Power pumping vs normal pumping?

[Fedfedfedup]

What's more efficient in getting supply up quickly and why? By 'normal' I mean the usual 10-15 mins of continuous pumping

Speaking as someone hunched over a pump currently () I would say power pumping to get your supply up initially and then regular pumping to keep it going. I’ve always started expressing for a freezer stash after baby’s first growth spurt, usually at a week old, when they’ve cluster fed for about 24 hours straight, and have got your supply up.

The key after that is to maintain the ‘demand’ on your breasts, so I use a Haakaa on the alternate breast at every feeding, which probably produced about 5oz a day. And then do a big pump middle of the night when baby’s slept for a few hours.

Oh and also keep hydrated. The more water I drink, the more I pump!

Hey @TopCatLuther
Thanks for your response! How often would you recommend power pumping? At present my LO just gets frustrated at the boob so I guess that's when I will do it. I'm hoping once my flow increases, she lasts a bit longer at the boob and I can just continue to pump once she is off?

Power pumping is said to mimic cluster feeding so it should lead to a quicker increase in supply than regular pumping.

As with most things related to the body, it will take a few days to notice an increase so the advice I followed was to have one power pumping session a day for about a week in order to see the impact.

Bear in mind a power pumping session will take one hour total so you may need to have someone at hand to watch your LO!

@Sairafina did you see a significant difference? It's so disheartening to see tiny amounts when pumping.

I couldn’t pump a drop with either method. Still EBF and still feeding at 18 months. Expressed volume bears no resemblance to what the baby gets.

Baby is best at boosting supply. I always intended for DD to have expressed milk but we never managed.

Obviously if you need to express that’s different-but if you don’t need to give a bottle, don’t bother is my advice.

I'm exclusively pumping as LO was terrible on the boob! But yes, pump output is not an indication of breastfeeding output as baby is (usually!) the most efficient at removing milk.

It took several days for my supply to increase with the pump and even now I will try to make sure I pump for 120 minutes per day in order to maintain the supply.

My output is around 33oz per day and LO has 30oz per day so I technically have an oversupply but this is very individual as some babies will eat 35oz per day

@Sairafina

I'm exclusively pumping as LO was terrible on the boob! But yes, pump output is not an indication of breastfeeding output as baby is (usually!) the most efficient at removing milk.

It took several days for my supply to increase with the pump and even now I will try to make sure I pump for 120 minutes per day in order to maintain the supply.

My output is around 33oz per day and LO has 30oz per day so I technically have an oversupply but this is very individual as some babies will eat 35oz per day

@Sairafina Well done! I know a few that pumped exclusively-you deserve a medal. All the hard bits of BF with few of the benefits and all the faff of bottles. I salute you! I was on the fence with BF vs FF and always said if BF had been hard I’d have switched.

Thank you! I'll be honest, I don't find it that hard at all so don't feel deserving of anything. For me, formula was the third option so very glad that exclusively pumping has worked out