Colostrum expressing

[shutupsteph]

Hi ladies

I've started hand expressing colostrum and I'm barely getting 1ml after about 20 minutes on each breast. Is that normal? I'm putting it into syringes to freeze, is this little amount worth freezing?

Also, my left breast barely produces anything. It was pierced about 6 years ago for a few months, not sure if that's got something to do with it but I'm worried about when it comes to breast feeding!

Hiya yes that sounds within normal limits- how many weeks pg are you? My first baby had 1ml of colostrum every 3 hours for the first 24 hrs. Second had 7ml in first feed which surprised me. But yes overall it'll be very small amounts that you can harvest now.

Make sure you're warm, relaxed. The amounts may increase too over time.

@hairyxmasturkey that's good, I can't find anything online about the 'usual' amounts.

I'm 39 weeks today.

When the baby comes how do you feed the colostrum to them? Do they take it via the syringe as it's obviously not enough to feed from a bottle?

Yes you would defrost it in a cup of warm water, then feed drop by drop straight from the syringe. Do you have 1ml syringes? I was given a bunch by my midwife.