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Hi there,

We have twins who are 3 months old (1.5 months corrected) that my wife
is currently breastfeeding. Occasionally I bottlefeed one of them to
give her a break but our problem is with the other one (Hannah) who
has problems with the bottle.

Hannah will start to take the bottle fine but after several minutes
she will try and spit the nipple out, start crying, arching,
stretching and looks to be in a lot of pain. If I try and continue,
it's as if she can no longer get a good latch on the bottle nipple.
If I do get it above her tongue she will try to suck but quickly
fights it off or sucks but it most seems to spray out of the side her
mouth or leak out.

We've tried all manner of nipples (using different brands, flows,
shapes and textures) but can't find anything that works. She
definitely has reflux and is on Previcid for it. Putting her on it
has allowed my wife to nurse her where before she would not even nurse
very well. Nursing still isn't perfect with her as she sometimes will
take very little but she must make up for it at other times as she's
gaining good weight consistently.

Any ideas would be most appreciated.

Thanks.

I haven't read the massive replies already given, so I don't know if this
has been suggested, but try vanilla extract. It kind of worked for DD2, who
still, to this day, outright refuses bottles. She has had the odd bottle of
EBM only. Never had even a tiny drop of formula, and with EBM in a bottle,
she would still refuse it.

A friend suggested trying vanilla extract. I thought she was on glue or
worse. She said that she had the same bottle issue with one of her boys as
I had with DD2. Her story was the same as mine - every type of bottle and
nipple and then some and nothing worked, and, eventually, she just gave up
on trying to force a bottle for a rare occasion, just as I had. Then she
heard to try vanilla extract.

The best bottles for this to use are ones that are wider. Something like a
Playtex nurser or similar with a very wide opening and nipple. Put a bit of
vanilla extract on your finger or Q-tip and just wipe a bit of the extract
around that ring part that the nipple goes in then screws on to the bottle.
Just put it around there where it can be smelled but not eaten or tasted.
Friend told me that she heard somewhere that to a nursling, their mother's
milk has a slight vanilla scent to it.

After this suggestion, I really did think she was sniffing the glue and had
gone insane, but I tried it out anyways. Oddly enough, this way and with
one of the bottles and nipples I had previously tried, DD2 took the bottle.
She took it very reluctantly, but there was none of the screaming, crying,
back arching, freaking out, spitting the nipple out. DD2 clearly did NOT
like the bottle with the vanilla around it, but she did take it and she took
it just fine (although didn't seem to stop letting us all know she wasn't
all too impressed!)

I was able to leave her with a bottle on an occasion or two - I had planned
to begin going back to my once a month meetings that required 'Daddy Time'
for the kids, and I was able to go back to that when DD2 was about 4 months
old and we figured the vanilla trick.

No idea if that will work for you, but it definitely worked for us over here
and also for a friend who suggested it and tried it on an occasion.

The friend also used EBM in a bottle as well, not formula, and you didn't
mention if it's formula or breast milk in the bottle, so if it is formula,
the baby just might not like the taste of it and fight it and in this case,
I don't think that the vanilla trick would work at all. It might, though,
if it's breast milk in the bottle. Who knows? It might be worth a shot!