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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

Original poster

Expressers of the world unit.........moral support thread.

54 replies

LadyTophamHatt · 28/01/2007 20:26

So, How many ounces do you get per day??

I've produced enough for one 5oz feed. Pretty poor really.....

Still no luck with latching DS4 on, kind of given up with that now TBH.

I now seem to spend half my day plugged in to the milking machine, counting the drips as the trickle down the tube.
There really aren't enough hours in the day for me ATM!!

OP posts:
SoupDragon · 28/01/2007 20:29

I wondered how you were doing No idea about expressing though I'm afraid, not really. I didn't start until much later.

NotAnOtter · 28/01/2007 20:31

i spend months attached to those things with each baby - but i hire one - i dont know how you finances are lth but i SWEAR by them...will find link

NotAnOtter · 28/01/2007 20:35

i used these they were fab arrived next day

Original poster
LadyTophamHatt · 28/01/2007 20:35

It's going ok-ish.
I can't get a proper routine for expressing set because with DH and Ds4 being the hungriest baby I have ever encountered it's impossible.
I manage about 4, sometimes 5 "collections" per day

OP posts:
Original poster
LadyTophamHatt · 28/01/2007 20:37

I bought a mini electic one NoA which is much better than the manual one.

I just wish it had a volume control, it drives me nuts with bbbbrrrmmm.....bbbrrrrmmmm.....bbbrrrmmmm...bbbrrrmmmm....

OP posts:
Original poster
LadyTophamHatt · 28/01/2007 20:38

NAO even...Ican read and i do know your name

OP posts:
shonaspurtle · 28/01/2007 20:49

I'm back on the milking conveyorbelt (hopefully temporarily though).

Bloody typical, I had just started doing some non-essential expressing to get enough for a night out for me & dh when right side went screwy again.

Ds is latching on in a really funny way and isn't getting very much out at all - and it's excrutiatingly sore due to massive crack. Hopefully will get up to the bfding clinic and get some advice at the beginning of the week.

I'd handed the electric pump back into the hospital because I thought I didn't need it any more so I'm using my Avent hand pump. Getting a lot more than when I was using it before though (about 2 weeks old) so if you can hang in there LTH it does seem to get more productive as time goes on.

At least I'm still (touch wood) ok on the left side so that takes a lot of pumping pressure off. I just need to get enough for 3/4 feeds a day which isn't too bad.

Lucky that it's the right side actually because I don't seem to be able to get more than an oz out of the left

Original poster
LadyTophamHatt · 28/01/2007 21:03

my right side produces more too....

how weird!

OP posts:
theUrbanDryad · 29/01/2007 11:07

other way round for me, my left side spurts like crazy, but the right one's not so good. i managed to express 2oz yesterday evening, but it was my first attempt, and i was using a hand pump! have yet to feed it to ds though, as i don't think i could cope with bottles at night!! going to try him on a bottle as soon as he wakes up for his next feed.

we are the milk machines.....mooooo......

Original poster
LadyTophamHatt · 29/01/2007 13:11

I've got just over 6oz in 2 goes today.

quite pleased with that....

OP posts:
theUrbanDryad · 29/01/2007 14:25

ooh LTH you cow!

i'm in pre-pregnancy jeans now too so ner!

Sterny · 29/01/2007 19:33

Hello,

I have been expressing for a grand total of five months now. I started because my DS was born prematurely and couldn't bf, then he wouldn't bf. I started off expressing every three hours, around the clock. Am now expressing 3 times daily only and bf during the day.

I use a Lactina Electric Plus pump by Medela. It's great. At my most prolific I was producing 1200mls per day (not sure what that is in fl oz(36?) but am now producing about 700mls and giving 1 bf and 1 formula feed.

Didn't plan to carry on expressing this long but am now addicted I think. Plus it's a great way of getting out of washing up/cooking doing chores around the house. Hee Hee.

shonaspurtle · 29/01/2007 20:26

In awe of your 1200mls a day! You are the expressing queen.

macneil · 29/01/2007 21:35

I've been expressing properly since about the second week. I didn't really realise how important it was to do it a lot when I began, and just relied on formula and lots of latching attempts that all failed. Now it's the domperidone and I can manage about 6 pumps a day, but they're all for half an hour because my let down is slow and I don't like to stop when there's a jet (which there is now, half an hour in - I'm pumping as I'm typing).

The first pump of the day is 80-110mls - how many ounces is that? 2 ounces is 50mls, so up to 4 oz? Then the next few are about 60, 40, 30, 30, maybe a last gasp of 10-20 at the end of the day, sometimes more. This is nothing like as much as the baby wants. I've tried pumping in the middle of the night, but the baby takes so long to settle after her middle of the night feed that after about an hour of feeding and holding her, if I then start to pump, and she still won't settle and starts crying and my husband has to go to work at 7.30 the next morning, I feel really bad. Her cot is with him and I'd pump in a different room. So I don't know - I don't seem to be able to increase the supply at all, really, drink a lot, massage, warm baths, fennel tea, drugs, staring at the baby, holding the baby, it's just not working.

