Should I have a breast pump from birth?

[TellMeWhatToDo]

Hi ladies,

I'm due at the end of this week(!) and am wondering if I should buy a breast pump, just to have it ready. At the moment I have no bottles or steriliser either as am really hoping to BF.

To while away the hours, I have been reading childcare books, eg she-who-must-not-be-named among others... and she talks about expressing a little milk before a feed. Is this necessary? TBH I have chucked that particular book in a drawer as it freaked me out and am reading Tracey Hogg instead but, even so, I have read in quite a few places about expressing a little here and there if you have engorgement or to stimulate supply.

I am starting to panic as I really want BFing to work but there just seems to be so much conflicting information out there, I'm not sure I'll know where to start! I think I understand about feeding cues and latching on but the switching sides thing looks complicated... I read in one book yesterday that in the colostrum stage you should do 15 mins from each breast and only start feeding from one breast when the proper milk comes in. I never knew this - will someone tell me this after I've had the baby?

Ok, I'm calming down now.... my original question was, do I need a breast pump straightaway and if so, what's a good one?

Thanks

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MNHQ

I think six weeks is the time that's 'safe' to start expressing. Any earlier and it might mess with your milk supply.

But yes - have one ready by all means! I have a Tommee Tippee one which is fine. It's electric and cost about forty quid.

IMO no

you will be knackered

the last thing you need to worry about after delivery is pumping

get baby to the breast as soon after delivery as possible, and then as much as he/she needs afterwards

if you do get engorged then you can hand express a tiny bit before a feed before you get your baby to latch IF there is an issue

WRT to times there is no hard and fast rule - don't time feeds as each baby will be different - before your milk comes in just get baby to the breast as and when and it is the same when you milk comes in and things will settle a bit at this point

offer one breast and then when baby seems done (sleepy & satisfied etc) burp, change the nappy and offer side 2 - if he is hungry he will take it and if not he won't

you will get to know your baby and his particular signs

DD has always been a fairly speedy feeder and feeds 8 - 10 mins per breast now - in the early days was around 20 mins (she is 16 weeks now)

DS was always 45 - 60 mins per breast

i started to pump at 6 weeks, but only when i got to 11 weeks + did i start to do it regularly

the Tommee Tippee hand pump is the one i have found the best

You don't need a breastpump straightaway. In fact, the only time you need to express is if you are going to leave your baby with someone else. And even then, hand expressing is really easy and effective.

Re everything else. Put the books away. Seriously.

The feeding cues are that your baby cries or is irritable - try them with a feed at that point. Someone on here had the mantra 'if in doubt, get the boob out' which I think is a pretty good one. You can only do positive things by offering feeds often.

There is no set time that a baby should feed for, or intervals between.

It's good to always offer both breasts at each feed. Some babies might not want both, but again, it does no harm to offer. This doesn't change from birth to toddlerhood (well, they ask for the second, but thats another story).

Latching - you need RL help for this - check out the NCT bumps and babes groups, baby cafe, breastfeeding support groups in your area for help after birth. And your mw will help you straight after birth and when you are on the ward. Don't be afraid to ask for help and keep asking if it is still hard.

No is the short answer.

The longer answer is that if you do decide to start expressing, you could hand express. A bfing counsellor would be able to talk to you about this.

I had a Ameda Lactaline which I bought secondhand which was very good.

My other advice would be to put Tracey Hogg and she-who-cannot-be-named in the bin. They know fuck all about bfing and everyone I know who has read them has ended up ff.

If you want to read a good parenting book try Baby Calming by Caroline Deacon

More importantly, mix with other bfing mothers. Find out if there are local NCT or LLL meetings and go along. Your local Children's Centre may also have a bfing support group and you can go to all of these while you are still pregnant.

don't bother getting bottles/pump etc before baby arrives if you want to bf - it's far too easy for your DH or you to use them in the early days of getting feeding established if they are easily available! and shops are open all the time now, so if you need them at a later date, there's nothing to stop you buying them then.

good luck

No - for all the reasons that everyone else has said.

Expressing never did stimulate supply in me - I was useless at expressing, but has successfully breastfed two babies - they were obviously much better than me at getting the milk, which makes a lot of sense when you think about it.

I found that the best solution to engorgement was to have greedy babies - as the milk came in they drank it, and didn't give me much chance to become engorged! That's one reason why feeding-by-the-clock is such a daft idea in newborns, by the way. Plus the fact that they have such tiny stomachs (the size of a marble) that they can't take in a lot of milk in one go.

