Don’t freak out if your kid comes early and you’re reading a hundred articles a day on how to raise them. We’re here for you.
There are a lot of things you need when you’re having a baby, and bottles are one of them. If your kid is born early, you’ll have to adjust your buying strategy accordingly.
If you’re looking for the best bottles for preemies, I’ve done the work for you.
Page Contents
Why a special bottle for my preemie?
In order to guarantee that premature newborns, get appropriate nutrition and grow at a pace comparable to that of healthy, full-term babies, more attention must be given to them.
Be aware that they have specialized feeding requirements. Because they can’t digest as rapidly as normal newborns, they have to drink less but more often. First and foremost, premature babies have a harder time sucking and swallowing milk.
Because of this, having a custom-made bottle for your early gift to the world is essential.
As a result, many new parents of preterm newborns find themselves immediately rushing to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). So that doctors can keep an eye on how much the baby is consuming, you may be asked to bottle feed.
This might be the start of your baby’s bottle-feeding experience, which can be both beautiful and challenging.
What to look for while buying a preemie bottle?
Here are some of the unique characteristics of the best bottles for preemies, and why they’re so valuable.
Go with the flow
When we become new or re-parents, we all strive to just “go with the flow.” To locate the best bottle, you’ll need to pick one that has the correct flow—literally speaking.
When it comes to premature babies, they have a smaller nipple opening because of their tinier stomachs and predisposition to digestive disorders.
Colic, which is painful for both the baby and the mother if the milk comes too quickly, maybe exacerbated. In general, a nipple that causes milk to flow too quickly might cause your infant to choke on their own milk, which is never pleasant.
In order to ensure that your infant receives the proper quantity of milk at the right time, a well-made preemie bottle and slow flow nipple should be used.
Fewer bubbles, fewer troubles
Air vents placed into the bottle are something else to keep an eye out for. As a result, gas and burping are less likely to occur after a bottle-feeding session, thanks to these devices.
Colic might be exacerbated by the presence of air bubbles in your baby’s stomach. As a bonus, less air means less spit-up, which means less mess for you!
It is important to remember that few bottles have an internal ventilation system while others have nipple air vents for ventilation. As a result, cleaning these bottles might take a long time due to the number of components involved. Air vent holes in the nipple tend to have fewer parts, yet they are still very effective. When making a purchase, keep this in mind.
When it comes to cleaning and putting together and dismantling a bottle, if you’re like me, this may be an unneeded burden. There’s also a risk of spilling milk all over yourself and your baby if the nappy isn’t put together correctly.
You may not mind cleaning up a little more time if your kid enjoys the bottle and it helps with their digestive issues.
Shape might matter
When a baby is born prematurely, doctors advocate nursing or bottle-feeding breast milk to ensure healthy growth and development. You should choose a wide-necked bottle that resembles the mother’s nipple as much as possible if you’re alternating between breast and bottle feeding.
It’s possible that you’ll be pumping nonstop and have to go back to work right afterward. There are repercussions when a baby is denied what he or she is used to, as we all know.
In the beginning, when I dropped my daughter off at daycare, I prayed that she would have the milk. As a precaution, I made sure she got the quantity of food she required. A few months after we started using the new bottles, she was a happy and healthy eater, sorry for her previous struggles with the ones we were using.
As a result, our feeding experience was considerably enhanced when we had a bottle that resembled the shape and breadth of the nipple.
The wide-neck shape also makes cleaning easy. With a sponge or cloth, you’ll be able to remove any residue more easily than with a narrower container.
It’s possible that the form of the bottle, in addition to the nipple and mouth, might make a difference in your comfort. The indentations on certain bottles make it simpler for you to grip. A handy method to hold a little bottle made things a bit more manageable for me when I had to spend 30 minutes attempting to hold the milk bottle in the appropriate position for my baby.
What’s it Made of?
Keep in mind that not only the form but the substance must be taken into consideration. Stiff plastic is used to make nipples that have large mouths and are supposed to resemble genuine breasts. The infant may have a hard time latching on and adjusting to this.
If it’s made of silicone, soft, or pliable in any way, it will feel more natural on a newborn baby and be simpler to use. Everything to make them believe it’s your nipple is good when transferring from breast to bottle, and the material may aid with the transition to a bottle.
