5wks...better, but more questions! (pumping and child care)

So, Madi is now 5 wks old, and you were all right....we are "over the hump"
and bfing has gotten much better. Thanks to all that replied with help on
the latch issue. It's still not perfect, but better. I found that I needed
to pay more attention to angles....the angle of my nipple in her mouth, and
my tendency to latch her on, then slump down when nursing sitting up in bed.
We've started putting her in her crib in her own room at night (everyone's
snoring was waking up everyone else!) and now I night nurse sitting up in a
rocking chair with way better posture!
So, we've started introducing a bottle and I'm pumping. (just one bottle a
day to get her used to it before going to daycare at 12 wks) I have an Ameda
Purely Yours pump and when I pump in the a.m. can get about 6 oz total in 10
min. Other times of the day it is way, way less (like 0.5oz to 1.5 oz).
1) Is it better to pump often and get small small amounts, or pump less
frequently and get larger amounts? If I pump every 2 hrs or so I get less
than an ounce usually. If I pump in the am or after she's been napping for
a few hours, I get 4-6oz.
2) Freezing increments: I've been freezing some full (6oz) bags from my
morning sessions, and then putting the smaller amounts in an ice cube tray
for consolidation into one bag every other day (still in cube form). At
home, when we defrost a full bag, we feed a little, refrigerate, feed a
little, etc until it's gone (no more than 24 hrs from defrost). Will the
daycare do the same or are there likely to be rules around tossing uneaten
breast milk from each feeding? IE should I be freezing only enough for one
feeding, or is it OK to freeze a whole day's worth at once? I know I could
call them and ask, but I wanted other's experiences and rationales before
doing so in case I need to do some advocating.

Thanks!
Amy

V. wrote:
So, Madi is now 5 wks old, and you were all right....we are "over the
hump" and bfing has gotten much better.

Yay!!

1) Is
it better to pump often and get small small amounts, or pump less
frequently and get larger amounts? If I pump every 2 hrs or so I get
less than an ounce usually. If I pump in the am or after she's been
napping for a few hours, I get 4-6oz.

When I was pumping for a stash I only pumped in the morning and during the
time he got a bottle. It is normal not to be able to pump a lot when you
are pumping around a babies nursing. In my case, the pump output went way
up once I started pumping *in place of* the nursing when I was actually at
work. I started out pumping every 2 hours while at work but I think I
quickly moved to pumping ever 3 hrs. I fed right before I dropped him off
and right after I picked him up. If I was short of milk I pumped right
before I left to pick him up and he just had to work a bit harder for a
feed. :-)

2) Freezing increments: I've
been freezing some full (6oz) bags from my morning sessions, and then
putting the smaller amounts in an ice cube tray for consolidation
into one bag every other day (still in cube form). At home, when we
defrost a full bag, we feed a little, refrigerate, feed a little, etc
until it's gone (no more than 24 hrs from defrost). Will the daycare
do the same or are there likely to be rules around tossing uneaten
breast milk from each feeding?

My unlicensed home care provider saved the bottles in the fridge like you do
as long as she didn't forget them sitting around. My licensed daycare
center used one bottle per feed so I had to send only bottles as big as I
thought he'd drink. When he first started there I sent (he was 9mos
already) 6 ounce bottles for the number of feeds he'd have and then a back
up 2 ounce bottle (which they would send home). He rarely if ever needed
the back up so I quit doing that. He was eating solids then too, which
makes a difference. When I was building a stash I froze in 4-6 ounce
increments which seemed about right.

You also don't have to fiddle around with the ice cube tray if you don't
want to. I just dumped the pumped milk together in a bottle in the fridge
until it was at the amount needed to freeze. I never had a problem with
leaving milk in there three days before freezing. I generally always had
enough at the end of three days.

--
Nikki
Hunter 4/99
Luke 4/01
Thing One and Thing Two :-) EDD 4/06

V. writes:
: Will the
: daycare do the same or are there likely to be rules around tossing uneaten
: breast milk from each feeding? IE should I be freezing only enough for one
: feeding, or is it OK to freeze a whole day's worth at once? I know I could
: call them and ask, but I wanted other's experiences and rationales before
: doing so in case I need to do some advocating.

: Thanks!
: Amy

They will often have rules saying that a bottle must be comsumed within
a specific time frame. In any case, I would not recommned freeding more
than 3 to 4 oz at a time.

