Breastfeeding baby halfway through day at nursery

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My daughter is six months old. She will be attending nursery two mornings a week starting in one month's time. She will accept a bottle but can be really fussy and get upset about it, and I am keen to keep nursing her for as long as possible. I am in the extremely lucky position that I am able to leave work halfway through the morning for half an hour to nurse her, if I should want to. My question is, has anybody done this - nursed their child halfway through a period of time spent in the care of another provider, and did it work well or just create another difficult separation on top of saying goodbye at the morning drop off? All advice and viewpoints appreciated.

I had by 6 month old brought into my office on my lunch break, was lovely and worked fine, we did it until she was about a year or so and dropped that feed.

Sounds like a great idea

Some babies would get upset at you coming then leaving without you taking them with you.

What time where you thinking? A lot of baby room start early so by 1130 are having lunch. Or if they start at 8 and you are aiming for milk around 10? I presume you have or will start weaning soon.

It would also depend if the nursery is set up with a quiet and comfortable space for you to feed. You could find yourself in a very noisy and busy room and instead of being relaxed event you would be listening to other babies crying (some people just do. More babies bigger the risk) plus generally noise.

I think at the moment it also depends on covid rules in the nursery. My nursery has a blanket no parents inside the building except for settling in so it's worth checking if the nursery will allow this at the moment.

In general terms I guess it depends on the baby and how settled they are. My now 1 year old tries his best to get back into nursery when I'm collecting him so I doubt he would care.

Some babies would get upset at you coming then leaving without you taking them with you.

That would be my worry. If your DD is unsettled by you leaving she could potentially find it quite distressing to have settled into nursery for the day have you arrive and think you've come back only to then leave her again.

It's also worth considering where you would feed her as due as many nurseries aren't letting people into the building due to Covid so would you potentially find yourself collecting her, feeding her in the car and then taking her back to the door to be collected by staff?

Honestly I would express. Its disruptive for her and the nursery for you to go in and feed her, and at six months it's not the end of the world if she doesn't take as much from a bottle as she usually would from you.

I did this with my baby who would not take a bottle at nursery. the nursery was not far from work, so I would drop baby at nursery in the morning, then collect her at lunch & walk to a nice cafe 2 mins away where I could feed baby + eat a sandwich all at once. then drop baby back at nursery.

of course, the nice cafe won't be open at the moment, but something similar could work.

I honestly think it will disrupt her day and throw her off, and you'll struggle to get her back to them after you visit.
Even my four year old would be upset if I turned up half way through the day and then left again. I would absolutely express.

I work in a nursery and we’ve had parents do this. It works well and, as a breastfeeding mum myself, I would 100% do it in your position.

I worked at a nursery where a mum did this, it was fine and I think baby would soon get used to you coming in and leaving again as it would be part of the routine.

I was going to do it with my first but then the goodbyes were so hard it wasn’t worth it. If you can make it work though I think it’s a great thing.

Thanks ladies. I might see how she is at her settling sessions first before I make a final decision. I should mention that up to this point ny husband has been bringing her to work at 11 and I feed her then he takes her home again and that's worked well, but obviously that was when her caregiver was her other parent.

I think it would be really disruptive to both her settling in and to the staff/other babies. What if she's really upset when you leave? What if it takes ages for the keyworker to bring her (I waited 10 minutes the other night for them to bring DS down at home time because of things going on with other children). Nursery workers are miracle workers at getting food, bottles and sleep into otherwise reluctant children so I wouldn't worry too much.

If it was a full day, I'd say give it a go.
But if it is just 2 mornings, I think you'd be better just skipping a mid morning feed those days.
Feed her just before she goes to nursery (7am?), feed her when she is collected at lunch (1pm?), with some food, water, and a bottle offered between.

I used to do this although at mums house as she provided childcare. It was fine, although I suspect DS would have eventually taken a bottle had I not gone. It also often took longer than 30 mins (it gets harder to leave them as they get older I found) and it disturbed work, which was actually fine for me but it might not be for others.

Sounds lovely. I did similar and it worked well.

If she's used to it with your DH I'd absolutely try it.

In my cases the other care giver was her nanny, was fine

I did this 5 days a week at the childminder's house from when my baby was 7-12 months. She settled quickly with the childminder (she was there most the week though) so didn't mind me going back to work for the afternoon. She was a bottle refuser.

I did this a couple of times when my children started nursery at 9-10 months old and they were struggling a bit to get through the day. They were both bottle refusers so no point expressing. With my daughter this happened during COVID but I fed outside/in a separate room and it was inbetween lockdowns. I didn’t make it a regular thing as both children soon stopped needing it during the day and fed in the morning/evening instead.

My babies were both doing full days though, I think they could have managed fine to go a morning without a feed.

I wouldn't, it will be unsettling for the baby.