Middle of the night pumping pals

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I'm starting to wonder if it's the oatmeal that does it. I have oats for breakfast every morning, and this week for some reason I put twice as much oatmeal in my smoothie as I normally do :dohh: so I wonder if that's why I'm getting such a great output in the morning and so little as the day goes on. I managed to squeeze out another 3 oz combined in the next two pumping sessions yesterday and 1 oz after putting DD to bed. I say squeeze out because I imagine it like wringing that last bit of water out of a wet washcloth. :haha: Funny visual for something like boobs, but it seems like it's that much of a struggle.
 
Oatmeal DEFINITELY does it. When I have oatmeal breakfast bars I notice a difference.

Glad to hear it is going well!

So DS has been biting. Last night and this morning. I hope this doesn't last, I don't want to exclusively pump if I don't have to. But I am not going to be a chew toy! That hurts!!!
 
Ouch!! Have you tried anything to get him to stop biting?

I had a normal single-serving banana oat smoothie this morning, so we'll see how today goes. It made me laugh when I realized I was eating a double serving of oatmeal. :haha: That's a lot of oats! Maybe my supply doesn't respond much to normal servings, just to insane amounts. I wonder what fenugreek does in high doses...
 
Well, I am afraid I messed up today :( Didn't pump last night. Pumped after her morning feed at 7am, then had a Dr. apt, DH watched her and have her a bottle then we had running around to do and she didn't want to nurse until 1! That was 8 hours one empty and then 6 hours between emptying :( I hope I haven't slowed myself down too bad.
 
You should be fine kaja. I've had a couple of similar nights lately! Last night I was confused by my alarm, turned it off, then got up later and pumped, it had been 7 hours!! Then went 5.5 after that! But it looks like 1 day didn't make a difference. I think our bodies don't adjust until our whole habit changes.

DS has been sleeping through the night again for a few nights! So we must be through the spurt. Though he just woke up and nursed. We were out at graduation parties and he didn't end up going to sleep until 9:30 or so! Super late for him. And as a result, he is sleeping crappier!

Also, random, but I just turned my TV on while pumping (after he nursed) which I NEVER do because I don't want to get sucked in, and it was in for 10 minutes and then said "will power down now for updates" ... really? When I'm actually TRYING to watch it?!?! Lol
 
UGH I wish DD would go to sleep before 9:30! I don't want to leave her to cry it out, but I'm starting to fear that may be the only way to get her to go to bed earlier. Even if she's sleeping, if I try to put her in her bassinet before 9:30 she wakes up immediately. Any tips? Most of what I've read says to establish a calming bedtime routine, but baths get her all excited and previously she hasn't been interested in books. She just wants to eat! I know it would be better for both of us if she went to bed earlier, but nothing I've tried has worked so far.

I haven't pumped at night in a long time, sadly! Mostly because of the issues getting her to bed at a decent time and I just give up and try to get some sleep in the recliner before it's midnight. I think it was about 10 last night when I put her to bed and called my mom and she woke up about 10 minutes later. She was wide awake for a while and it took some time to get her back to sleep. Part of me is hoping if I can get this whole supply thing worked out maybe she'll sleep better? I'd love a milk drunk passed out baby right about now!
 
I don't think DS started going to sleep before 9:30 until he was about 5 months or so. That is when we finally got into the routine. The bath does help him, even though he loves baths and gets excited too. Once he gets out he gets in jammies and has a bottle and usually falls alseep while eating. But we only do baths 2-3 times a week.

Most people think "keep them up during the day and they will sleep well" no. Not at all. More sleep = more sleep. At least with DS (me also) and other babies I know. More naps equal better and more sleep at night too. Tired babies fight sleep for some reason.

She will get there. Soon I'm sure! Hang in there!!
 
Oh, I hope so! We only do baths once a week unless she gets particularly dirty. She always falls asleep eating no matter what time of day it is, so I don't think there's any chance of changing that being the bedtime routine. Although that really only applies to breastfeeding. She doesn't fall asleep bottle feeding, but that's not surprising. Breastfeeding is warm and comfy and releases all those sleepy hormones, so it seems only natural to me that that's how she likes to go to sleep. And it's really not surprising that she wakes up when the warm comfy boob is gone. :haha: I just wish that last attempt to put her to bed when she finally doesn't wake up would come a little earlier! Then I might have time to do things like dishes and cleaning without sacrificing sleep to do it. I've only done that twice because I was so desperate to not have dirty dishes piled everywhere. I always feel so much more on top of things in the morning when I can get everything prepped for the next day before I go to bed. And I feel guilty sending her to the sitter's the next day with 3-4 oz less than I could have if I had pumped at night.
 