Larry

V. wrote:
So, Madi is now 5 wks old, and you were all right....we are "over the hump"
and bfing has gotten much better.
Yay!

So, we've started introducing a bottle and I'm pumping. (just one bottle a
day to get her used to it before going to daycare at 12 wks) I have an Ameda
Purely Yours pump and when I pump in the a.m. can get about 6 oz total in 10
min. Other times of the day it is way, way less (like 0.5oz to 1.5 oz).
1) Is it better to pump often and get small small amounts, or pump less
frequently and get larger amounts? If I pump every 2 hrs or so I get less
than an ounce usually. If I pump in the am or after she's been napping for
a few hours, I get 4-6oz.

I'm not sure if it really matters healthwise - more a convenience
issue, I would think. Someone else may have better information.
Personally, I'd rather pump a lot at once than several times for the
same amount, just for the hassle issue. I suppose there could be
foremilk/hindmilk proportion issues, but I'm not sure if that really
makes much of a difference. Anyone?

2) Freezing increments: I've been freezing some full (6oz) bags from my
morning sessions, and then putting the smaller amounts in an ice cube tray
for consolidation into one bag every other day (still in cube form). At
home, when we defrost a full bag, we feed a little, refrigerate, feed a
little, etc until it's gone (no more than 24 hrs from defrost). Will the
daycare do the same or are there likely to be rules around tossing uneaten
breast milk from each feeding? IE should I be freezing only enough for one
feeding, or is it OK to freeze a whole day's worth at once? I know I could
call them and ask, but I wanted other's experiences and rationales before
doing so in case I need to do some advocating.

I've only done licensed home-based daycare while pumping, and I know
she would put bottles back in the fridge. She would also let me just
give her the bags. I know at least some of the centers I looked at
would make me prepare bottles ahead of time.

I tended to prefer using smaller bags, so that there wouldn't be a lot
dumped if there was extra, esp. since neither kid really liked bottles
that much. Tho after they were older (4 months or so?) I would mainly
give 4-6 oz bags to daycare. I tried to keep smaller bags at home,
since neither kid took bottles as well from anyone else, and anything
larger than 2-3 oz just would get tossed by dh or a babysitter.

Definitely a ymmv sort of thing, and fine tune as you go. It will
also depend of course on the daycare's policy, as you realize.

Irene

Amy:

Glad to know that things have improved! In no time, nursing will be so
easy, you will hardly know you're doing it!

I would stick with pumping once in the morning, if you are getting the
most at that time. Also, have you tried pumping on one side while
nursing on the other? That worked for me. Also, if my child took a
long nap, and I felt especially full or engorged, I would pump. I'd get
a good amount then, too.

If using the milk for home use, I would save it in the smallest
increments (for a 5 week old)...2-3 oz. I would freeze the milk in per
feeding increments (whatever it may be for that age), when saving for
your daycare stash (though I stay at home, so I don't know from
first-hand experience). It's been my rule, though, to freeze the milk
in the smallest increments necessary, since I hate wasting precious milk.

I don't know what method you're using to contain the milk, but I found
it really convenient to put the milk into the lansinoh or gerber zip-loc
plastic baggies, and freeze flat. That could then be poured into a
bottle, or (as I chose) put them into a disposable style bottle. That
made it really easy for clean-up. The baggies thaw/warm up so fast
too...just under running water.

You're doing great!

Annie


V. wrote:
So, Madi is now 5 wks old, and you were all right....we are "over the hump"
and bfing has gotten much better. Thanks to all that replied with help on
the latch issue. It's still not perfect, but better. I found that I needed
to pay more attention to angles....the angle of my nipple in her mouth, and
my tendency to latch her on, then slump down when nursing sitting up in bed.
We've started putting her in her crib in her own room at night (everyone's
snoring was waking up everyone else!) and now I night nurse sitting up in a
rocking chair with way better posture!
So, we've started introducing a bottle and I'm pumping. (just one bottle a
day to get her used to it before going to daycare at 12 wks) I have an Ameda
Purely Yours pump and when I pump in the a.m. can get about 6 oz total in 10
min. Other times of the day it is way, way less (like 0.5oz to 1.5 oz).
1) Is it better to pump often and get small small amounts, or pump less
frequently and get larger amounts? If I pump every 2 hrs or so I get less
than an ounce usually. If I pump in the am or after she's been napping for
a few hours, I get 4-6oz.
2) Freezing increments: I've been freezing some full (6oz) bags from my
morning sessions, and then putting the smaller amounts in an ice cube tray
for consolidation into one bag every other day (still in cube form). At
home, when we defrost a full bag, we feed a little, refrigerate, feed a
little, etc until it's gone (no more than 24 hrs from defrost). Will the
daycare do the same or are there likely to be rules around tossing uneaten
breast milk from each feeding? IE should I be freezing only enough for one
feeding, or is it OK to freeze a whole day's worth at once? I know I could
call them and ask, but I wanted other's experiences and rationales before
doing so in case I need to do some advocating.

