Breastfeeding twins

[kayzisexpecting]

My friend had twins 2 weeks ago and has been breastfeeding them. They have lost weight which she worried about and was planning to change to ff until she read in a magazine that a lot of babies lose weight in their first week or so. So she decided to keep at it with the help of the midwife. Now she has been discharged from the midwife's care and has the HV coming round. The HV has told her she would be better either BF just 1 baby or to FF both.

My friend was quite upset about this and has tried talking to HV about it, who insists the best thing would be to stop BF both twins. She rang La Leche League who have told her it's perfectly possible to BF twins. She is now very confused and has actually made an appointment to see the MW again to get her opinion. I said I's ask for opinions on here.

Thanks.

No no, no offence meant, sorry but the basic biology of it is that those things are not essential to making milk. Essential to having the strength to carry on yes, but not to making milk. Aparently a woman will still make milk even though she is just about to die

I haven't BF twins and hats off to those who do. I never BF my DS as he wouldn't latch on and so I exclusively expressed for him for 18 months. I got to see for myself the exact effect of eating, drinking and sleeping on milk production - it was as the experts say, absolutely nothing whatsoever. I even produced the exact same amount whilst in hospital for an infection that was so serious I could have died, and whilst having gastric flu. And I got much less sleep than your average mum for the first few months because of having to get up in the night to express as well as having to make up the bottles and feed him, etc. Milk supply was always more than sufficient unless I fell behind on my expressing schedule and missed a few sessions - that had a very quick effect on supply.

I disagree they are critical to many.

If you are so skinny you weigh far less than before carrying twins and as a result often felt feint, are so exhausted through lack of sleep and loss of weight that you can't drive or function properly, are weeping constantly and hating every minute of being a twin mum food and sleep do become rather important as you'll give up breast feeding far sooner.

They may not be critical to some mums but to many who have to care for twins with very little support or manage badly on lack of sleep they are.

Don't worry Plady

MilaMae - I think I may have not been clear in my post. They are not critical, as TPL says, to milk supply as a woman will continue to make milk without them as long as her babies are suckling, but yes, I totally agree that they are necessary to stay functioning as a living body! And speaking, as it sounds as though you are, as someone a stone and a half under (slim) pre-preg weight due to my babes sucking the life out of me!! That is actually one of my fave things about BFing - the guilt-free chocolate feasts!!

I am not disagreeing with you. I am saying that these things do not hamper milk production, not that they could not cause the end of BF.

If you say to someone that the fact that they are not getting enough sleep or eating brilliantly well means they may not produce enough milk to feed their babies then that may cause them to doubt their bodies and look for problems with supply that aren't there. They might see the normal behaviour of young babies as evidence that they aren't getting enough milk - hell, many mothers of single babies are on MN every day with just that worry. It must be even worse if you have twins.

So I am just stating what I understand as the facts - sleep and good nutrition do not affect milk production (unless the mother is literally starving). But of course mums may also give up because they are exhausted and have no support, and they should try to get as much sleep, food and drink for their well being, mental health and ability to cope.

Oh yes my lovely midwife ordered me to eat cake and checked I had lots inGuilt free scoffing seems a long distant memory now-sob!!!

True Plady

No one has called me Plady before - I quite like it

Oh I think she'll like the eating cake and chocolate part. She has said she feels like she is eating as much as a small army.

Her cousin had twins but she FF them so she is trying to help her with the general looking after twins but can't help her with feeding.

ProvincialLady, wow, expressing for a baby for 18 months is probably harder than BFing twins. Yes you are dead right that it is easy to doubt your supply - I know I did in the first 12 weeks. After that my DTs were more settled and I felt I always had enough milk for them. Twelve weeks is a turning point and after that BFing twins has got to be 100 times easier than FF what with all sterilising etc (and when you are out and about).

I could never get the hang of tandem feding newborns either. I can tandem feed now they are older cos they latch on as long as they are anywhere near my breast but newborns is a completely different matter. Luckily my twins were quick feeders so it was quite easy (and fun) to feed them separately.

Expressing helped me to feel confident that they had had a good feed at the end of the day when I felt my supply was low. It may have been that my supply was not low, who knows, but it felt that way (milk not spurting out like in the mornings etc). But I agree expressing is not for everyone. I think you need to be a bit of a control-freak character .

Provinciallady, can you testify then that expressing does not decrease your supply (if you expressed for so long and kept your supply up)?

Well I don't know about harder but it was certainly no picnic! You do have to be a bit of a control freak for regular expressing I agree.

With exclusive expressing it is common to lose supply because the pump does not stimulate the breast in the same way as a baby would. Expressing on top of normal BF would increase supply but expressing during the day to have a very long break, especially at night, could decrease supply. But on the whole, the more milk you take out the more you make.

It is interesting how we tend to feel less full later in the day isn't it? I used to and yet the amount I got out at 6pm was just the same as at 10am. The only time I got more milk out was the first express of the day, when there would be so much that I had two use the biggest collecting pots and have back ups when they got full It was very messy..

That is really interesting about getting as much out at 6pm as 10am. My mum (BF four - not at same time tho!) always rolled her eyes at my expressing cos she was sure I had enough milk (she was prob right) but giving them their bottles of ebm did help reassure me they weren't hungry. Did it for about six weeks (eventually they decided they wouldn't take a bottle anymore!)

I am hoping to continue to express after they are one so I can give them breast milk as a drink not cows milk.