Breastfeeding storage

[Larnem]

Hello, my baby was born at 36+1 and is a week old. All she does is want to eat and I’m scared breastfeeding I’m not giving her enough. So I’ve thought of pumping and topping her up with breast milk in a bottle. The question is, how long can you store breast milk at room temperature? I feel like there’s so many different answers, anything would help? Thanks

Is she showing signs that you're not giving her enough? Is she having enough wet nappies, does she seem satisfied?

Newborns have tiny stomachs and feeding all the time is very normal, especially when breastfeeding. Look up cluster feeding. You may find that pumping disrupts your milk supply and gives you too much milk if she's already feeding a lot.

Rule of 6.

6 hours at room temp
6 days in the fridge
6 months frozen.

Chances are you absolutely are feeding her enough on the breast, new borns just get a great deal of comfort from feeding. It's all they are programmed to do at the moment!

If you are getting through nappies at the rate of Knott's, your baby is fine!

Two trusted sources I used were

kellymom.com/ & www.laleche.org.uk/

You're doing great!!

Also when people talk about breastfeeding and newborns being hard work...this is usually what they mean!!

Enjoy the fact you have to stay in the warm and make sure you're comfortable, being waited on and are eating enough to replenish yourself

Please don't pump just yet or least not without advice as you could cause over supply and that's another host of difficulties all together!

Do you have a local peer supporter group? Ours does phone chats or video chats if you don't feel up to going out just yet.
When ds was born I spent pretty much two weeks on the sofa establishing breastfeeding whilst Dh did all the bits and kept me fed and hydrated.
As long as baby is alert, having wet nappies and some dirty ones then that's a good indicator that they are getting enough. Don't let people who haven't bf get into your head x

Trust your boobs and your baby! Its too early to pump. Just feed responsively to her hunger cues and you will be fine. BF in the early days is hard work, you're doing brilliantly.

Thanks for all your messages. She is dropping weight so it’s been advised I pump to help fill up what she’s not able to get. It seems to have settled her and she’s actually managing to get some sleep in cos when I say it was all the time I mean like every ten minutes. Hopefully it means I can sleep too as I’ve spent the whole nights trying to feed her with maybe an hour sleep. I thought it was 6 hours at room temperature too but was told otherwise. Does anyone else have an opinion on this?

6 hours at room temp. X