Use of I-phone to help record details of breastfeeding

[HedgehogBear]

I have been looking into how you can use apps to help with managing breastfeeding etc with new babies. Dose anyone recommended any apps that held them keep track of breastfeeding etc?

I found keeping track was more of a faff than it was worth. And I use apps for nearly everything.

Baby cried - put baby on boob - repeat

Didn't worry about length of feed/which side I fed off last

I spent first few days after first child keeping notes of feeding times.

My midwife (rightly) suggested that I was obsessing - and that writing down how little sleep/how many feeds and when might distract from reading cues that dd was giving and from just going with the flow.

Binning the record was the best thing ever - didn't need it written down to see that was feeding loads, dd was healthy and so on. And certainly didn't need to be reminded of how little sleep I was getting in the early days.

The only thing I found tricky early on was which side to feed first - until I realised that one boob was often more engorged meaning I'd start with that one.

Are you looking for one with a timetable? I started just recording when I fed but that shortly went out the window. I found it tough after a while as I was so tired and seemed like I was breast feeding 24 hours a day. I lasted a month I so wished I could have done it longer but I wasn't enjoying it or dd2 because of constant feeds or snacks.

My friend did fantastic though and just did it on demand and she had four kids to look after!!

Good luck it's not the easy option !!

i used Baby Log, picture of a yellow bottle with magnifying glass on a turquoise background.

I had a slow to regain birth weight baby and the app was a lot easier than writing it down for the every 48h visits from HCP's. They kept asking how many feeds in 24h/how long for and I didn't have the faintest idea initially!!

Downloaded it at about 3 weeks and really regretted not doing it sooner, I paid about £3 I think - well worth it, as she grew I used it religiously for a week to see what routine she was naturally falling into, then a couple of weeks off, then on again etc. It was really useful in the fog of new motherhood to realise that actually, despite the perception of no routine she was already falling into one, sort of. Plus you tell it 'start' on a boob and 'stop' much easier than remembering to look at a clock (which I always forgot and had to guess start times…).

Good luck :-)

I really wouldn't keep notes. I recently came across my list of obsessional notes from the early days of dd1 and laughed. It helped not a jot, and was something else to be exhausted by.

I drove myself bananas with one of these for my DC1.
With DC2 I simply held and fed her many many times a day for as long as she wanted, from each side roughly the same amount. Guess which baby I had a better bf experience with?

I found recording feeds really detrimental and contrary to the feed on demand advice for bfing. It just means you obsess more. Let nature take its course with some things, and I'm another app fiend!

Good luck!

Definitely don't do it. You'll drive yourself mad!!

Oh gawd flashback time!

We had a stopwatch ffs! And and a notebook. Every feed, nap, sleep shit and blink!

No wonder I stopped bf and didn't enjoy newborn stage much!

I had ibabyfeed with my first. It wasn't really helpful looking back but I liked it at the start especially when HCPs would ask how often she was feeding.