Nutritional Needs for Babies From birth to four months the baby only needs breast milk or formula. Some ba- bies get a combination of the two. Babies at this stage are fed on demand. It in- volves the mother figuring out which of the babies several cries means “I’m hungry” and feeding the baby until he or she is full. Breastfeeding mothers some- times wonder if their baby is getting enough. In such cases, she needs to look at how comfortable the child is after feeding, how far apart the feedings are and, most importantly, how much weight the baby is gaining. If the baby is gaining an appro- priate amount of weight at his or her well baby visits, there is no need to be con- cerned. At this stage, some babies eat a couple of ounces
