Pumping at hospital

[BEO]

ladies who wanted to Breast feed and express feed- what did you take to hospital? Do you take milk bags/ pump/ bottles/ steriliser or just rely on breast whilst in hospital and express when home? Did you also take formula or ready to drink bottles incase there was a supply issue with breast milk? I guess you don’t know how long you’ll be in for so it’s best to be prepared.

Hi there I am a registered midwife with interest and experience of working in infant feeding teams (they support both breastfeeding and formula feeding mums). I would suggest if you wanted to give breastfeeding a good start ask your community midwife for some hand expressing syringes and try hand expressing some colostrum from 37 weeks of pregnancy. Some women get nothing before the baby is born, some lucky ones get full syringes, most mums are somewhere in between. Even if no colostrum is coming it's worth trying a few times a day for 5-10 minutes to stimulate lactation. If colostrum does come you can store it in the freezer until D-day. Bring it with you to hospital in a cool bag and ask your midwife to put it in a milk fridge, every ward has one. After Baby is born- lots of skin to skin and unlimited access to the breast especially at night. Also ask for help with positioning and attachment. No woman makes milk in the first 3 days, it's biologically impossible. Babies feed off colostrum which is made in tiny quantities. This is what babies did for millions of years. Colostrum is very different to mature milk or formula. It's very yellow in colour because it's mostly fat and antibodies. So it's enough even though babies tend to feed, feed and feed for first few days until mum's milk comes in on day 3-4. This is normal baby behaviour. Especially at night when mum's milk hormones at the highest level. No need to bring formula or bottles unless it's your choice. They will be supplied if your Baby needs them for medical reasons. I am familiar with the problem you describe i.e. babies refusing bottles. I can assure no baby has starved through stubbornness and health visitor would be able to advise if you decide to switch to bottle later on. 6 weeks might be a good time to try both bottle and a dummy. If you give formula in the early weeks I am afraid it could really interfere with your milk supply and your Baby's ability to suckle effectively. In my experience, these babies tend to put on a great show that they are suckling well on the breast. However as it's so much easier for a baby to drink from a bottle, they don't put in the work required on the breast. So mum's milk starts going down and more and more formula is required. I would say if you really want to introduce your baby to a bottle wait for 6 weeks for your supply to establish. I hope it helps

they support both breastfeeding and formula feeding mums

It'd be nice if this was the case everywhere. Always good for women to have contact details of local groups and national support lines that can help in case like so many women zero support is given.

Further to the earlier message..... Global Health Media Breastfeeding Videos Series is a collection of short of what to expect in early days, what a good latch should look like etc. Apologies, struggling to post the actual link

What to expect

You're most welcome :) good luck, you'll be fine, just wait until delivery day with 'I will be breastfeeding' in mind and go from there.

Disregard introducing dummy advice - If a baby suckles on a dummy in the early days, they are exerting their small awake window 'energy' on suckling dummy instead of breast. Dummy's can be useful, and have a place, but bare this in mind when wanting sufficient weight gain and transfer of milk at first. P.s babies are allowed to suckle for comfort.. especially if receiving milk at same time :)

Regarding colostrum harvesting, this is useful for diabetic mums and mums with medical conditions however not needed at all in mainstream expectant mums. Far too much pressure for little return. Biologically, like previously mentioned, the saliva and hormones stimulate your body to make milk, not your hands/pumps during pregnancy. Your choice though.

@thebreastmilkqueen
@wildflowerbreadtfeeding

• few instagram pages that can be useful with a BF journey.

Take care.

I planned to breastfeed but baby was in NICU. They lent me a pump to use whilst in the hospital and all bottles were supplied.

@Soontobe60 it may be a faff for some people but I know people who exclusively express feed and have no issue. It’s not debilitating my friend only pumps 3x per day/ hands free pump so doesn’t take anything out of her day and her baby is 12 weeks now. At the start she was pumping through the night but doesn’t now. If it’s what you want to do it isn’t a faff at all. I don’t want to exclusively Bf as I want my partner to be able to feed and I don’t want to be tied too much but I know it works for some people and that’s fine for them.

so idealy I would like a medium and do both :)

@Tiredbehyondbelief when I say bottle feed I will be expressing (hopefully) and feeding via bottle this way so hopefully won’t affect my supply as I’ll still be expressing if I’m not BFing :) but thanks for your help really useful information. I want to express and breast feed if I can but if it had to be one or other I would rather express then exclusively breast feed just because of my circumstances. I understand to make sure my supply comes in and keeps up I need to try brest feeding exclusively for the first 4-6 weeks or so which I will try to do :)

thanks for all your help ladies and if anyone did express feeding with breast feeding and has any tips please let me know :)

Hi BEO, it's midwife again, speaking from experience of supporting mums who were trying to do what you are hoping to achieve. You won't be able to use the pump until your milk comes in on day 3, day 4 at the latest. You will have to hand express into a syringe if you are not keen to have Baby on the breast. Partner of course will be able to feed syringes to Baby. Hand expressing and later expressing with a pump is quite often harder than people realise. You will still need to find time to hand express (at the beginning) or pump. Syringes are single use, however pump will need to be sterilised. From a practical perspective, it's often easier and more time efficient to put the baby on the breast. I introduced a bottle of expressed breastmilk to my 2nd child around 4 weeks so my husband could give him a feed if I wanted to go shopping etc. I also gave my son a dummy around that time (even though he tried stitting it out). I exclusively breastfed both children till 12-13 months. My first one was always on the boob. My 2nd one learned early on he was going to get a dummy unless he was quick (I had a 2 year old to look after as well). So by 2 months my 2nd was taking all his breastmilk in 15 minutes flat ( and slept 5-6 hours at a stretch at night - without any sleep training, just on brestmilk alone). I remember comparing my situation to my mix-feeding or bottle feeding friends when my son turned 2 months: no need to prepare formula, no need to sterilise anyting, just baby on the boob for 15 minutes 8 times a day and that's it. I hear this is not what you want to do, I am just sharing practical side of things. When I support mums with breastfeeding, I always say, "Every drop of breastmilk counts, give it your best shot and don't beat yourself up ifthings don't go exactly to plan". I hope it helps.

Thanks @Tiredbehyondbelief . I will try my best to exclusively breast feed for the first 4-6 weeks then will try to pump and introduce a bottle of expressed milk.

I understand that exclusively having baby on the breast may be simpler and easier for others and that some people see pumping as a faff but that is what I want to do so i will try it.

My friend managed to harvest colostrum for her baby and had him on the breast for the first few days. She then got into a pumping routine and only express fed from about 2-3 weeks onward as babh preferred the bottle to boob. She finds it quite simple, doesn’t take extra time out of her day and other people can feed baby. I am aware what works for her won’t necessarily work for me but that is what I am going to try. I would still like to do both (breast and express) as long as possible but if baby stops taking Breast then I will try to express feed solely :)

I was provided with a double breast pump and all equipment including fridge in hospital.