Unfortunately, things don't always work this way for everyone and some parents find themselves finding out that their gorgeous child has some challenges. This happened to me and my partner who found out that our son had a 'Syndrome' we didn't know what syndrome he had and the hospital couldn't tell us but what we quickly realised is that our baby was not able to breast or bottle feed effectively. One of the possible reasons given by the hospital was his 'high arched palate' but this was also included with comments from doctors like 'tongue tie', 'small jaw' and 'maybe he has a weak tongue'. The reality is the hospital didn't know what the issue was and neither did we.
Faced with the prospect of being sent home to continue tube feeding our son I started investigating online to see if anyone else had encountered similar challenges and had overcome them with a special bottle. My search led me to a review on Amazon.com which read as follows :
"If your baby has a narrow high arched palate, try this feeder! My breastfed baby struggled for months to feed from a bottle. We tried Dr. Browns, regular Medela, NUK, Comotomo, Mimijumi, and First Years Breastflow. She has no visible tongue tie but she gagged on regular length nipples, struggled to latch on shorter nipples, and was never able to achieve a good latch with suction on any of them regardless of flow. The milk would pour out of her mouth instead of getting swallowed. If we flattened the Breastflow nipple and took all the air out, she could drink a few ounces over several hours. It was miserable, frustrating, and exhausting for her and us. At our wits end, this feeder was recommended to us by our pediatrician and changed EVERYTHING. From the first time we used it, my baby was able to take a full feeding from it with ease. No more struggles! No more tears! No more hungry baby! I would like to hug Mandy Haberman and Medela for this feeder."
I then looked to see if Amazon in the uk also sold the Medela Special Needs Feeder and thankfully they did. So at this point I was interested but didn't know much about it. I checked youtube and came across an explanation of the feeder given by the inventor Mandy Haberman. For those that are still wondering the Haberman Feeder is the Medela Special Needs Feeder, they are the same thing.
From this video and a few others I was convinced that this could be helpful for my son. I was at least willing to try given that all other attempts had failed within the hospital. So I purchased the bottle on the spot from Amazon.co.uk with next day delivery.
My Medela Special Needs Feeder / Haberman Feeder review
First feed
Having studied the videos and waited anxiously to receive the 'answer to all our problems' bottle I settled down for my son's first feed.
I put the bottle in his mouth aligned the medium flow line with his nose and waited. To my delight he started sucking really hard and kept going for longer than he had done previously on other bottles. I was so happy especially since us taking him home from the hospital was dependent on his feeding progress.
Unfortunately, my joy turned to confusion and disappointment when I pulled the bottle out of his mouth to find that despite his efforts he hadn't taken anything. Much like the other bottles we had tried. The good news was that the Medela Special Needs Feeder has an ace up it's sleeve and that is the ability to help baby along by squeezing the milk into his mouth. I did this and gradually the milk started disappearing into my little one. This wasn't the ideal outcome I was looking for but HE WAS BEING FED WITH A BOTTLE and not just his tube. Which was a great result. Also he had taken 30 ml of his 46 ml feed which was great on reflection.
We persevered with the Medela Special Needs Feeder bottle and as my partner and I developed our squeezing technique and became adept at reading his sucking and swallowing rhythm we are now able to feed him almost entirely on his bottle. At the time of writing we have been using the bottle for four days and the last feed we managed to give him all but 6 ml before he fell asleep mid feed.
Conclusion
It is still early days for us and I will update this post with more results as the time passes, however, as it stands our results have been positive. It's not ideal that he's not using the bottle as intended and we are 'squeeze feeding' him but it may be he will never have the mechanics to do so. It could also be that as he becomes bigger and stronger he will develop the tongue strength to drain the bottle of his own accord. Time will tell.
Having a child with a syndrome (especially an unknown syndrome) is incredibly difficult especially when fundamental issues like feeding become problematic. The Medela Special Needs Feeder has given us a sense of normality and could be life changing if we are able to provide all feeds via the bottle and free our son of his feeding tube.
Our son doesn't have a cleft palate which from what I have seen the bottle works really well for but he does have a feeding issue and I suspect many other parents will be in the same position. The bottle is more expensive than regular bottles but the problem it solves makes it worth every penny. I would highly recommend Medela Special Needs Feeder / Haberman Feeder.
