I feel silly - breast feeding question..

[Emmiedarling]

I feel like I should know all of this, but I really have no clue! Hope you guys could shed some light...

I am planning to breast feed. I am also planning to express milk so that other people can feed baba and a little bit later, so I can go back to work.

Now, what on earth do you do with it when you've pumped it out?! I presume I will need to buy some storage bags. Then I presume I put it in the fridge.

After that, I have no clue. Put it a bottle - yup - guess that..but then, Do I warm it up? How warm is warm? Is there some special machine?!

What if i'm out and about and I've brought along some expressed milk I want to use? Is there a portable warmer or?

I feel useless!

Special sterile storage bags, freezer or fridge (needs to be used asap if fridge). Yes to bottle then warm it NOT using a microwave. Bottle warmer or old fashioned dunk in hot water.

You're not useless!

When we were giving ebm in a bottle we gave it cold or at room temp. Easiest if your lo can get used to that. Ebm can also be out for longer than formula - 6 hours i think..
Store it in a bag in the freezer or bottle in fridge and serve in bottle. I sterilise in Milton, some think it's not necessary for ebm.
Hths

Lansinoh do milk storage bags (Amazon sell them, along with others)

Yes you can warm the milk up, but if your baby is happy having it at room temperature (and my son was) then its obviously much easier when you're out.

Do bear in mind that getting a bf baby to take a bottle can require some patience (my 8m daughter won't take one despite a lot of effort!)

You can store it in anything so long as it is clean! You can buy milk storage bags though or tubs that fit your pump. Bags are great as they have measures on teh side so you know how much you have and space to write the date and time.

You can store in the fridge for 5 days or you can freeze it.

You don't have to use a bottle, depending on teh age of the baby you can use a sippy cup or cup feed a little baby by letting it lap the milk up.

You can warm it in hot water or jsut let it get to room temp naturally, or even give it cold from the fridge if your baby likes it that way!

You can freeze breast milk which is really handy if you want to save it up.

Depends on your baby whether you need to heat it up or not (ds was fine with straight from the fridge), but you can just use a jug of hot water to warm it, or run under the hot tap.

Kellymom is fab for all bf questions. This is their expressing section: kellymom.com/category/bf/pumpingmoms/

I pumped using an avent manual pump I got in boots. It came with little storage pots included - and an attachment to turn them into the bottle. So I usually pumped and stored it in the fridge until I had collected enough for a feed and DP would feed the baby. We warmed the milk slightly under a running warm tap.
Worked well for us - it was so good to have a wee bit of space :)

Youve all been so helpful, thanks so much x

When I express it goes in the back of the fridge for up to a week (so my midwife reckoned, usually in practise am FAR too disorganised to have milk ready a week ahead of when needed). Then. I. microwave.it.

So about 10 or 15 seconds takes it to room temp. Now someone will tell me about all the nutrients or whatever I'm killing. Considering it's once a fortnight approx am accepting that. I can also never be bothered bringing it with me when out, it's much simpler to go direct to source.
Good luck with it!

the problem with microwaves is the uneven temp and hot spots. you could burn babys mouth