Pumping is usually 3 hours a day, plus all the bottle washing, because she has 2 bottles at every feed - me + formula. I come back to England in the spring and will have to give the pumper back to the hospital, so I guess I'll give up at about 4 months. I would like to carry on, though. I'm going to hope my one-handed hand pump will see me through when I give back the industrial one.

kathryn77 · 29/01/2007 21:47

Hi, I have recently given up breastfeeding but did it for six months and expressed daily.

I could do 2 x 7oz bottles a day amd used a medula breast pump

I used to express with DS suckling in the morning and then at night.

Keep trying...perhaps a hot bath!

macneil · 30/01/2007 17:50

And when I give her the EBM bottle, I'm like 'you really have to enjoy this' and pour the last drops into the teat at the end and make her suck until I hear the squeak. Whereas I'm happy to let the formula drip all over her neck. She really seems to enjoy throwing up breast milk, too, she really goes for it - out the nose and everything.

shonaspurtle · 30/01/2007 18:24

I'm with you on the you-must-finish-every drop...I do the same with the squeak at the end.

Was with dh the other night because he left about an oz in the bottom of the bottle .

Don't think I'd take it so personally with formula but then it's my blood, sweat & tears (sometimes literally [hmm) getting the expressed milk out.

shonaspurtle · 30/01/2007 18:34

Have you seen this information on pumping from Dr Jack Newman which says you can just wrap your pumping attachment in a plastic bag and store it in the fridge between goes (as long as you're using it again the same day)?

I've been doing this for the last couple of days and just washing it all out in very hot soapy water each night. Saving me some time.

Have to say though, I tried hand expressing a couple of times and it was v messy...kept squirting every which way except the jug (when it wasn't dribbling down my front)

wools · 30/01/2007 20:38

Am with you Macneil and Shonaspurtle - every drop of precious breast milk must be drunk. I was so angry with dh when he accidently spilt some recently. Never care about formula - she can leave as much behind of that as she likes....What are we like?

wads · 30/01/2007 21:53

I'm expressing 4 or 5 evenings a week in preparation for returning to part time work & it takes for bloody ever to get 1 or 2 ounces, meaning I need 3 nights to get 1 bottle. However when I do my 1 day at the moment & express at lunch time I get 3 or 4 oz from 1 side only (right side as well - did you see a thread a while back linking to a study saying 76% of women produce more on right than left?). Anyway hats off to all expressers 'cos it sucks compared to the real thing

NineUnlikelyTales · 31/01/2007 11:31

I'm exclusively expressing as my DS wouldn't latch on, despite loads of help. I do 5 x 20 minutes per day, including once in the middle of the night (a killer!). Like you Sterny, I started off doing it every three hours so 5 times a day seems like nothing in comparison.

I get 1200-1500ml a day, so I freeze the excess. You might think it's fantastic to produce so much, and I am glad I don't have to worry about under supply, but if I don't get it all out I get painful blocked ducts very, very easily so it's not all a blessing. I had one last night and it was a killer to get rid of.

Does anyone else find it really annoying that people seem to think it is just the same to express or BF direct? Because the baby gets the milk, so what's the problem? Well it takes me nearly 2 hours a day being strapped to a hideous machine and I still have to feed my DS, plus all the washing, sterilising, warming bottles etc. And being attached to a machine is hardly the same lovely bonding experience as BF is it? I am glad I can express and it's imprortant to me that DS gets my milk, so I'll carry on, but please don't tell me it's just the frigging same as BF...

Nine

Sterny · 31/01/2007 13:38

Hi Nine,

I know exactly what you mean. My MIL used to say 'why aren't you taking DS out and making new friends?'. Hmm, well perhaps it's down to the fact that you can't exactly hook up your breastpump in Starbucks can you? I don't think expressing in public will really ever take off.

I sympathise about all the washing, sterilising etc etc.

I am now only expressing twice a day as DS breastfeeds during the day. I probably could give up altogether and just BF but I find it hard to give up the idea that I know exactly how much milk he is getting for his morning and evening feeds. I gave up the middle of the night expressing session when DS started sleeping through. When I was expressing in the small hours I found that after having my nipples tweaked, washing up, going down to the kitchen to refrigerate the milk I couldn't get back to sleep!

Sterny · 31/01/2007 13:40

Also forgot to say that I have had five bouts of mastitis. Yucky!

shonaspurtle · 31/01/2007 13:48

Nine - it's the biggest hassle isn't it? None of the convenience of either direct bf or ff.

I'm really impressed by the willpower of those that make the decision to do it long term and I realise I'm really lucky to (hopefully) be working towards getting back to direct bf.

Like Sterny though, I find it really helps to be able to see exactly what's going in - one of the reasons I started expressing from one side was that I was convinced he wasn't getting anything out. That's a bit of a psychological barrier to stopping but god knows I've got enough incentive to get over it!

macneil · 31/01/2007 20:54

It's a mad crazy hassle, and as I don't produce enough, I'm formula feeding too. So 3 hours pumping, about 3 hours feeding and settling DD, an hour making up the formula bottles that supplement every feed, in varying sizes. I think there's probably no way my few drops of breastmilk make much of a difference, but I am also, now, halfway between and addicted and used to it. Thanks for making us feel better about there being downfalls to being brilliant lactators! Although I still dream of having wonderful jets that spurt at everyone whether I like it or not. I feel weirdly triumphant if it comes through my t-shirt.