BF baby now taking bottle at 6 months - pumping?

[PockerMaus]

My 6 month old son has decided he will now happily down a bottle after 6 months of refusal. He is currently EBF but this is great news for me as it means my partner can now help with some of the feeds. I'm also due to go back to work when he's 10 months old so I'd like to create a bit of a stash

Anyone have any experience of introducing pumping at this stage? I pumped a bit around 2/3 months but gave up when my son was refusing to drink anything from a bottle.

Do I need to slowly introduce pumping to not less with my supply? Ideally I'd like to pump enough to give him a bottle before bed as I've tried this the last few nights and he has slept for double the time before waking & then a little bit more to put towards a stash for when I return to work.

Also my son has always fed to sleep at night. Does anyone have any experience of introducing a bottle and then baby being able to settle on this overnight instead? I work night shifts so I'm just concerned that although he will now be able to have his milk whilst I'm away, he won't be able to settle with my partner.

You won't lessen your supply by pumping. Your boobs will ramp up supply to match demand so once you start pumping you'll need to do it regularly regardless of whether you actually need the milk in order to prevent mastitis. Enjoy your freedom!

Haha just realised I wrote less instead of mess* 😊

Thank you for your reply! I think I'm just keen to build up a freezer supply but as you say, I would like.to avoid mastitis!

I wish the 😂 was still an option! Well done typos 😂

Personally I found it really hard to ever produce anything for a pump and the older the DC were the more difficult it got. I just stopped bothering. When are you going back to work? Remember they start to rely more on solids at some point so you might not need loads of milk on hand, and it is also easier to pump when output has drastically reduced e.g. you're feeding every 4-5 hours when together but suddenly are separated for 8+ hours - you may wish to pump a bit for comfort in this case and that will provide you with some milk for the next day.

Oh and if you haven't frozen any milk yet, I recommend trying to freeze a small sample and then defrost it and check if you have the gene that makes your milk taste soapy after defrosting. I don't personally have this issue but have read about it on here and it's gutting if you only find out after you've frozen loads of milk and then it's no good.

Oo interesting, have never heard of this!! I did worry that my son wouldn't take defrosted milk but I found a couple I had saved from the earlier days in the freezer and he drank it last night so fingers crossed it'll always be ok!

I won't lie, I really hate pumping. I find it so boring and time consuming. I think I'm just hoping to get my partner more involved and able to have our son for longer than 2/3 hours without me!

My night shifts are 15+ hours which I know is quite extreme so I think I'd like to build up a stash due to the length of them but appreciate the points you've made :) I guess a lot can change in the next 4 months before I go back!

Oh good :) Then this is fine. You should be fine to build up a freezer stash!