My daughter is 10 days old, and since about 5 days when my milk was fully in we’ve weaned from formula to 95% breast milk. We supplemented with formula from a bottle in the hospital due to high jaundice levels to help flush it out of her system while we waited for my milk to come in.

When we first came home, I used a tube (SNS style) to add in formula then eventually compiled milk while she nursed to make sure she was getting enough. She got used to the faster flow of bottles we’d been giving her and of the tube, so she got frustrated with nursing and wouldn’t stay latched for more than a handful of pulls until she realized it wasn’t as fast as she wanted.

We saw a lactation consultant who set us up with a nipple shield and now she’ll nurse like a champ. But, she falls asleep before she drains me. She’ll only stay awake about 15 minutes, and with a weighted feed with the consultant to make sure she was taking in enough (they wanted us to watch her closely until she hits her birth weight so her bilirubin doesn’t rebound) it took her a solid 15 in both breasts to get her normal feedings worth (about 1.5 ounces). The lactation consultant was able to pull on her arms and scratch her head and all the things they do to coax her to eat, but I CANNOT get her to stay awake! Usually I give in and let her go to sleep, then I pump as advised after I nurse to keep my supply up and coming in, then she usually wakes up within 20 to 30 min and I have to give her a bottle because I just drained myself with the pump.

She’ll stay awake until right at the very end when bottle feeding, we’ve been trying the “paced” bottle feeding to slow her down but still it only takes her 15 minutes when we realllyyy slow her down to drain a 1.5 to a ounce bottle, she just doesn’t have 30 minutes worth of awake eating in her.

I’m really struggling, I want so desperately to nurse her for my own emotional reasons, but I get so worried about her getting enough and frustrated trying to keep her awake that I don’t really know what to do.

Any advice?? How to you keep your little ones awake and engaged in nursing?