Sept 08 - Is it day or night?

[lollyheart]

Hope no one minds me starting a new thread?

Unrelated to any recent comments...is it ok to add just-expressed milk to expressed milk that is already cold in the fridge? I can't see any reason why not, but have a nagging feeling I read somewhere you shouldnt...

cat811 they suggest that both milks are the same temp so no bacteria can breed (i think)

Microwaving milk is discouraged as uneven heating and can get too hot.

Sterilizing, when you say no to sterilizing do you mean milton or all sterilizing? I use a steam sterilizer with no chemicals as i don't like the smell of chemicals.

Cat11 you can add fresh ebm milk to ebm milk in the fridge, i asked my bfc thismorning and she said you can.

All sterilising is unnecessary, unless you keep very poor hygiene! I like to steam things to know that it has hit a high temp at least once because I don't have a dishwasher and don't wash up it very hot water!

cat If you do, you risk heating the existing milk a little with the new milk, and getting confused how old the milk is. You can chill the new milk first before adding though and label or 'remember' the age of the oldest milk!

I do what lollyheart suggests though, coz I'm a lazy mother!

I too use a steam steriliser as I don't like Milton - but then I'm ff so use bottles ALOT!

plusonemore not sure if you are bf or ff. If bf, babies shouldn't get constipated (though I'm sure there will always be exceptions to the rule). If ff, try a small amount of cooled, boiled water. Charlotte took a little last week and did a huge poo within 12 hours

hopefully my DP used to be a chef, so isn't a fan of microwaves but we do have one that is an oven/microwave combi - very handy when cooking large dinners (eg at xmas) or when we're grilling something and need to use oven as well, as our main oven is also the grill(eg sausage and oven chips - lovely healthy meals at the moment!). I mainly use the microwave for reheating cold meals at the moment though....

dear god I've had a bad evening today....why am I writing such rubbish about bloody microwaves? .
Off to bed, sod it. Tomorrow's another day.

ebm should not be microwaved. it totally destroys the living cells in it. warm it up in a jug of hot, not boiling water.

also, do not vigourously shake it. also destroys the living cells. swirl it instead as you are not making butter.

Had an appalling evening yesterday - T woke himself with tummy ache at about 8pm and screamed till 10pm. Luckily he then settled after his feed and, miraculously, settled within half an hour after his 4am feed. There's definitely a very small window in which we can put him to bed during the evening, and if he wakes again or we miss it he's a disaster with tummy ache/over tiredness. Poor chap.

Have to go to doc's for 6 week check, and will have to feed in the waiting room, as there were no appointments at useful times for us.

Hello chaps - I know I haven't posted in aeons but I read every day and have found your posts so helpful (THANK YOU starlight and foxy - I have never seriously doubted that I have enough milk, even in darkest early days, thanks to your persistence in myth bustng) and cheering. How parasitical of me.

Frank is 7 weeks on Weds and is a little trooper. Last night he slept from his feed at 7.30 pm to 3.30 am - this seems an incredible stint from a breastfed baby, but its becoming quite regular. So now you would be quite justified in hating me, but I still complain - I would much rather he took his last feed at about 9 as then his long sleep would much more correspond with mine!

But he is just zonked at 7.30 and so keeping him up would seem to run the risk of making him overtired. I need to string him out more but don't know how without messing with what is obviously a good thing!

Also adding my voice to those who feel like failures in 'entertaining' babies during wakeful periods. Frank is not a fan of baby gym unfortunately as hates lying on his back and STILL goes into crawl reflex when on his tummy! I do talk to him and sometimes get smiles, but mostly the stern look of a kindly but disappointed headmaster. and then tears. I have shoved him in his sling to type this - poor bored baby!

PS notcitrus - I see you are Brixton based - so am I. If you fancy meeting up and have an anonymous email addy ( I don't, and am a bit cautious) post it here, and I'll get in touch. I find the more outings I arrange for Frank and I the better in terms of sanity maintenance.

