Breastfeeding twins - please be honest!

[willisurvive3under2]

Have you done it? Did it work?

I’m expecting twins and I’m struggling to get my head around how I will BF them.

Is it doable? Realistic? I also have a DS who will be 20 months when the twins are born. He’s still feeding now (morning and evening), not sure what’s going to happen there.

I absolutely love BF my DS, I was so lucky from the beginning and we had a long and happy experience.

I feel almost bereft that I won’t be able to do the same with the twins.

Any experience welcome (positive or negative, I just want to hear it as it is!).

Yes it can be done. You need to eat and drink like a loony. You will also be able to get away with dumping them with Dad for one bottle a day and getting some sleep. It is bloody hard work though and will strip calcium from your body. Luckily I had DTs first and thought that level of exhaustion was normal.

I BF’d twins for a year, despite MIL telling me I wouldn’t be able to and that I should give up every time I found it challenging!!!

It’s tricky and it really helped that I had a years mat leave but absolutely not impossible.

I was ‘housebound’ for a while - it felt like I’d only just finished feeding when I had to organise my set up again to feed them together.

I did the rugby ball hold with each of them on pillows. I had food and drinks to hand and, most importantly the remote control!!

Go for it!!

My DC1 was 21 months when my twins arrived. I breastfed from the off and they were ebf for 18 months when I had had enough! I even had to go dairy and soy free from when they were 10 weeks old (the week of Christmas waaaaah) until they went on solids as they were/are cowsmilk protein intolerant.

It is doable, it is hard work and it all falls on you (I never expressed so didn't even do a bottle of expressed milk for them) but you get into a rhythm. I learned quickly to feed them together with cushions and v-shaped pillows, and the only time I didn't feed together was if one wanted an extra feed or during the night as it was harder to arrange them on my own.

Cluster feeding for the first 11 sodding weeks was tough as from 5/6pm until about 11pm I was constantly feed one or both of them. But I got through it through sheer stubbornness as I was told by many I wouldn't manage to breastfeed them both and I am stubborn like that (plus they both latched on immediately post birth and I had no issues even though they both had bad tongue ties. I was very lucky in that respect).

All the best, and good luck! Twins are ace three toddlers on the other hand are a challenge

I haven't, but a good friend did. EBF for about 6 weeks then mix fed, but the majority was breastmilk. She used to feed them both at the same time, one on each boob with a nursing c shaped pillow when the were very tiny. She also had a double electric, hospital grade pump. At one stage she was expressing 2litres a day. Massive respect for what she did, but she didn't have an older child as you do. I don't think it's ridiculous to want to do it, but EBF might be your difficulty.

My sister had a 20 month old when her twins were born too! She no longer bf her oldest then but she did dual bf the twins for almost 9 months. Great when they did it st same time, not when they didn’t!
Totally take my hat off to her and you ! Good luck x

One thing to bear in mind is that they are often early and a bit jaundiced which makes them sleepy and bad at feeding. For the first week I had to express and use soft squashy bottles to squeeze the milk into them. Mine were right on the edge of the criteria for tube feeding in scbu. With a few ups and downs we managed 18months.

I breastfed my twins for 18 months and didn’t use any formula at all.

I didn’t have an older child though!

It was very hard work in the beginning but once we got the hang of it I reckon it was easier than preparing all those bottles. It was certainly cheaper.

Best of luck!

My friend did it. Held them like rugby balls and said was far easier than bottle feeding (she did switch to bottle once they got too heavy, and found breast feeding extremely easy so was easier for her to breast feed, but she said if she'd found remotely difficult she would have stopped, as she did with her older DC)

She said the perfect prep machine saved her sanity once she had switched to bottle.

Good luck OP!

I'm 27 weeks pg with twins and feeling fairly optimistic about breastfeeding them. I ebf my DD (now 3) until 6m and then she kept it up til about 14m when she just tailed off. I'm really hoping to manage it as I know how much easier it will be in the long run not to have to cart around 2 lots of bottles etc. Although I know the first 6wks-2months will be really tough, I am lining up family and friends (and new Disney DVDs...) to help with DD once DH is back at work after paternity leave (he's taking shared parental leave too but not until they are 4mo).
There is a TAMBA webinar about breastfeeding twins which I'm planning to buy (£15 I think) and I've also found a couple of very helpful FB groups, one is "breastfeeding twins and multiples UK".

Thank you everyone, I feel more optimistic now!

@moggle I’ll check that out, thank you!

I meant to say, a twin breastfeeding pillow is a god send. There are a few different kinds these days but I had an EZ2Nurse pillow and it was wonderful.

I started off tandem feeding (rugby ball hold) but couldn’t manage that past about 10 weeks as they got too big.

I switched to feeding them one st a time after that with the twin who wasn’t being fed in a bouncy chair at my feet so I could talk to them and give them rattles and toys while I fed the other baby.

When feeding twins you feed each baby from one side during a fed and then switch sides for the next feed. I had coloured brackets so I could remember who I fed on which side last.

There is a wonderful book called Mothering Multiple by Karen Kerkhoff Gromada (you can get it on amazon) which has lots about feeding twins including pictures of different holds.