Exclusively pumping - advice please!

[Bumbershoot]

DD is 3 months old, so far exclusively breastfed. She's now being put on a special formula to help her grow as she's failing to thrive and is both lactose intolerant and allergic to cmp. Trouble is she hates the formula and point blank refuses to take it. Her calorie intake is so tiny at the moment, it's very worrying, and we need to get her on the new milk ASAP without her losing any more weight, so I've started pumping feeds for her and hope to start gradually adding formula till she's taking full formula bottles happily.

What I'm wondering is how often and for how long I should be pumping in order to get the right amount for her. We'll hopefully only have to do this for a short while as she adjusts, but I have a toddler, so time is short! I understand she needs an average of 750ml breast milk per day. Is that right? Should I pump at every feed (about every 3 hours) or do longer sessions less often? And does anyone have any tips on what's most efficient in general? I have an Avent single electric pump and don't really want to buy a double since this is likely to be a short term situation.

Thanks

[Ithinkwerealonenow]

Hmm, it was a long while since I did similar (and it worked for us no problem - gradually changing the composition of the milk until they just take the hypo formula, so a good plan).

From what I can remember, if you start expressing after a couple of the feeds - whichever is most convenient - then your body should start to recognise the demand and make more after a few days. You'll have to experiment to see what works best for you though.

Or - if she's getting the BM straightaway anyway - why not just pump before a feed in the daytime, then bottle feed it to her? As the proportion of formula goes up, you'll have extra BM you can freeze, to use for nighttime mixing if needed.

[Bumbershoot]

I hadn't thought of that! Worth a try. Although means twice as much time, which won't go down well with DS... Would pumping for a bit longer but less often end up wrecking my supply?

[Ithinkwerealonenow]

That I don't know, its likely to vary with each individual. You could try it, and keep a record of times and how much you get. If it starts to go down, then you'd need to pump more often and longer to try to get it back up again, but how well your body responds to that is an unknown - some women can really struggle to get supply back up again, especially when via pumping rather than baby.

Given that its only going to be for a few weeks until baby takes the formula (hopefully), I'd be inclined not to mess with the current frequency, but just try extra distraction techniques (aka bribes) for your older one.

But I am no kind of expert, and it is a few years since I did this, so don't go on my word alone! Good luck...

[qumquat]

I pump 5/6 times a day I think the recommended amount is 7 times to maintain supply . The best tip I got was to pump at least once between 1 and 5am, this keeps supply up and also I get loads of milk! Look on kellymom website for lots of good advice.