Colostrum harvesting - any success?

[cupcakemumma]

Hi everyone, hope that you're all doing well!

I'm now 38 weeks pregnant with my first baby.

As I have gestational diabetes my midwife has suggested that I try colostrum harvesting to use incase our baby has a dip in blood sugars when she is born so that there is some colostrum there at the ready. I went to a session at the hospital where a healthcare assistant showed me and some other mums to be what to do, though it was a very brief 15 minute session.
Problem is I've tried hand expressing for the first time today using the method that was taught to us but not a drop came out.

Has anyone else tried doing this from 38 weeks? Any success? Any tips or advice would be really appreciated, I really want to do all that I can to successfully express but at the moment I am now worrying that it isn't going to happen :(

I've not hand expressed before I had baby? Didn't know u could, but I hand expressed coloustrum at days 2-4 with baby post C-sec, milked boob by massage and squeeze into sterile cup boob Hung into the cup and then syringed it up and gave to babe. She now 5wks old and BFin well. Gd luck.

I was 39wks on hospital dates and 37+3d on my dates when babe born

Thanks so much for letting me know, I think that I am overpanicking a bit that it didn't work when I first tried. I think that it just feels like a strange thing to do before the baby is even here!
Great to hear that it was successful for you and that your baby is BFing well. I need to relax a bit, as sure that the colostrum will come along when ready and baby is here...

Hello - you may want to repost this in the feeding section, as there are loads of experienced BFing mums there who may have advice.

I never managed to get colostrum before DS was born but it's there as soon as the baby is born so I would have thought you can just put the baby straight to your breast. Try not to worry about it too much

Thank you for being so reassuring, I didn't know that there is a feeding section on here so will repost it there too, good idea x

Hi,

I had GD with my first pregnancy. Baby wouldn't BF so the hospital gave me a breast pump to try to get the colostrum out. That didn't work either, so they gave him a bottle as his blood sugar was low (I now realise that they gave it too soon, and I had a few hours to keep trying to BF).

So baby FF for first 2weeks. I was really upset as I wanted to BF. However the midwives kept coming round to help me, and baby and I persevered and we began BF'ing when baby was 2 weeks old. We BF for 8 months, and DS is now 2.5 years ld, and I am expecting again.

What I am saying is, try harvesting to colustrum before birth, if that doesn't work, try Bf'ing after birth. If you do have to use bottles as I did, you can change to BF'ing weeks afterwards.

Re: Bf'ing. I had very flat nipples, so ended up using nipple shields to give DS something to latch onto! I never actually used them for their actual purpose of protecting my nipples. After we had BF for a few weeks, I managed to wean him of them and BF 'normally'. So this time around, I will take to the hospital sterilised nipple shields in case I need them. I will also be buying that thing which sucks at your nipple a bit to make them erect and using it in the last weeks before the due date.

HTH. :)