Hi all,
I had my DS at 31 weeks and have spent the last month between NICU and SCBU. Currently expressing and using the occasional top up of donor BM if he needs it depending on when I get in each day to visit.
I’m currently just about producing enough to sustain him but coming in slightly short of his daily volume. I’d hoped to BF but the ward is so stressful that we’re not having much luck. He is doing well with his bottle feeds and I’m hoping to try BF again once we’re at home rather than keeping him in for longer while we try. He’s putting on weight brilliantly and we’ve been offered transitional care for this week.
I have questions regarding what to do once we’re (hopefully!) home.
- If I’m not producing as much as he would take in a 24 hour period - would I need to top up a feed with a formula feed since there will be no more access to donor breast milk? Did anyone else have to do this, and if so which formula did you choose?
- He only moved from a 3 hourly strict feeding schedule to cue based feeding yesterday, so do I just need to wait for him to waken unless it runs over the 4 hours in which case I’ll wake him to try him at the breast? I’m hopeful being home and uninterrupted skin to skin will mean I can increase my supply.
- Does anyone have experience of trying to establish BF and expressing at the same time? I currently have set times for expressing but conscious that if I’m to try cue based feeds with him at home that I’m going to struggle with knowing when to express? EG - I’ve offered breast, he doesn’t take it, DH can give EM in bottle while I express, but then if he wakes again in 20 minutes to try again then I’ll have nothing to offer from breast?
- Any experience of how to monitor volumes when it’s cue based rather than the set volumes at set times we’ve been used to? I work too hard for this milk to waste any of it - should we start with half the volume and heat more as we go each feed?
- How did you heat your EM for bottle?
We’ll obviously speak to the staff today when we ‘move in’ and some of these questions may be obvious but we are sleep deprived and have been running on fumes for nearly 6 weeks now so I can’t see it for myself! Thank you for any advice!