Confused about sterilising bottles!

[firstLO]

I breastfeed but give my baby a bottle of formula in the evening and the occasional top of formula as she has been slow putting on weight. Anyway I normally sterilise the bottles then use them as and when needed but think I've been doing this wrong. Am I supposed to use a newly sterilised bottle for each feed? What confuses me though is that my steriliser is quite big and can hold quite a few bottles. It says in the instructions though that items will only remain sterile for up to 24 hours as long as the lid is NOT removed. Well obviously I only will need one bottle at a time so as soon as I take the lid off to get that first bottle the rest will then not be sterile for when I need them!!! I don't get it, what is the point of having something that sterilises loads of bottles if I'm going to have to sterilise one again for every feed? Am I being really thick here?

 

[Bec L]

No you're not! I find it confusing too. I b/feed but have to sterilise some stuff for Poppy and I had the same problem of not knowing if things stayed sterile when I'd opened the steriliser. I think to be honest the stuff you leave in there (for up to 24 hours) will be absolutely fine. Sometimes if I needed to take something out with me ie when I was using breastshells, I would sterilise them and also sterilise a tupperware box, then store the shells in the tupperware so I could take them with me. Not sure if that was the right thing to do but never had any problems with Poppy being poorly or anything.

Maybe someone else can give you a more accurate answer!

 

[jenstar]

Yes I also thought this was a bit odd and didn't know if stuff was sterile so i went old skool and I use mine as a cold water steriliser with Milton tablets! (It's a tommee tippee microwave steriliser so it can be a cold water one too.)