Harvesting colostrum antenatally

[Penguinpinata]

I’m coming up for 38 weeks pregnant and have just started trying to harvest colostrum antenatally on the advice of the midwives, as our baby has a cleft lip and palate so won’t be able to breastfeed once they’re here. I had some success on the second day and filled a 1ml syringe over 3 sessions but since then, it seems to have got harder and I’m barely getting anything (0.2ml this morning, in about half an hour) and am getting more and more stressed about it.

Does anyone have any tips on anything that has helped them? All the blogs/comments I’ve read online seem to be from people who once they got the hang of it were managing to fill a couple of syringes per session within a few days so I feel like a total failure!
I’m trying after a bath and shower and/or using a heated pad.

Please don’t feel like a failure; you are not and the fact you are attempting this speaks volumes.

My colostrum didn’t come in until baby was born and then I went from nothing to being able to hand express syringes full enough to feed him off that so it may be once baby is here it all works out.

Have you expressed before? Have you got the technique right? Maybe you could ask at your next MW appointment or watch a YouTube video?

But please don’t put pressure in yourself to do this, baby will be totally fine without. Try and enjoy your last few weeks of being baby free 🥰

I found it quite difficult initially, was asked to start at 36 weeks due to planned induction. What helped me was:

• stay really hydrated
• better about an hour after a meal
• better the later in the day it got
• getting a good technique - watched lots of boobs on YouTube
• heat (as you’ve said)
• massaging/rolling each boob before starting.
• thinking about baby
• don’t stress! Some days I got very little, others more so. After about a week it was more consistent. But stress definitely makes it harder.

I never managed to fill several syringes in one go. I think in the couple of days before I could get 2 syringes with some effort of an evening but I’d been doing nearly 2 weeks by then! And never as much in the day.

I switched boobs several times per session - not sure if you do that?

Massage, warm compress and practice your technique.

It took me a good few days - like 3/4 - of just getting dribs and drabs before it really kicked in and then yes I was able to fill a couple of syringes at each “session”.

Massage is good and definitely try just in the shower when warmed up, don’t worry about trying to collect it but try the technique and to encourage your body.

If you find in the end your body just isn’t ready then don’t force it and please don’t feel guilty or anything, sometimes your body just doesn’t kick in until baby is born.

It’s lush you’re trying though and hopefully you’ll have a freezer bag lined up by the time baby comes!

It’s so hard but please remember you are not a failure everyone is different. The things that helped me were making sure I was really hydrated drinking loads of water. Warm showers and when I had time to just sit by myself and try and relax to do it. The more stressed I was the worse it was. Watch a few videos and ask the midwife to. In the end I managed to fill a few syringes and the midwife said not everyone is able to do that amount. So please don’t feel like a failure I was able to get more once my little one was born as he was unable to feed so needed to keep going. Make sure u are not hurting your self to do this I was doing it wrong at first and left a nice bruised on myself. Good luck and please don’t be afraid to ask for help

Thank you for all your tips - and the reassurance! I think I got excited when I did manage to fill a syringe, and convinced myself it would just carry on gradually improving so then the past few days have been really dispiriting.

I’m going to have a look to see if I can find some good videos on the technique; I thought I’d worked out how to do it with some advice over the phone from the specialist midwife but I’m just not sure I’m getting the action right.

I just wanted to update on this in case anyone else comes across this thread - a few days of trying to relax, and not stress, and just practicing in the bath, did wonders for my confidence/technique. I’ve now got 11 syringes in my freezer & can fill a 1ml syringe in the morning and then another in the evening, not quickly but relatively easily.

Does anyone have an idea of how many syringes it would be good to take to the hospital? I asked my midwife on Monday but she didn’t really know much about clefts or colostrum feeding so just said quite vaguely ‘as many as possible’ and then suggested I take 6. And also slightly terrified me by suggesting there might not be room at the hospital for them to be stored. Hopefully not the case!

I had to syringe feed dd for the first 15-20 hours. I think we got through about 10 mls in that time - just to give a very rough idea.

No cleft lip, we just couldn't figure out latch. I imagine the biggest difference to how much won't dependent on the cleft lip, but the appetite, joe birth goes, etc...

