to give my toddler expressed breastmilk?

[Carrierpenguin]

I'm pregnant with dc2 and hoping to bf again, assuming no difficulties. I remember having excess milk with dc1 which tended to get expressed, put in the fridge, then forgotten and thrown away.

Aibu to give dc1 (aged 3) some of the expressed milk, on cereal etc? My logic says that she has cows milk so why not my milk if it's going spare? Saves wasting and maybe even healthy for her?

I'm in exactly the same situation and have been wondering the same thing. Children benefit (in some way) from breastmilk until around the age of 5 when the immune system matures, so I have wondered about giving DS some when DC2 arrives.

Struggling to see why this would ever be unreasonable. I suppose there may be a tiny risk of your toddler developing a taste for the sweeter breastmilk and so going off cow's. I think though as long as it's blended the chance of that happening is low.

Congratulations :)

theory is fine but you may find your milk production is different this time!

Mrscog glad I'm not alone then! I can't see any reason for not doing this, especially if it benefits their health.

A friend of mine did this when she felt very full and needed to express. It wasn't regularly but every now and then her ds would get a cup of breast milk or some on his cereal.

Wheresthelight that's true, I hope not though as with dc1 bf helped me lose loads of weight and eat like a horse at the same time

Eugenes thanks!

Not unreasonable at all, it would be good for her.

I don't think YABU. Although I found I never had the glut of milk with my subsequent babies, with DC1 I would leak a full bottle from the 'spare' side on just one feed. With my other three I really struggled to express any extra milk at all after the first week or so.

I did this with my toddler when my baby was born. Mostly went in her cereal.

Where do you draw the line here though? Why not use it on DH's cereal also?

Why not? Definitely healthier than cows' milk. My dd was still breastfeeding at 2 1/2, it's not that unusual.

Simontowers, dh welcome to have my breast milk on cereal if he likes but doubt he'd want to seeing as he handles expressed breastmilk as though it's radioactive waste. I draw the line at giving it to him from the tap. It's just milk. We put breast milk from another species on our cereal every day. That's weirder when you think about it.

I did, several times. There were a few occasions when we were trying to get DS to take a bottle and he wasn't keen, and DD asked for the milk (I'd fed her once or twice a day until I was about 7 months pregnant so she remembered it as a fairly recent thing) so I gave it to her rather than waste it. And then the time she got a horrible tummy bug I deliberately expressed for her a few times as she wasn't keeping much down and I remembered that breastmilk was meant to be much gentler on the stomach - it worked as well

I didn't do it a lot though - was trying to build up a small reserve in the freezer then once I was back at work trying to keep up with leaving enough for the next day, so spare breastmilk wasn't something there was a lot of.

Why would this ever be a problem?

I have a toddler and a baby, baby refuses a bottle so toddler often has the discarded bottles. He loves it!

Of course it's reasonable!

And given the fact that human milk is much sweeter than cow's milk I suspect your toddler will think it's entirely reasonable too

I do it. I weaned my boy at 13/14 months when I was already a good 3/4 months pregnant. After the baby was born I found I had enough milk to express a full bottle a day. Baby is fully breastfed, so toddler has the 'spare' bottle every day. I don't think he remembers feeding from me (he's now 23 months) but he likes the milk and knows what's cow's milk and what's "mummy milk" (his description, I never acted like there was a difference but he does see me pumping). Before getting pg I had wanted to breastfeed for 2 years so this makes me feel a little better about weaning him.

No reason why not. But from my experience, it is a rare toddler who will actually drink expressed breastmilk, let alone stuff that's been frozen and thawed.

I actually gave EBM to our cat once...

Excellent idea!

I donated milk to Birmingham Women's Hospital. They collect and drop off the bottles.

DS1 (6) and DD1 (3) still have expressed milk, so I think you're not BU. :)

Yanbu, I don't know why anyone would think it was weird.

I did it when DD was small and my supply was going crazy, DS (who was nearly 3 at the time) was sick and DD wasn't ready for a bottle, so I gave it to him in a cup. Thought why not, might give him a bit of an antibody boost. He'd only completely finished feeding 6 months before, so maybe it was more of a no-brainer for us than most

YANBU I gave my older 2 dds BM when I was feeding their brother. The novelty wore off soon enough and naturally they lost interest. They were only bf for a very short time themselves I thought it would be good for them.

Can't see any reason why not! If they drink milk from a cow why would it be weird to give them milk from a human? He may not like the taste though as it will be unfamiliar, but you might as well try!