In a message dated 3/28/2006 1:24:04 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, [log in to unmask] writes: Finger feeding...most babies appear to pattern very quickly on any method of artificial feeding. I found this out the hard way many years ago. I rarely have Mom/Dad only FF for more than 24 - 48 hours. I will suggest alternating cup feeds with paced bottle feeds and breast, with or without the NS, and have great success with most of these determined intelligent little ones. Ann, This is helpful. I wish this baby had been able to eat in those other ways, we tried cup feeding, and paced bottlefeeding, with no success. Baby also only even partially succeeded at breast with NS or without, when I was there for some reason, mom just couldn't get anything to work consistently except the FF. She also refused to try the bottle at all, when I first recommended it as an option, thinking the finger feeder was as least part of a human being. After a hugely traumatic postpartum week for both mother and baby, I figure she really needed to exert some control over her relationship with her baby, and with such poor weight gain in the two weeks before I saw her, wanted anything that the baby would do consistently. With a tight, type 3 type/4 tongue tie, that just wasn't much. I am very interested in your statement that you don't use FF as a tool for more than 24-48 hours. As a private practice LC with no hospital resources, the mothers I work with have to buy the FF for themselves, is this a tool your hospital provides for free? I would think spending so much money on something one uses for a day or two might be a issue, just wondering how you deal with this. Thanks so much for your response. As an update, since some of you asked for that, the baby is now doing paced bottlefeeds, though still needs a lot of coaxing, waiting, helping, and with some constistency since yesterday. I know this mom and babe, and I know I could be hearing something totally different tomorrow. Thanks to everyone who is giving input. Judy Judy LeVan Fram, PT, IBCLC, LLLL, Brooklyn, NY, USA *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html