babies, is it just a gut feeling or a bias i can't
>quite describe yet? comments please)

Perhaps the fear a bottlefed baby and his mom would not be as 'in synch' as
a breastfeeding pair?

I have slept with both my children, both more out of necessity than
anything else (my daughter doesn't sleep unless she's touching me -period).
 While I've fallen into a nice rythym with my daughter and feel completely
rested from her (she'll easily sleep 11 hours at night waking only to nurse
and go straight back to sleep every couple hours) my son (bottlefed) is
another story entirely.

I had water bottles by our bed I would add powder to and later ready to
feed formula in empty bottles to minimize the strain of waking up.  Waking
up with him was (is still) like waking up to a nuclear war drill.  He
doesn't rustle and whine, he has a blood curdling scream from nowhere and
it's been like that since birth.

For various reasons this system did not work long and I ended up trudging
back and forth to the fridge at night to get bottles for him.  I nearly had
a nervous breakdown from exhaustion and could (can still) barely control my
rage when I read *^*&%^ saying bottlefed babies sleep better or give a baby
a bottle before bed to get a longer sleep.

Anyway, after I couldn't birth my son myself (was supposed to be born at a
free standing birth centre, transfered for a lot of reasons had epidural
and pit standard birth) and then couldn't feed him myself I felt at least I
could sleep with him because then at least it would be mildly different
than babysitting I'd done for other people's kids.

He still wakes at night.  He has periods of wanting to sleep with us and
periods of not.  He has occasional periods of sleeping all night.  He is
more exhausting at night than my 6 month old.  My dh and I wouldn't be able
to function if we had to go get him, get his bottle, put him back in his
bed, then go back to ours, then do it all over again several times a night,
then get up and tend to kids/go to work.

Final comment, IME, people who think bottlefeeding is easier/less tiring
than a well working breastfeeding relationship are ________________.

-wendey (LC in training in Montreal)

             ***********************************************
The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html