Any advice- breastfeeding and going back to work?

[Fluteyboots]

I'm going back to work very soon, and still giving my DS (1 in 2 weeks) a morning and night breastfeed. I'm not in any hurry to stop this, but am not sure how to deal with it when I travel with work. If it's just a night I can express for 2 feeds or see if he will accept some cows milk for them. But not sure how to cope if it is longer.

From a booby point of view, would it matter if I didn't feed for a couple of days? Would my milk supply dry up? Will I be in agony? Often at work events the day proceedings run straight into dinners etc, so I can't sneak off and pump. Might sound stupid but I also don't want to have to stand in front a bunch of my mostly male colleagues and put my breast pump in the tray at the airport scanner. So is it possible to not feed for a few days and pick up again when I get back?

Fraid I don't know the answer but from tommorrow I am going to be away from DD for 3 days and taking my pump with me- just plan on pumping morning and night, so marking my place in the thread! Could you take a wide neck bottle and hand express in the loo if you get uncomfortable?

Hi - I've only done a max of two nights not feeding. My DS alwayes accepted the cows milk much more easily if warmed up to blood temp.

Re boobs - if it were me I'd be tempted to take a pump as I'm a bit rubbish at hand expressing. And if dis-assembled blokes I don't see that anyone would be able to work out what it was unless their partner had used one. In which case they're less likely to be weird about it. And I can't see that the airport people would be likely to need to see it separately - it could stay in your handluggage. I tended to pump when I got back to the hotel room late at night and first thing in the morning. That was enough to make sure that there wasn't any discomfort/leakage for me. I actually didn't get much out (and less than DS would have had) but it worked out well enough.

By a year I'm sure your supply is pretty stable and you'll be able to pick up feeding again when you're home. Good luck with the return to work. I found bf a lovely way to reconnect with DS when I started back at work.

Thanks Gruffalo, that's reassuring. The whole reconnection thing is why I want to continue, so it's good to hear it worked out for you.

And I will instruct DH to warm the milk!

I bf ds1 until he was 15 months, I stopped his before bed feed because we went out for the night and I didn't want to express just for that. My mum gave him cows milk in a beaker and he never wanted breast milk again from that point. I was only feeding once a day, not twice as you are, but I never had any engorgement or soreness and I still had milk until about a year later if I squeezed, but not sure of the quality of the milk, so think you should be ok for a few days but I'm not expert!

I used to have the same issue as you, except at 6 months DD would not touch formula, so I had to express constantly to keep up supplies.

I would advise the same as Gruffalo, I took a pump with me whenever I had to stay away and just expressed and binned just to keep my milk up.

Good luck