No need for a breastpump.

Try reading better books - Tracey Hogg's baby whisperer is not a good example. Will work OK if you have natural high levels of milk production. Not good if you need to work at it with baby. She recommends introduction of teats.

I loved 'Breast is Best' but it is perhaps better as a breastfeeding bible afterwards. Sharon Trotters Essentials of Breastfeeding is good too.

One thing to get though if you leak breast milk when feeding are breast shells. You sterilise them and pop it in your bra and it will catch milk that you leak from the opposite breast. I used to catch 2 oz at a time. I froze it for future use. Although it was drip milk it went to wards making up a feed with other milk stored. I also hand expressed when I went back to work which was more effective than a pump.

I needed a breast pump straight away (eg 2nd day) as ds2 was having latching problems and it meant i could still keep my milk supply and he could still have breastmilk.
I could never get the hang of hand expressing and before your milk comes in it took me hours just to get 2mls, at least with the pump I could get a good amount.

The Medela breast pump was recommended to me by the breast feeding nurses who came out to see me at home and it was far superior to the avent one which was crap. Shame it only gfot used for 3 days ds2 is now ff

I have both here if youre interested?

I had a breastpump from birth (an electric AVENT one, about £80 but worth it's weight in gold). I started expressing from about 3 weeks in so DH could do a feed - earlier than midwives tell you but I was desperate for some sleep. It didn't interfere with DS's latch at all. If you're the sort of person who likes to be organised then I'd buy an electric one from birth - it was as much as I could do to read the instructions post-birth. The thought of trekking out to a shop and choosing one would have been totally beyond my capabilities at the time.

I couldn't get the hang of switching sides either or expressing breastmilk before a feed. I tried to do Gina Ford (and failed) but she does make sense about expressing in the morning as you do have much more milk then.

The best bit of advice I can give is if you find it a struggle get help immediately - call the midwife and get her to come round asap, don't try and figure it out on your own.

It is absolutely not necessary to have a breast pump. To be honest it is much easier not to bother. BUT, if you would like to have the chance for your partner to do some feeds and get the baby used to a bottle then you can start expressing a bit as soon as you feel like it. For example it is nice to be able to go to bed early and let partner do a late evening feed with a bottle of expressed breast milk. Also, if you can see yourself wanting the freedom to sneak off for a few hours or for a night out, then it will be essential to have some expressed milk. I have previously used an Avent manual pump, which works fine.
As for which breast to use, I think it probably is a good idea to switch between the two quite often in the early days. Later on when the milk comes in, it becomes more obvious which one is fullest and when to switch sides. Don't worry though I'm sure the midwives involved in your postnatal care will advise.

I bought an expensive electric pump before birth and I can barely get a drip out with it so it was a complete waste of money for me, even though I have no problems with supply. So DS is 5.5 months and I've never even tried him with a bottle. Other people I know have no problems with expressing, but their babies refuse to take a bottle. I think you can borrow/hire pumps from the NCT and other places so it might be worth doing that to find out if it will actually work for you before shelling out the money.

In terms of switching sides etc, in the first few weeks, I fed one side only - no one said anything about offering both and it didn't seem to cause any problems. I used a hair band on my wrist to remind me which side was next until I got the hang of it.

Baby should be offered second breast but it isn't essential baby takes it. Some mothers need the stimlation of both breast to build a good supply. Others don't and you get to know what works for you and your baby.

All breastfeeding mothers should be shown how to hand express so that they can deal with engorgemnnet problems just to get baby on if needed. It is a handy skill to have.

The only people who think it is vital for brand new mums to have a breastpump are the breastpump manufacturers ... sadly, Medela et al seem to be getting their message across to everyone else pretty effectively.

I know surprisingly many people who got very anxious that they weren't producing enough milk on the basis of what they saw when they expressed, and switched to formula. Its a depressing myth which, sadly, the Baby Whisperer encourages with her ill-informed idea of doing a "yield" to check supply. Utter piffle. The amount you can express using a pump bears no relation to the amount that a baby can get from your breasts, the two things work in different ways.

Anyway, getting back to positive stuff: the most important piece of advice for BFing is to ask for help early. The second most important is to ask people who know what they are talking about. Ditch any book written by someone who is not a qualified BF counsellor. You will get much better support here on MN, from people who have actually successfully BF their own kids! and from real BF counsellors too of course.

