Drinking alcohol and breastfeeding.

[shouldIbecrossaboutthis]

My baby will be 5 weeks old when my friend has her 29th Birthday. I really want to have a few drinks (ie. more than your daily allowance).

I can feed the baby his last feed at 7pm, but if I drink too much I can't feed him for 12 hours. This means he will have 4 bottles of expressed milk in a row. He has 1 bottle at the moment, so I know he will take it, and I express 6oz every day so I know I can express.

I'm just wondering really if having 4 bottles in a row will make him then refuse the breast? Even though he is only 3 weeks I feel breastfeeding is going well he was 8lb 14oz at birth and weighs 11lb 6oz. He feeds 3-4 hourly for 10-20 mins in the day and has plenty of wet and dirty nappies.

It depends on how much you drink but I think sometimes you have to sacrifice somethings. I personally would wait until your babies older. You might need a while yet yourself.

It kind of depends on how much you're planning on drinking. Alcohol (IIRC) disappears from your breastmilk at the same rate as from your bloodstream. I take the view that if I'm safe to drive I'm safe to BF. That might be a lot less than 12 hours (provided you're not on a total bender). Am sure someone will be along to provide links as I can't remember where to look for them...

12 hours is a long time your boobs would explode unless you pump regularly. I assume you are not going on a mega bender and still have to be fit to look after the baby. Who told you 12 hours anyway?

I would have two drinks without worrying. If i had three or four drinks i would miss the next feed. Unless i got shitfaced i would not need to miss more than one night feeding. In six months the most i have done is give two bottles in a row.

Alcoholic drinks leave your body approx one unit per hour

Thanks everyone for the advice, I was planning to express and dump for the 12 hours to keep supple up and not have exploding rock boobs!

The internet said 12 hours, I think I will probably only have 3-5 vodkas over about 5 hours with lots of water; I think 12 hours is a safe figure, just to ensure it's all out of me?

If you're safe to hold the baby, you're safe to bf. A small amount of alcohol in your milk isn't a big deal. Are you thinking single vodkas, or doubles? I'd think you'd be safe a few hours after stopping drinking, really ...

This leaflet may be of use ...

You prob want scientific fact at this point, but I bf both of my babies and had the occasional glass of wine. My family is of European extraction and not drinking wine with dinner is a huge offence! I was very conservative with my first, hardly drank. But with my second, had a couple of wines with food, lots of water in between. And I think she's fine. I don't really do spirits so can't say if that's better or worse. Go with your gut. Don't drink if you don't want to, but don't get paralytic I guess!

If alcohol goes into breastmilk how does it then disappear? I never understood how that milk didn't have to be pumped out. Blood is cleansed by the liver function - breastmilk isn't? Sorry, prob just me being daft??

Squidgers, alcohol passes in and out of breastmilk very freely....it does not 'sit' there.

The biochemistry of this can be checked in the textbooks and academic papers, and actually fully understanding it is beyond my poor brain, but it's something to do with the molecules and the permiability of milk-making and storing tissue.

Some substances don't pass out of the breastmilk very easily, and while they don't sit there, they reduce in 'strength' as they degenerate and become harmless (and/or then pass out of the milk). This means, for example, that breastfeeding immediately after certain strong medication could mean the meds are in the milk, and then waiting a few hours means the meds are no longer able to affect the baby.

That's just a made up example. A large no. of commonly-used meds are in fact pretty safe to use when breastfeeding, and one of the reasons is this effect of degenerating and/or passing out (other reasons include the stuff does not get in the milk in the first place).

Hope that helps :)

If you had enough alcohol in your breastmilk to affect the baby you'd be dead from alcohol poisoning.

Go out, have the vodka and you'll be fine to feed

Pottering that's actually overstating the case.....babies start to show clinical effects of alcohol when a mother is very drunk, IIRC when her blood level is 3x the drink drive limit. So not actually dead :)

It is of course possible (and actually likely) that less obvious effects on babies can be there before that stage.