Expressing Milk - Advice Needed!! ***Another Question**

[Lindsay]

Can someone tell me roughly how long it takes to express milk using an expressing pump?

I have bought the Medela mini electric pump and tried to express some milk this morning. I had it on for about 20 minutes and only expressed 2ozs which to me doesn't sound a lot am I doing something wrong or is my milk running out? I am worried about the latter as when I got Jacob weighed yesterday he had lost 2ozs and I have introduced a small teaspoon of baby rice at lunch time for him. He is also waking every 2 hours again in the night.

Thanks in advance

 

[Lucy]

Hi Lindsay

I must say that I've never been able to express very much but I used to get 5 oz in the morning whilst I was feeding Olivia on one side and pumping the other. I found drinking a glass of water before starting helped as well.
If you're not feeding Jacob at the same time they say to look at a photo of your baby to help your "let down" reflex.

Is this in preparation for when you go to work? If it is, I'd say you'll get lots during the day when you're at work and not feeding Jacob but that will be enough for his feeds the next day.

Also, they say if you keep pumping at the same time every day your body will think the baby is feeding more and so it will start producing more milk for that session.

HTH

Lucy

 

[skatty]

I don't know if its an old wives tale but I have been eating oats everyday and have loads of milk, I also drink loads

 

[Daggers]

Hi Lindsey, I've got one of those pumps as well, fortunately at present I have no problems exoressing however it does vary from person to person. My sister who has no problem BFing (now 18months later), was no good at expressing milk, so go figure that one? . Mabe just try and slowly build up your supply by trying to express 2 - 3 times a day at around the same time and see if you are able to express more each time?

 

[Lindsay]

Thanks for your replies. I have taken your advice and have been expressing while feeding jacob on the morning and I have got a bit more milk out

Another question though please!

I have put the milk into a container in the fridge as DH is going to try feeding Jacob at lunch time with this milk. Does the milk need to be heated or brought out of the fridge earlier to bring to room temperature before given to Jacob?

Thanks lots!

Xxx

 

[Daggers]

I've been warming my milk, as it normally is body temp when baba BFs, milk from the fridge would be to cold mi thinks. I have a bottle warmer which does the job, if you haven't got one just boil some water and try to warm the baby bottle with milk to body temp (37 degrees I believe).

 

[bagpuss]

Hi Lindsay,
hope you and Jacob are well,seems like I haven't spoken to you for ages!!

I also use a bottle warmer to warm any milk that I have expressed,seems better than leaving it out to get to room temperature.

Expressing whilst feeding tricks your body into thinking you are feeding more than one,so it ups your milk supply,so I was told,hope that is right now i've said it!!
I also used to use two pumps at the same time just after feeding Finn,one of the medela mini ones and an isis hand pump,to get all that nice rich milk as oppose to the fore milk,again,your body produces more because it thinks baby is feeding more.

 

[Urchin]

I agree a bottle warmer or boiling water, microwaving or over heating can destroy valuable nutrients found in breastmilk.