PS Actually I think pumps are damn handy in their place. I pumped when I went back to work at 6 months. Felt deeply odd doing that in a meeting room!

I found it handy as my breasts were so engorged when my milk came in that dd couldn't latch on,so I expressed a small amount to soften them slightly.Only other times I have used it were once with DD1 when I had a blocked duct and was trying to clear it ,and for a couple of days when DD2 went on a nursing strike at 7m.I would say it is handy to have one as guaranteed the one time you really do need one will be a bank holiday or something,but you may never need to use it.(I have been feeding for five years solid,two babies,and have only used it four times.

My breasts were so engorged when my milk came in DS couldn't latch but I hand expressed a little bit and that was enough. Hand expressing isn't nearly as complicated as it sounds, it's just squeezing a bit out. Some ways of squeezing are more efficient than others.

I second that the most important piece of advice is to ask for help. Get people to check you are doing it right even if you think you are. The most useful sign that I was doing it wrong was that when my DS was just latched onto the nipple, when he sucked he got a dimple in his cheek so I knew I had to take him off and start again.

ooooh you've reminded me of how much people on the pregnancy thread rave on about Baby Whisperer...take the good experienced advice on here instead and dump the books.

The only people I personally know who pumped from the start gave up BF very sharpish. They then donated their pumps to me. I am happy to say they have all gone a bit mouldy in the cupboard as I have never used them, even though Tracy Hogg did cast a spell on me for a while and made me feel very inadequate, and never mind that, made me feel that my baby wasn't normal .

I think I have found "the womanly art of breastfeeding" most helpful now that I am ten months in (I dip into it for some advice from time to time), but seriously? if you TRUST your body and TRUST your baby then machines and books will not be needed!

My MW told me not to express before 6 weeks as it could mess with your supply.
I know plenty of people who do start earlier though.

I work in a wellknown baby care shop and regularly tell customers who ask your question, to wait, establish a feeding routine and then buy one. You don't want to spend out on one then not be able to use it.

You might also find the idea that you can express to milk so that someone else can feed and "give you a break" is a load of nonsense. I was told on here (by a lovely poster who's name a can't remember ) that told me that what would actually happen was -

I would half kill myself expressing at every feed, I would label and store the milk, I would organise stock rotation of the milk, I would organise and clean the bottles, I would defrost the milk, I would warm the milk, and then I would hand it to DH/DM who would sit there with the baby while I felt duty bound to run around doing all the things that I wasn't generally doing because I was breastfeeding all the time.

And she was right.

Expressing for a baby sitter so that I could go out occasionally with DH and have some couple-time was worth it. Expressing so that you can sleep is also worth it, but comes with a warning - obviously some of the posters on here have done it and it's worked, but both women that I know in real life that have done this have completely buggered up their supply and ended up on formula. The late evening and night feeds are really important to maintain supply (which sucks, I know!). Better to arrange for a doting grandparent to give the milk in the day (hopefully you have one nearby) and have a nap then.

Forgot to say, one thing I did while I was still pregnant was to find out who my local bfing counsellors were, just in case I needed them. I also wrote down their numbers and packed them in my hospital bag. MW's are very helpful but are often very busy and many haven't bf themselves.

Try LLL or NCT

If you're one of the unfortunate people who NEED to pump at first (I was as DD couldn't latch on to my very inverted nipples) you can easily hire good breastpumps.
Mrs Tittlemouse - so very very true!

And then the person giving the bottle smiles at you graciously and tells you how wonderful that it is that they can give you a break.

(not that I ed at the time, mind you!)

BUT be very careful - I was never able to express even though I bf both mine exclusively for 6 months, and then dd until she was 3 and ds until he was 1. If it hadn't been for my very calm wise mother, I would have panicked when I tried to express milk for dd - I got practically nothing and thought that I wasn't producing any milk. Mum pointed out that dd had shot up past her birth weight practically instantaneously and so she must have been getting food from somewhere, and as she couldn't reach the pedals of the car to get to McDonalds......

In my opinion there's time enought to buy a pump when you need one - it's extra stress in teh early days.

I had a pump from birth, though I never got on with it well for expressing milk to be honest. That being said, I was mighty glad to have it when I got a blocked duct. I used it to help clear the blockage because hand expressing wasn't getting me anywhere and I found the pump less painful.

I bf for 8.5 months, stopping when the morning sickness of new pregnancy kicked in, so having one in the house certainly didn't stop me successfully bfeeding.