Expressing breast milk for newborn

[ImBrian]

I have a week old ds who I have been formula feeding. I've attempted breast feeding 3 of my previous children but found it very painful and never managed more then a couple of weeks.

I seem to have a lot more milk this time and had a go at hand expressing tonight - 1oz in under 10 minutes. I'd like ds to have some breast milk and was wondering if it would be worth getting a pump so I could mix feed him or if my milk will dry up as he's not feeding from me.

He's taking 3oz of formula every 3hours or so.

If it was nipple pain then perhaps nipple shields might help - I find pumping quite robust on the boobs (though not painful) - just wondering if it might be less painful to use shields or hand express?

I tried them the last time, the midwife seemed to think I was just very sensitive as my latch was spot on. Hand expressing is perfectly comfortable so I could just keep doing that as often as possible.

I managed to express breast milk for 4 months to fully feed my son because I found breast feeding to awkward until he was that bit bigger, get a pump and just pump every time he eats and congratulations ??

If you pump regularly you should continue to produce milk. My baby was prem and too teeny/weak to breastfeed. So I expressed. She never got the hang of latching on so I am still expressing now she is 4 months. Bar one day of mix feeding while my milk was coming, she has only had expressed milk. You need to do it 8-10 times a day to begin with to get supply established though. Now I am down to 5 times a day which is more manageable. Your milk shouldn't dry up just because you are expressing rather than feeding directly.

I hired a hospital grade pump from ARDO as I was intending to express regularly. I have a medala hand pump to use when I am out, which is pretty effective and fine for occasional use.

That's really good to hear, even if it was only for a month or so I'd be happy. Did you express during the night as well?

My DS had problems feeding from the Breast so I pumped for two months, with an electric pump I could get 5oz in 20 mins! I think pumping at night as you will be awake anyway would be good and apparently it helps production as well. I recommend trying a hand pump in the bath as well, I found milk spilled out in the bath so hand pumping was really effective in there. I loved knowing that he was getting my milk even if he flatly refused to get it out the convenient way himself :)

Yes, you do need to pump at night to get your supply established.