Annalise rarely goes to bed before 10pm, I am mostly done with it though because I can rarely get to sleep before 11pm anyways
 
Unfortunately nothing new to report here. I haven't slept in my bed in nearly two weeks now and no night pumping. :(
 
DS either sleeps through the night completely or wakes every 2-3 hours... no inbetween really. I did make DH feed him this morning, not sure what time, I pumped and finished around 2:30... so it was sometime after that.
 
If only we could count on babies for consistency!
 
Well I usually do my night pump about now, but DD has been cluster feeding all evening! Like 7pm to about 10 minutes ago. Yep, that is four hours of couch lock! Must be that 3 month growth spurt. :)
 
Oh Kaja.... I feel for you. Those are some hard and rough nights. I hope you get through it quick! Those times are just no fun!
 
Strangely enough, she didn't cluster feed tonight. We were at a friend's house for the 4th and she was enjoying the new sights. She nursed some when we were watching fireworks and again when we got home. I pumped after she went out and only got an oz between both. I wish I could know how much she eats when she nurses! My pump output at work has been bad the last few days (was home today so I don't know if last night's cluster feeding hosted anything or not) and I worry about only getting an oz this time, but she did nurse on both sides for about 15min on one and 10 min on the other so an oz right after might not be bad.
 
Gotta love cluster feeding! Although with my supply issues cluster feeding for me just means a fussy baby and more formula.

It seems a few of DD's reflux issues may be returning. We're starting her back on the nat phos today to see if that helps things. She isn't spitting up more than normal or having trouble sleeping (other than not sleeping very well at night when she isn't on me! But her naps are fine and she isn't waking every 30 mins or so), but the past couple of nights she has been crying when she wakes at night like she's in pain. It was twice last night, once sometime after 2 am and once around 4:45. She was going to sleep last night at a decent time, but then at 10:00 just decided it was time to be awake! It was probably around 11:30 when I convinced her it was time to settle down and go to sleep, but then she just started crying. For some reason breastfeeding works well lately in one chair with the boppy pillow, but not the other chair we usually use. So I moved to the other chair and she latched on and ate some, but then started crying again. When I moved her to my shoulder to burp her, she finally fell asleep. So I got about 2.5 hours of sleep before she woke crying again, then another 2 before she woke up crying again and it was time to get ready for work once she ate (really well thankfully!) and went back to sleep.

We'll see if the nat phos helps her again. If not, it must be something else bothering her. Maybe the fenugreek? It gave both of us gas the last time I tried it, but now something seems to be upsetting both of our stomachs. Oddly enough we aren't gassy and we both seem to be having trouble with constipation. I have a bottle of blessed thistle coming today because I finally started to smell like maple syrup from the fenugreek over the weekend, but I haven't noticed an increase in supply yet. I read that fenugreek seems to work best when paired with blessed thistle, so I'll give it a shot. If it doesn't work, I'll probably finish the fenugreek and blessed thistle I have and call it a day. There isn't really anything else for me to try, so I'll have run out of options at that point.
 
DS will go a night where he sleeps 10 hours, not a peep. Then the last 3 nights every 2-3 hours he wakes up. I hope we figure this out soon!
 
It's so tiring when they wake frequently. I hope he starts to make more of a routine of sleeping 10 hours with an occasional off night instead of the other way around.

DD finally slept in her bassinet 3 hours last night! I think the nat phos is helping, so she must have been having some amount of reflux problems again. They just aren't as severe as they were last time, and even then they weren't too bad! Hopefully this round of nat phos will be it and we won't have to deal with reflux issues again. :) I didn't get back to bed again after that, but if we can spend a few hours in bed before she wakes on a regular basis (preferably earlier in the night, but we were finally sleeping before 11!) I can probably actually keep myself awake so I can get us both back to bed. I even got to pump before I went to bed! I had a great letdown on the left side for the first time in quite a while. I seem to get about 7-15 ml per letdown on that side for some reason and I managed to get abut 20 ml in one letdown! I normally need two letdowns to do that and 3 to get over an ounce.

I need to find some kind of snack that's mostly oats that I can make and eat during the day. I thought about making my own granola bars (the ones you can buy are always made with quick-cooking oats, though there might be an organic brand out there if I want to pay a lot of money), but do you guys have any ideas? Lactation cookies officially do nothing for me. There aren't enough oats to make a difference or enough brewer's yeast or flax per cookie to boost my supply. My banana oat smoothies I've been drinking (I put brewer's yeast and ground flax in these, too), Life cereal, and oatmeal have been the only things that have made a difference so far.
 
For me, Nature Valley Breakfast Biscuits do it!
 
But I hear you on the lactation cookies. Such a waste of time and money those turned out to be! At least they were yummy!
 
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