I'm such a bad mother. Not only have I woken T early from his nap to stuff a feed into him so I don't have to spend ages at doc's (no probs with public feeding, just don't want to sit in the waiting room for an hour), but I have just looked down and he is covered in biscuit crumbs from my morning custard cream intake.

Good to see you charity! Very envious of your long sleeps, although it must be annoying having them in the wrong place. i'm sure once he's doing them regularly you'll be able to massage them a bit later night by night if you want to.

Luckily T is fairly happy under the gym if he's not suffering with the tummy, and my other discovery is baby einstein DVDs. He's only been focusing on them for about 3 days, but he is transfixed once his eyes land on the telly while its playing. I can actually get dressed and brush my teeth while he's watching it from his bouncy chair! Still feel I'm not interacting with him enough. Is no aspect of my life to be free from guilt?!

plusonemore - hopefully your lo has had a poo bynow, if not bicycling their legs and rubbing their tummy clockwise can help.

injections - I still haven't decided what to do. I think I will opt for the jabs but when ds is a bit older. Did you know the main reason the first 3 lots of jabs are given when they are is to catch working mothers before they go back to work, not because it's an optimum time for the baby to receive them. I find that interesting and a bit disturbing.

Foxy technical question:

When my milk has been standing in the fridge all the fat sticks to to sides si I shake it to try to mix it in again. Should I not do this and not worry about the fat?

Charitygirl Sounds like things are going brilliantly. Baby Starlight is 'beginning' to do an occassional long stretch at night now. Last night she did midnight til 6, but that was after feeding non-stop from 8pm-midnight. I still woke at 3:30 though and it would have been just as easy as not to have fed her then.

how long can i keep ebm in the fridge for? expressed last night but would quit like to use it tomorrow night - that would be 2 days 6 hours approx since i expressed it. too long?

Oh, and plusonemore i was told to drink orange juice. i drank lots and he pooed a few hours later, but it may well have been coincidence, as it had been so long at that point...

Iliketomoveitmoveit That's !

Will check out these baby einstein dvds hopefully - if only to see whats on them! am about to stick on some mozart to see if this will prove more soothing than jeremy kyle.

will actually not mind my 3.30 am feed tonight. i do them in the living room so as not to wake DP and tonight i#m going to put the telly on - someone must be showing US election coverage!

Iliketomoveitmoveit I've heard the same thing. How long do you think you'll wait until taking lo in for the injections?

re the mmr: it's not just autism that worries some scientists. it's the fact that they are injecting three live viruses into children without actually knowing exactly how these viruses interact with each other. the combined vaccination can affect some children differently, so why risk it imo? i don't get what's wrong with being safe and splitting the vaccinations up. at least it'll give the lo's immune systems to handle what's coming in and maybe they will even obtain better immunity from handling each virus separately.

thanks for the advice people, alfie still hasnt done a poo (im bf btw) but will def try the orange juice and bicycling legs!

i too am interested in how long ebm can be kept in fridge...anyone got the answers?

8 days fresh (if stored at the back) and 24 hours after it has defrosted!

hopefully up to 3 days in fridge is optuimum. up to 8 days acceptable (I doubled checked this for a thread yesyerday - see my profile if you want links as trying to get m to sleep now). hth

should add that's if your fridge is less than 4 degrees

here is the LLL advice

here is the breastfeeding network leaflet]]

They answer a lot of question

thanks very much! good to know i can use the stuff i pumped yesterday - i reckon it will take me till wed to pump enough for a full feed (am always too scared to pump at any time except after evening feeed, as i know i have 3 hours to replenish)

we have poo!

hopefully i thought you could pump at any time, that your breasts never really get empty- have i been doing it wrong? i try to do it whenever i get the tingly let down feeling

I know what you mean hopefully about pumping too close to a feed but actually think plusonemore is right - your breasts never run dry and the pump should actually stimulate your breast to produce even more.

I am more fearful of Frank starting to scream while I'm pumping, just no way I could hold him and keep going, but loathe to break off to comfort him - i pump into bags and they're not very stable, have visions of coming back to find precious EBM on the floor !