HELP! Starting to express - advice needed please!

[Jen2727]

My DD is 4 weeks old today and BF has never been easy for us. I expressed 1fl oz yesterday to practice with bottle and she took it fine. Have 3 fl oz to give her later (which i believe is enough for 1 whole feed) and will express for next bottle when DH is giving her this one. Is this the best way to proceed? How can i build up more of a supply without affecting my milk supply. I don't want to end up drying it out, but would like to express for at least 1-2 bottles a day. Any advice would be appreciated. Expressing at least some feeds is the only way that i can see myself carrying on with breast feeding ... HELP

Expressing will stimulate your supply

Best time to do it ime, iis after the first feed of the day and perhaps after the last one

It will build slowly and will depend on your pump as to how much you can get

1 - 2 oz per time is fine

You can add to it too, so make a 4 oz feed per day

If you want to keep bfing too, consider using the smallest holed teat you can find so it comes out slowly. If it's too easy for her she may start to refuse the breast.

What problems are you having? Can we help?

She is an extremely fussy and sleepy feeder - it takes me an hour to an hour and a half for her to start and finish her feed. She falls asleep, gets a lot of wind and fusses over the breast. She is putting on weight really well and is generally a very content baby, but i get no time really between feeds and its frustrating me!
I would like to breast feed as well as bottle feed. We have the Closer to Nature Tommee Tipee slow flow teats, so hopefully they are like the breast. I am holding off stopping breast feeding until the magic 6-8 weeks when hopefully she/i will have the hang of things but if not, the appeal of switching to formula is massive! I am hoping that if expressing works, it will take the pressure off me and DH can do some feeds and we can leave her with grandparents if we want to go out and i can take expressed bottles out with me ... i know breast is best and i want to try to give her it for as long as possible.

If you express to order, i.e. she has in a day what you express in a day and don't let her take big feeds you should be fine. The potential problem at this stage is oversupply. Once you get to 7 weeks this will be much less of a concern as your supply should have regulated itself by then (your boobs will stop feeling so full)

If she takes more than 3oz then she may go longer before the next feed (which would be off you) so that may cause problems. 1-3oz is about right for a feed (i.e. don't stress if she only takes a small amount and make sure DH doesn't try to convince her to take the rest).

I would only do one bottle a day, as to minimise bottle preference. As carrotcake said, keep her on small holed teats, also get DH to change sides with her, introducing small breaks. (you're avoiding her liking the immediacy of the bottle so much that she then doesn't want to work for milk off you, which changes speed and requires some work before let-down).

Also it's better that you do one of the middle of the night feeds as this is best for milk production.

The kellymom exressing section is very useful. Has a calculator to tell you rough guides of how much milk per meal (basically 1oz per hour so 3 hourly feeds are roughly 3oz bottles) and also that after six weeks, how much they need doesn't change (so no stressing when comparing to formula babies).

and feel free to start a separate thread regarding your BF problems, hth

Thank you ClimberChick, some valued advice! I'll probably only do 1 bottle a day until 7 weeks anyway. But am i right in thinking i can introduce more bottles after 7 weeks? I have already started a thread about breastfeeding problems last week - HELP, 3 week old daughter and want to stop breast feeding ... I am a little more positive since then but still up and down with my emotions!

Jen2727, I'm not an expert, but am BF-ing my 1st, and I really do sympathise, you're in what I think is the hardest time for BF-ing. Or was for me, anyway.

I was fantasising about introducing formula around now, btw. I found when I got to 6 weeks, I was happy enough to keep going a bit longer. And then a bit longer. Personally I found that taking it a day/week at a time was much more practical than making great ambitions... If I thought about BF-ing for 6 months when DS was 4 weeks old, I would just burst into tears and simply not see how that was possible. Really! Now I've got no idea how long I'll bf for, but that's because I'm not really that bothered, it's easy enough and I'll play it by ear. DS is now 5 months, and no longer feeds like a 4 week old, thank god... That said, if I had found BF-ing truly intolerable for a long time, I would have introduced formula and aimed to feel proud of the BF-ing I'd done, not ashamed of the BF-ing I didn't do, IYSWIM.

Great that your DD took a bottle, and good that you can express, as well - I think 1 bottle a day is a very good idea, to get her used to it, but hopefully not make any problems you're having any worse.

Climberchick's advice sounds excellent to me. If its any help, the scenario you describe whereby expressing gives you a little more flexibility and some breaks is exactly what I have now (except for bottle feeding him myself when I'm out and about - breasts are much quicker, don't go off, and it turned out that I was actually fine about feeding in public, contrary to my expectations. Esp when DS is screaming in a public place and I want to shut him up asap). DP does 1 or 2 feeds a night with a bottle, which is a HUGE help - when grannies are babysitting, or DP takes DS out on his own, they feed a bottle of boobmilk.

It takes a bit of organisation, and I've had the odd day of overly full boobs because of oversupply - but it mainly works very well.

I'm sure it's been a factor in keeping me BF-ing. And I think it makes me appreciate BF-ing more. I see how it bonds us when I've been away from my son - how the bedtime feeds now feel special, rather than some awful chore I couldn't get out of. In all honesty, BF-ing for the 1st 6/7 weeks felt like an awful, exhausting trap. Now it (mostly) feels like a lovely thing we do together, that's a bit of mum and boy time, and keeps us both happy. Weird. If someone told me that at 4 weeks, I wouldn't have believed them....

tbh I think the pressure won't be lifted as you'll spend the day thinking you need to express enough to get 2 feeds.

Most people find 1-2 expresses a day to get 1 bottle manageable. I think the trick is to not set targets, but just see how things go. If DH ends up giving your DC two feeds a day, then so be it, but don't get hung up on it. Also ask yourself is this still the easier option. It might get easier to feed her in which case you may as well feed her yourself, otherwise you'll most likely be expressing at the same time he's feeding to get enough.

Obviously it would be great if DD was good to feed but you'll have to take it as it comes and if 2 bottles a day is what you feel you need then c'est la vie.

good luck either way. I def took each day as it came at this stage and be warned growth spurts can be horrible, but it doesn't mean you're not good enough.