Engorged breasts at night

[SylvanMuldoon]

DD is 3.5 weeks old and feeds pretty much all the time during the day. Amazingly she has started sleeping for a longer stretch at night (5/6 hours yay!) which I am obviously happy about but it means that I'm waking up with really painful engorged boobs! She last fed at about 10pm and now at 12.45 they are already feeling full and hard. Do I need to express or what? I have a hand pump (Avent) but don't get on with it all and have been pumping in the mornings with my Medela electric pump but it's a massive faff unplugging it from downstairs (DH currently sleeping on sofa) and also it's so noisy! I can't seem to get the hang of hand expressing either, I just seem to hurt myself and get nothing out! Any advice appreciated!

This used to happen to me and I would leak. However, my body soon learnt when baby needed milk and it wore off. If you express I think you may encourage your body to make more

How long does it take for your boobs to settle down? Our lo is 2 months old and I am still leaking quite badly at night and getting engorged.

My midwife said it was ok to pump off an 1oz (if you can get that much) to ease the engorgement. I think if you need to you should pump a little as I have had mastitis twice and would not wish that on anyone!

I am having this problem as my baby is starting to sleep through the night but I wake up at 4am literally exploding. I am scared I will get mastitis, also because I don't leak so my boobs can't release the pressure. So I have been expressing a bit, just 1-2 ounces. I think it is ok if you don't express the full feed the body should still get the message that that feed is not needed anymore. And meanwhile I am building a nice stock of frozen mill which i am sure will be useful at some point.

I had this problem and I think it's a case of supply and demand as other posters have said- express a little so it's not painful if you need to and your body will soon adjust. Don't make the mistake of trying to sneak in a dream feed! I also found wearing a well fitted sleep bra was helpful.

Thanks for the advice, giving a dream feed did cross my mind actually but then I thought better of it!

I've ordered a Tommee Tippee pump in the hope that it won't hurt, the Avent one really hurt my nipple when I tried it, haven't dared use it since.

Just hoping this sleeping amazingness continues, my other two were still feeding 1-2 hourly through the night at this age!

If the pump hurt your nipples is may be work asking advice about the size of the funnels. I was having this problem and changing the funnels solved it.