warming up breast milk?

[Sonilaa]

until now i put the bottle into a pan and poured in boiling water and let stand for about 10 mins. takes annoyingly long to get the temperature right.
the (cows) milk for my 3year old i put in the microwave for 30 secs, shake and let stand for a minute - perfect temperature.
can i do this with breast milk as well?

microwaving breast milk zaps all the good stuff out of it

i don't know how much it matters for the odd bottle tho

i usually just use warm water to heat EBM or leave it out at room temperature (as it can be left for longer than formula)

I use boiling water but don't heat it up to hot, as when breastfeeding its only body temperature ie just warm/tepid. Should only take 5 min or so.
I'm cautious of heating it in microwave because of the risk of hotspots, or do as rubyslippers says and leave it at room temp, the BF counsellor said it can be at room temp for 6 hours.

you shouldn't microwave bm, it destroys its goodness.

ruby am a bit [shocked] at your suggestion about the odd bottle, no point giving the bm if you are going to do that, may as well give a bottle of formula.

durr

I exclusively expressed, and am expressing about 3/4 of feeds for DD due to bfing difficulties. I usually stick it in a jug of hot water, or leave it out if it's going to be fed within the next 6 hours-ish. I used to have a bottle warmer for ds which was a godsend when he was receiving all his milk via bottle. I would never microwave it because I am not sure what it would do, plus it contains all sorts of things (white blood cells, antibodies, etc) which would almost definitely be killed off by zapping it in the microwave.

The main problem with microwaving is that it heats the milk unevenly which risks burning your baby's mouth (though the process doesn't do much for the bm either).

I am pretty lazy and have never warmed bm - just left it on the side for a bit or shoved it down my rather ample bra if there wasn't time for it to warm up to room temp. Breast milk is quite sweet and tasty so I'm not sure if the warming thing really comes from the FF culture but I accept that some babies may really not do cool breastmilk.

FWIW - I wouldn't disparage anyone's efforts to give any baby any amount of breastmilk by any means - any is good

Warming doesn't come from a FF culture - breast milk comes out at body temperature, any warming of any milk is trying to emulate that.

I am pretty sure that microwaved bm - though not as good as fresh - is still an improvement on fm.

how can mw bm be good enough to give if all the goodness has been nuked out of it, as opposed to ff that would have all the extras added.

By the way, I have never ff and long term bf all 5 of my dc's past 2 yrs, so is a genuine enquiry.

TBH, warming the expressed bm takes a few minutes so no real need to mw anyway imo.

I did say it was a guess, and I don't know for certain, but because formula is still an artificial food, and based on cow's milk, not human milk.

i just used to stick the bottle in my bra or hold it tightly between my legs to bring it up to roughly body temperature, not so easy to do if you are out and about tho

So down the bra or the waistband is the best option as it brings it to body temperature. This gives you more information. You can keep expressed breastmilk out of the fridge for a surprisingly long amount of time.

thanks a lot for your help, will stick to hot water and pan then
its mainly for my hubby, who feeds baby when I need to go out...

why does a microwave destroy some of the goodness of BM? Not being agro, just interested to know?

I would say stick on a radiator/in a warm place/use bottle warmer.

i check the medela website.
it says do not warm the milk in microwave and boiling water.

I personally tried to warm it in the milk bottle in the just boiled water.

The medela plastic bottle went soft and a very strong plastic smell came off.

I end up throwing the milk and reheat another bottle of expressed milk using only warm water.

Just to be safe.

Armpit is good .

We have one of those flash avent bottle warmer things so it heats it from frozen quite quickly.

All microwaving does is excit the water molecules in things so I am not sure how it would destroy breastmilk. Hotspots however are a concern and if I shake my breastmilk it goes cheesy, but is fine if swirled so I wouldn't use a microwave for that reason.