Breastfeeding/pumping help

[AmyB1978]

I need some help/advice if anyone has been through this and has some experience to share. I will be calling the lactation consultants at the hospital where my daughter was born but I am afraid I won't be able to talk to them until Monday and that my supply, which I worked so hard to establish, will be messed up by then.

A little background:

My daughter was born at 34 weeks and spent 2 weeks in the NICU for apnea and feeding issues. She is home now, came home on Tuesday and we were following a schedule of breastfeed, supplement w/ bottle of expressed breast milk, then I would pump. She was also getting two feedings a day of Neosure. She went to her pediatrician on Thursday and we were given the go ahead to try stopping the neosure all together and giving the supplemental breastmilk only when she has a really short/poor feeding session. She is doing pretty well and is adjusting off her NICU schedule and onto her own (I still wake her up some of the time but she is waking up wanting to eat more often now.)

My question is how to handle pumping/my supply. I pumped religiously when she was in the hospital and am now producing more than she is taking. At times, especially on the breast I am not feeding with I engorge and leak ALOT. i want to make sure that I keep my supply up but I also realize that she needs to start commanding my supply. I don't want to not pump and lose supply but I also don't want to keep engorging and leaking because there is too much. I am worried about pumping, as well, because she is feeding more often and I don't want to "drain" what she needs. How do I go about transitioning from pumping so much to exclusively breastfeeding her? Right now I am mainly pumping when she has a poor feed and I supplement her (with expressed breastmilk) or when I engorge and start to leak.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated... I am so confused as to how to handle this and what to do.

 

[DonnaBallona]

hmmmmm tricky one.

the thing is, if she has a poor feed, and then you pump immediately after; you are telling your body that she needs more than she does. I did exclusive pumping for my son but had so much milk that when I started cutting down pumping I gave myself mastitis and went into hospital for a week

personally; if it was me; I would very gradually start reducing the amount of time I pumped after her feed. honestly, it should be soooooo gradual you barely notice it at first. you don't want to try and rush it and give yourself trouble as that really will kill your supply. once I'd started pumping less after each feed and got the supply down to a comfortable level, I tried to leave it a little longer between pumps too, to signal to my body that I didn't need as much.

good luck chick. I hope it goes smoothly for you! xx

 

[Ice Cold Cube]

I could have written your post! I'm in exactly the same position right now.

Ella was born at 33 weeks, exactly a month ago, and I've been expressing for her too as she was in neonatal care until Friday and mostly tube fed until last Wednesday (when I started exclusively breastfeeding her). I have got to the point of oversupply - pumping about a litre a day when she is only needing approx 400ml. At the time I never really thought if it being a problem as I've built up a massive freezer stash and also plan to donate some to a milk bank - plus it gave me something to do when she was sleeping in the hospital. I was only pumping 5 times a day, and never through the night, so now that I'm actually feeding her, every 3 hours at least and through the night too, my chest is fit to burst!

I really don't know what to do. So far I've just been expressing off small amounts from the breast I've not fed from, straight after a feed if I feel very uncomfortable. I am sick of pumping, so really do want to limit it, but obviously I don't want to completely slash my supply to the point that Ella doesn't get enough when her appetite picks up. If anyone can offer any advice, it would be much appreciated. You are not alone!!!

Laura x

 

[Stelly]

I agree with Donna.. go slooow. Just from pumping ( I wasnt even decreasing supply etc) I got bad nastitis/staph infection and was hospitilized for 3 days.... you definitely dont want to give yourself mastisis!!! It decimated my supply.

 

[Foogirl]

I'd also say, give it some time, the first 6 weeks I was pumping and full to bursting most of the time. I stuck to my schedule and it settled down all by itself.

 

[inperfected]

Go slow.
Go slow.
Go slow.
That's about all I can say. I was pumping 1.5L a day, plus feeding him from me, so probalby about 1.8-2L a day at the most. The lactations advice was drop it by 20ml today, and 5ml for each feed today. Then tomorrow drop it by 5ml again. Then if you need to, keep it at that for a couple of days, then drop it a little again. It's sounds tedious, but it will get you there. Also, after 6 weeks, then again at 12 weeks, it does naturally drop off AND also if you can, save the pumped/frozen milk and use fresh milk, so you are pumping what she needs and a little more. It saves the freezing/defrosting cycle PLUS the fresh milk has the antibodies that are needed now - i.e. any bugs you've been exposed to and the like

It's a hard road, but you do get there in the end. Just go slow I have recently finished feeding Jesiah (his choice) at 15 months old and it was worth it, even with all the difficulty that came with it (prem and tounge tied)