My advice would be not to take it all into hospital when you go into labour. I had been carefully harvesting colostrum on the advice of my midwife and was really proud of my freezer stash, when I was in labour and waiting to go into delivery suite I have a vague memory of my frantic husband trying to get a midwife to put it in a fridge or freezer somewhere in the department. They acted like they'd never seen or heard of colostrum before and I've never asked but I'm pretty sure it all ended up in the bin. I couldn't have cared less by this point and didn't end up needing it but if you know you'll need a good supply then I would get someone to bring it up after baby is born, or just take a minimal supply so you don't have the added stress of trying to sort out storage.

I was told to take around 10 syringes full

They didn't put mine in the freezer straight away because labour was progressing so quickly there wasn't time, but it's fine in a cool bag for 6 hours.

If you leave some at home would your partner be able to bring more in if needed?

Good luck!

Hi OP,

Glad that you’re finding it easier now 😊.

I had about 20 syringe fulls for my DD, she was a big baby and sometimes drank 2-3 in one sitting. So I’d say as man6 as you can comfortably manage, without putting pressure on yourself.

I actually harvested all of mine in the bath, it seemed to be the easiest place! Great tips above.

Good luck with the birth.

Oh and I agree about keeping most of it in your freezer and just getting DH to bring a few in at a time to store in the hospital fridge.

This is all so helpful, thank you! I think I’ll aim to take 10 in initially, and hope DH can bring more in when he comes in the following days. Fingers crossed that I can do some expressing while I’m there, so it’s not just all on the syringes, but I figure the first few days are going to be quite intense!

The cleft team have emailed the hospital a feeding plan in advance and given me copies to take in with me, which mentions the colostrum syringes, so I’m really hoping to avoid @ConstantlyIrksome’s situation, which is definitely something that had occurred to me in my fretting. Eeeeek. It’s a big teaching hospital so am hoping that they will be a teeny bit more clued up.

OP, there has been some good advice here so I won't repeat. But how are you intending/hoping to keep feeding your baby once they are born? If you'd like to keep expressing breastmilk, just remember to keep up the expressing after the birth too. It's great that you've produced a lot antenatally, but if you want to keep up your milk supply, you'll also need to express some more in hospital each time baby feeds from the syringes. If you miss a feed because baby is taking a syringe from the freezer, this won't signal your body to keep up the supply your baby needs. It works on a supply and demand basis. If however, you intend to switch to formula, then keeping up the supply won't matter of course. Just wanted to make sure you don't feed using the pre-made syringes at the cost of your supply. How often you feed or express in the first few days has an impact on how much you'll produce later on. Expressing colostrum after the baby is born is also much much easier than antenatally. Many women can't get anything at all before baby comes, but produce plenty after birth!
Good luck! You sound like you're doing a wonderful job.

I’m hoping to mix feed - I’d love to be able to purely express but I think that might perhaps be unrealistic, especially long term - so we’re really just hoping the syringes will help us out and give us some breathing space while I concentrate on getting expressing established.

It will take at least 24 hours for the specialists to come out and assess what kind of bottles they need, etc and because I’ve heard so much about how important getting them fed at the start is that I think I’ve focused a lot (possibly too much?) on the syringes as a way of ideally being the best/only option in that initial period. And also because I worry I’m going to be a bit overwhelmed with the cleft side of things and how the baby looks, it feels like this is one thing I might have a tiny bit of control over.

I have used hopefully a lot in this post I realise....!

I think you sound very sensible. Some women manage to express large amounts very easily, but others find expressing a large volume more challenging sometimes. Planning to mix feed if necessary takes the pressure off yourself and allows you to take things day by day and see how it goes. It'll reassure you to have plenty of colostrum stored already. I just wanted to make sure that if you plan to continue to express breastmilk, you know not to 'skip' too many feeds by feeding your baby the syringes INSTEAD, when you'd otherwise be stimulating your supply by expressing that feed. Expressing as often as possible in the early days puts the order in for your supply to be up to the job later.
You sound like you've given it lots of thought. Well done and best of luck!

P. S. Your lovely baby sounds like he/she will be in very good hands

Sorry I'm late to this thread, I found it whilst searching for something very similar and I wanted to say how helpful I'd found it. I'm also expecting a baby with a cleft lip and palate and have been advised to harvest colostrum so this thread was really helpful. Thanks OP and everyone who replied!

OP - I hope you got on well in the end, sending my best wishes!