Difficulty expressing - where's the milk??

[huffpuff75]

My six week old DS is EBF and I am trying to start expressing a bit, mainly to give me the chance to pop out for a couple of hours (DH and I want to go out for our wedding anniversary) and potentially to have the occasional drink. I have an electric breast pump and have tried at varying times of day but so far all I have achieved is a pathetic trickle. My supply as far as Ican tell is pretty good. DS has gained 3lb in six weeks since birth and shows no sign of having difficulty getting milk out of me. I also have a very fast and forceful let down. So why isn't it working?? All help gratefully received!

Firstly, you can feed after the "occasional drink", as long as it is only a couple. You only need to worry about pumping and dumping if you are going to get sozzled.

You need to "train" yourself to let down for the pump, it won't happen straight off. I would suggest you start out by expressing off one side whilst feeding off the other. Try to relax and focus on your baby. Once you have that down you can try expressing without feeding simultaneously, but you will likely still need to look at your baby (or a photo) or hear him to get things going.

This might help abm.me.uk/expressing-breast-milk The pre-expressing massage is useful for pumps as well as hand expressing.

In the early days (DD was in SCBU) I had to really relax and "think baby", plus exhaustion and dehydration also really affected expressing. Now I don't have to think about it and get more far easier. I think a lot of people give up on expressing when it isn't easy straight away but for a lot of people it's something you have to work at initially.

Try expressing after a bath or shower. Do general breast massage before starting and then use compressions whilst pumping.

Japhrimel is right, for me it was nearly as much of a learned skill as BF itself, due in part to my not feeling comfortable at all with expressing and so not being able to achieve let down with the pump initially.

It was 10 weeks before I felt ready to give it a go after initial failure and I can still only get 40 - 50ml in one session per day but it all adds up and my freezer stash is quite respectable now!

I was lent a hospital grade pump by the HV and got help and advice from them too. Is there a BF cafe or something where you could get some advice? Otherwise, just keep trying, it will come.

Thanks for the responses everyone. I think you're pobably right in saying I need to relax and learn how to do it, and keep trying. I think because I didn't find it all that difficult to breastfeed in the first place I thought expressing would be not easy, but at least straightforward. Not being able to do it has left me feeling stressed outand like japhrimel says, ready to give upbecause it is not that easy. I have already tried as you suggest, looking at baby, doing it while feeding, and after a shower, but I have only tried each of them once. I need to stick with it! Good to hear that it can be done with a bit of work.

Morebounce - there is a local BF support group on Tuesday mornings, so I think I will go along this week.

Can anyone tell me how I would be able to tell if the pump has enough suction? It just doesn't feel like it is doing much - or is this what it is meant to feel like?

Thanks for the tips, and I'll check out NannyOgg's link as well.

A slight development... DH has just [ahem] 'found' a part of the breast pump that he mislaid when he sterilised the pump for me the first time. So basically I have been using the pump without the valve. Getting a trickle out was something of a miracle. So we'll try again tomorrow with all the bits intact! Ah well, such is life...

Ha ha - love your DH! I was going to say - i find first thing in morning best for expressing (not for me!) - but my milk def gushes out more when i express either at 2-3am or 6-7am.... And def get some bags so you can stick some milk in the freezer.

And if you are still having problems, look at picture of your DC as this really helped me first time.

Good luck!

Hehe, I've done that - I now know that if I can't feel suction, I've forgotten to put the valve on again.

If you got a trickle without the valve, you'll probably be fine with it.

Yep. I managed 3oz in ten minutes this afternoon. How ridiculous do I feel now? Thanks all for the help - hopefully the tips might come in useful for someone else though. Pity I can't retitle the thread - could change it to 'where's the valve'