Breast pump

[Sydney199]

I keep reading that it is best to hold off buying a breast pump until the baby is born. I am hoping to breastfeed + pump. I know breastfeeding is not guaranteed for everyone so I am only hopeful that I can and we will just see what happens.
But why hold off on the pump? How do you know if you don’t buy the pump to try….
1st baby! Clueless! Would be grateful if someone could explain 😊

@Sydney199

Hey! I'm due in June and also first time mum!! I have bought a manual tommee tippee breast pump second hand... check out Vinted as I got mine on there for £10 😊 once I know I can breastfeed I'm going to invest in a electric pump!

I used the Elvie pump which is brilliant but a few hundred quid. For that reason, I’d have waited to see if I definitely could BF

Other cheaper ones are available but you might not need it

If you do pump you will need to store any milk to be later administered to baby. For a newborn that means a steriliser and bottles. So room in the kitchen. Maybe declutter now, and wait till breast feeding is established before you buy.
It’s tricky for baby to adjust between breast and bottle so waiting till everyone has practiced breastfeeding is perfect..

You shouldn’t pump for the first six weeks as your body is working up to supply and demand. Your body will think baby is eating more than they are and you will have an oversupply with could cause mastitis.

I think stats are a lot lower for people breastfeeding after this point too, a lot drop out.

Breastfeeding is sooo hard mentally and physically. I wouldn’t recommend investing too much until you know it’ll work for you. (I’ve given up this week at 11 weeks)

My baby lost a lot of weight after birth and expressing was a fantastic way to build my supply quickly. I did lots of research as I’ve had bad experiences with electric breast pumps before and the manual ones never gave me much milk.
I bought a medela swing double one. It is fantastic, you can even buy a madonna-esque bra to hold the two pumps on !
My dd lost a lot of weight after birth and I was only able to up my supply by pumping. She wasn’t feeding well on my actual boob so the bottle was invaluable. Now I only express to provide milk for my dh to do some night feeds so I can sleep longer than 3 hours in a row.
You could research pumps and have some ready to order if you don’t want to spend money now or not sure you will bf

Go to a local breastfeeding support group while you are pregnant to build up your confidence and see other mums breastfeeding

But why hold off on the pump?
Because you might end up not wanting to pump at all and it be a big waste of money. I pumped loads for DC1 and spent ages getting him to take a bottle just so I could go to a hen do for a day. It was a massive faff. After the hen do I put the pump away.

Got it out again with DC2, tried once, remembered I hated it and couldn't be arsed ever using it again. Just avoided the bottle faff entirely.