I have a story I like to tell mothers whose babies refuse a bottle.  Early in my
breastfeeding helping career, I worked with a mother in my LLL group who was going back to
work at the Federal Reserve bank.  She had made all the necessary preparations and the
transition was going well.

At the same time she returned to work, a co-worker who had bottle fed from birth also
returned to work.  Both babies were about six weeks old.  The breastfeeding baby did fine
with the bottle, but the bottle-feeding mother's baby refused a bottle at day care for the
whole first week.

I like this story because it illustrates that there is more going on here than the usual
things people think of:  what type of bottle is used, when the bottle was introduced, how
the bottle was given, etc., etc.  This mother and baby obviously developed a close
relationship during those first six weeks.  On their first day apart, the baby took one
look at the caregiver and said to herself, "This is *not* my mother and I am *not* going to
feed!"

This story also makes it clear that feeding is a relationship. There is a lot more to it
than the details. For this reason, I have always loved Kittie Frantz's suggestion that the
mother have the person who will be the baby's caregiver be the one to introduce the bottle,
because that will be part of *their* relationship.

I also like this story because when a baby refuses a bottle, many mothers first blame
themselves.  They think, "I should have started the bottle earlier," or attribute the
baby's behavior to some other decision of theirs that "should" have been done differently.
The fact that the bottle-feeding mother's baby refused the bottle at day care allows the
mother to let go of those feelings and focus on the present situation.  It also helps her
factor in the "relationship" piece..

Hope this helps,

Nancy Mohrbacher, IBCLC
Chicago suburbs, Illinois USA

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