Breastfeeding : Offer one breast or two at each feed?

[ladyofla]

Hi,

DD2 is 9 days old and I thought with breast-feeding you should let the baby suckle on one breast until the breast is empty ? that way the baby gets the very nourishing ?hind milk? and will feel more satisfied. Then offer the second breast ? and the baby will let you know if she's still hungry.

Now, however I've heard that you should just offer one breast at each feed, as the milk never really dries up. This kind of makes sense but then it must be pretty hard work for the baby getting milk out of the one breast after a while. So one breast or two at each feed?

Did just one breast (alternating) with DS2 till he was around 6 weeks then when he pulled away from one offered the other - if he wanted it he took it. I think it depends on how large your breasts are - stands to reason that if you have large breasts one will be more likely to hold a fair amount of milk, whereas if your breasts are more modest they may need both to feel satisfied.

I'm not sure breast size has much to do with how much milk they 'hold' since most of it is produced as the baby sucks.
I think you get to know if the baby needs the other breast too. Do what feels right to you and give your DC as long as they want on the first breast before offering the second, if they want more they'll take it!
Congratulations by the way!

Both breasts. Drove myself crazy trying to follow the one-breast-per-feed rule. I almost gave up, until I realised that the advice wasn't useful. Tiktok will tell you...

I think the current advice is both breasts, especially in the early days.

There are no rules. The baby sets the pace - it's a good idea to offer both breasts each time, particularly in the early days, swapping when you feel the baby is taking a natural break (stops sucking, slows down sucking markedly, comes off and dozes, wriggles and burps....). It is as crazy to say 'only one breast' as it is to insist the baby always takes both. After a while, a pattern may emerge and some babies only ever want one, and some babies always want two, and some babies mix and match

A 'well known book' asks mothers to ensure the first breast is empty - and we get calls from mothers who are squeezing and poking and prodding, trying to assess when the breast is empty and finding that no matter how much they do this they can always get a little out. This is so unnecessary and fiddly. The healthy baby can be trusted to 'tell' you when or if he needs to swap.

All breastmilk is nourishing. It's not necessary to worry about foremilk and hindmilk, usually, and it's only very rarely that anyone needs to deliberately engineer the baby's intake of it.

Hope this helps!

Tiktok is so right. As always.

I followed dd's cues and let her take as much as she wanted from one and offered the second. She only ever wanted one side and she absolutely thrived. Conclusion being, that's what was right for her.

I always fed from both sides. Offered Breast 'A' first then when baby came off that offered 'B'. Generally 'B' would be fed from for a shorter time so next feed you started with 'B' and it became A iyswim. I found this was the best way to stay comfortable and certainly the only time I ever got mastitis in 47 months of bfeeding three children (with breaks NOT continuous) was when I fed from 'A', didn't have time to do 'B' (dd3 was 9 months old) then next feed forgot and fed from 'A' again. By the time 'B' got a look in it was sore and it went from there.

Agree with tiktok .

Personal anecdote here, but dd (aged 3 weeks) is currently cluster feeding some evenings and the flow is quite slow after a couple of hours. Sometimes we're just swapping backwards and forwards on and off all evening and it's impossible to tell where one 'feed' begins and another ends. When feeding is v v frequent like that then it really makes no difference in terms of fat content which breast is offered tbh!

Thanks for the advice. Tikitok - that makes complete sense and is pretty much what I did right now. I have someone around me right now who is making me question my instincts which is NEVER a good thing. Apparently I should only offer one breast because we have two because we are made to have twins and feed them at the same time

I meant to write that is what pretty much did with DD1.