How much do you express in a pumping session?

[weeblueberry]

I decided to introduce an expressed feed to my 7 week olds schedule but am finding the pumping less productive than I imagined.

I have an Ameda double pump and get about 50-70ml of milk in a pumping session (which lasts about 40 mins). I know the resources suggest not to express for more than 20 mins but I'd get virtually nothing then.

Baby just had her first bottle feed which was 110ml and took me 2 sessions over two days to express. She drank the first half of it VERY quickly (about 6 minutes) from the Medela bottle that is meant to simulate a breastfeeding motion as oppose to a normal bottle. The whole feed took maybe 15 minutes in total which surprised me since a fees is normally between 25-35 mins long.

I'm just curious if all this sounds normal? 60ml in a pumping session doesn't seem like very much at all. It seems like ill be pumping a lot for just a couple of feeds a week?

Totally normal. If I express an hour after a feed, I get about 60ml. This is actually a good yield. It's not normal to pump many ounces - that's an oversupply or someone who responds particularly well to a pump.

If I miss a feed, I generally pump about 5-6 ounces.

Also - medela bottles seem to flow very fast! I use them, too, and dd can drain 4oz in 5 mins.

I needed to express a lot (long story due to a prearranged commitment with my Gran - really not very interesting to anyone but me, was a pilgramage in memory of my Granpa that noone else in the family would go on) after the first 8 weeks when we had a rough waking up time (about 6.30) I would keep the pump by my bed (I used a manual Avent pump) and get up 20 mins early - and got 8-10 fl oz from one breast - then fed dd1 with the other breast.

I think I must have just been very lucky. Despite using some of his for dh to do evening/night feeds twice a week, I had expressed and frozen over a gallon by the time I went away for a week when she was 5 months. This was back in the days of 3-4 month weaning, so dh who looked after her used formula (the only time she had it) in cereals and food (though most of that was also cooked, any thinning done with bm, and frozen). All bottle feeds for a week were ebm, and one a day for the week I came back - I'd expressed 5x a day but it did take a week for my supply to reset abolish properly and I went on to feed to 12m+.

My breakthrough came when I realised the electric pump from the hospital just didnt work for me. Hand expressing was better, and the Avent Manual was excellent.