Can I give an occasional bottle instead of breast without having to express?

[SarahCaroline]

DD is 6 months, on 3 solid meals a day, and heading towards just 3 milk feeds. Up till recently 2 of her 5 milk feeds were bottle, but they're the 2 that are being dropped. I found the bottle feeds useful as I occasionally have to work during the day or evening so they gave me some flexibility to leave her with DH/my mum etc - e.g. I could breastfeed her at 11.30 and swap her 11.30 bottle feed to 2.30 in order to go out in the afternoon - that sort of thing.
If I continue breastfeeding at 7am, 2.30pm and 6.30pm, and then occasionally need to substitute a bottle for the 2.30pm or the 6.30pm one, will I have to express, or will my breasts adjust OK to that on an occasional basis at this stage? Anyone got any experience of this? When the feeds were closer together I could sometimes skip a feed without any discomfort, but with just 3 a day I'm not sure how my body would react. If it's not going to work I guess I'll have go down to 2 breast & 1 bottle feed a day - or get organised and express when necessary. Any thoughts?

You'll be fine. By this stage your body should be very effecient and missing one, or even two feeds won't affect your supply, or make you too uncomfortable. It might be worth wearing breast pads if you are missing a feed though as you may leak slightly.

It shouldn't be a problem. I was able to skip occasional feeds without any discomfort from about 5m - except for the first feed of the day. If I skipped the first feed of the day I was always uncomfortable within a few hours. I have never leaked as a result of skipping a feed, but then I virtually never leaked in any case with dd.

However, if you skip the same feed several days running, you will probably find that your body readjusts and that you have less milk at that time.

SarahCaroline - at 6 months you can be much more fexible with breastfeeds and will actually be able to drop some milk feeds altogether. I was very flexible with my last baby. If I wasn't there she got juice with her solids and when I was there she got breast. My breasts just adjusted accordingly. I actually donated breastmilk to a SCBU so I was regularly expressing but not because of fullness. Echo the comment about breastpads if you do leak. I also used the trick of pressing the heel of my hand against my breast if I felt a let down unexpectedly and that stopped the leak. Although you might feel full when you miss a feed, you will probably be able to manage it without expressing without any detriment to your supply.