u/Impossible-Title-403

Starting at 4 weeks, we tried to introduce a bottle once a day. However, I feel like every time we introduce a bottle (super slow flow/newborn size Pigeon bottle), nursing gets worse the next day. The baby starts popping on and off the breast repeatedly acting so frustrated and I can feel my breasts be fairly hard and not emptying throughout the day. Because of this, we'll pull back for a few days to try and 'reset' nursing. Two weeks ago, this sequence of events occurred and was really bad, so we haven't used a bottle in almost two weeks. We used one again last night and I swear today, nursing was worse (baby is almost 8 weeks now). Can having a bottle one time lead to a preference that quickly? I need to go back to work at 4.5 months, so eventually baby will need to take a bottle but I love nursing her.

ETA: She also seems to sleep longer overnight after a bottle than she does when nursing. I don’t think it’s a supply issue because she was gaining 1.4oz a day the first month and 1.1oz a day since our last appointment. And she has good diapers

It’s also possible our bottle attempts keep coinciding with growth spurts and that’s alternatively why she’s fussy.

Our baby girl is 7 weeks old. She's a good sleeper once we can transfer her to the bassinet, but getting there feels like a battle. For naps especially, we watch tired cues, wake windows, etc. but regardless of what time we try to get her to sleep once we start the whole routine (swaddle, dark room, white noise, pacifier, rocking her) she gets super irritable and starts crying and fussing. It will take 5-15 minutes of us rocking for her to close her eyes, then we hold her for 20 more minutes before transferring her to the bassinet. If her eyes open at some point this routine can take 30+ minutes each time. The length of the routine is obviously not sustainable, but beyond that the forceful crying and fighting is even more difficult and gives me anxiety every time I have to put her down. Is this normal? Do other babies just close their eyes and drift off to sleep when they're tired?

Our girl is otherwise fairly agreeable. Once transferred to the bassinet, she'll sleep fairly long stretches at night (always minimum 4.5 hours but often 5-6 hours from fairly early on). She feeds well and has been gaining weight great and is engaged during wake times looking at black/white cards, making eye contact and smiling at ass, etc. she just fights with all her might any time we put her down for a nap (this holds true for carrier naps and stroller naps as well).