Need to learn to express at short notice... any advice?

[ipanemagirl]

I'm taking ds 7 out for his birthday in a week to see a show leaving at about 4ish and getting home probably at about 11. I haven't expressed for dd(14 weeks) yet altho I do have an electric pump and sterilisers etc. But haven't given dd any kind of bottle, have never been away from her for more than 2 hours.
What are my chances of mastering electric expression ( I was rubbish at hand pumping for ds and never got the hang of it ) in thenext week!! I can hardly take her with me!
If that fails, what is the best formula for bf babies and should I try it first? I'd rather not do that but I don't know if I can master that expressing thing! And advice gratefully received. I don't want to set a precedent that will have my mil buying shares in a formula company because she is so desperate to feed dd!!

Seems to vary by person and time of day - I stuck my breast in the pump and it just worked.

Early morning is often good for my expressing. Also after a relaxing warm shower the milk flows out.
I've given A SMA Gold formula in the wee cartons (it's what I was raised on). But I suspect my baby will swallow anything put in his mouth - ebm, formula, Calpol, Nystatin have all gone down a treat!

I had best success expressing on one side while feeding on the other for a mid-morning feed.

and if you do need formula, def buy one carton of ready-mixed to stop mil getting carried away . The one time dd had formula (freezer failure ) I went for Hipp organic for the very considered reason that... it didn't smell of fish.

thnx very much i was always such a purist with ds, but that now seems a bit hysterical in retrospect....