Nipple Confusion

Since we have been bottle feeding her, we have had random times of good feedings-- meaning no drool, no spit up, just sucking the bottle down. Other times, we have had not so good, lots of milk drool and spit up. I went to BRU on Friday in search of smaller nipple because I thought that Maggie was just getting too much formula from the current nipple. I knew that when we opened the box of bottles that we got an assortment. Meaning, an assortment of tall 8 ounce and some small 4 ounces. We threw out the box long ago. But it never crossed my mind that their would be an assortment of nipples. Even when I went to get a preemie nipple, it never crossed my mind that I could have an assortment of nipples from the original box. I was just concerned that she was eating too fast and the flow was too fast. Solution- preemie nipples. I bought a package of three. This afternoon I boiled them. We tested this out around 1pm feeding... it was flawless. No drool, no spit up. Victory for all.

Mike comes home. I just used one nipple and was about wash them, but now I had put the one preemie nipple with the rest and I couldn't tell them apart. I ask Mike, "Help, I can't figure out which one is the preemie nipple." We examine the nipples for about five minutes. Seriously, picture it... us in the kitchen struggling over which one is the golden preemie nipple. We are looking at the hole at the top, we are looking at the base, is one smaller/larger? Surely, we are smart educated folks, we should be able to figure this out.

Then all of sudden, as I am examining the nipple in the afternoon light, I see wording on the base that says, "LEVEL P" meaning preemie. I quickly grab another one and it says, "LEVEL 1". Surely all the rest of our current nipples were Level 1.
Yep, think AGAIN!! THEY WERE ALL DIFFERENT!!! Some were Level 4- meaning for "aggressive eaters" Some were Level 3 for 6 months and above. Some were Level 2- 3 months and some were Level 1- newborns.

This explains everything. This explains why sometimes we were getting mega drool, because she was taking the flow of a 6 month old or an "aggressive eater". I mean she comes from a line of Kutsch's that surely can eat, but to label her "aggressive" at 3 weeks old is a bit much.

So we are not saying that she will never drool again or she won't spit up. But surely now she will have a consistent flow of level 1 nipples.

We also switched her to Emfamil from Similac. We also want to see if this helps her tummy get settled better and help her poop more. They say that some formula works better for newborns than others. Our pediatrician says that the difference in formula is like the difference in COKE and PEPSI. So we'll see how this change treats her.