Thanks!
Amy

V. wrote:
So, Madi is now 5 wks old, and you were all right....we are "over the hump"
and bfing has gotten much better.

Yeah!

So, we've started introducing a bottle and I'm pumping. (just one bottle a
day to get her used to it before going to daycare at 12 wks) I have an Ameda
Purely Yours pump and when I pump in the a.m. can get about 6 oz total in 10
min. Other times of the day it is way, way less (like 0.5oz to 1.5 oz).
1) Is it better to pump often and get small small amounts, or pump less
frequently and get larger amounts? If I pump every 2 hrs or so I get less
than an ounce usually. If I pump in the am or after she's been napping for
a few hours, I get 4-6oz.

When I was building my stash and doing practice bottles, I just pumped
once a day in the morning. I tried to time it so that she wouldn't
want to nurse right away, but long enough from the previous feed so
that I'd get something.

2) Freezing increments: I've been freezing some full (6oz) bags from my
morning sessions, and then putting the smaller amounts in an ice cube tray
for consolidation into one bag every other day (still in cube form). At
home, when we defrost a full bag, we feed a little, refrigerate, feed a
little, etc until it's gone (no more than 24 hrs from defrost). Will the
daycare do the same or are there likely to be rules around tossing uneaten
breast milk from each feeding? IE should I be freezing only enough for one
feeding, or is it OK to freeze a whole day's worth at once? I know I could
call them and ask, but I wanted other's experiences and rationales before
doing so in case I need to do some advocating.

My daycare's rules were that I had to bring in made up bottles each day.
I was able to keep a frozen bag in the freezer for an emergency, but
they never used it. My daughter(s) rarely took more than 4 ounces from
a bottle (both were bottle fed while I worked until 12 months), but
YMMV- some kids will go to 6 ounce bottles at some point. The rule at
our daycare for both formula and breastmilk bottles, was once a bottle
was started, it had to be used within an hour or else it was tossed, so
I was better off sending smaller bottles (I'd send 2-3, 4 ounce
and one 2 ounce bottle, so that if they wanted to give a bit extra
they could use the 2 ounce bottle. Rarely did they ever use it.

I usually used the milk I pumped at work for the next day's bottle.
I froze Friday's milk and Monday morning thawed Monday's milk. Thawed
milk is only good for 24 hours, so I usually froze my milk in 2 or 4
ounce bags. Then one bag was good for one bottle. When pumping, I'd
put all my milk in the fridge and if I was going to freeze it, combine
it from all pumping sessions and then freeze in my 2 or 4 ounce bags
(I liked the lanisoh zip lock bags, you can lay them flat and they
take up less room).

Mary W.

"V." wrote and I snipped:
So, Madi is now 5 wks old, and you were all right....we are "over the
hump" and bfing has gotten much better.

Yay! Keep working on it!

So, we've started introducing a bottle and I'm pumping. (just one bottle
a day to get her used to it before going to daycare at 12 wks) I have an
Ameda Purely Yours pump and when I pump in the a.m. can get about 6 oz
total in 10 min. Other times of the day it is way, way less (like 0.5oz
to 1.5 oz).

You don't really have to do a bottle a day, but it probably won't hurt. It
can be every 2 to 3 days, if you'd prefer. The thing with having a small
baby keep in practice using a bottle is that it can just be about 2 oz. It
doesn't have to be an entire feed.

1) Is it better to pump often and get small small amounts, or pump less
frequently and get larger amounts? If I pump every 2 hrs or so I get less
than an ounce usually. If I pump in the am or after she's been napping
for a few hours, I get 4-6oz.

I've heard that it's good to pump at the same time every day to build up a
freezer stash before going back to work. So, if you pump every morning AND
you want to give a bottle every day, then keep out about 2-3 oz for that
day's bottle, and freeze whatever is left over, no matter how much or how
little it is. Then, don't worry about pumping until the next morning.

2) Freezing increments: I've been freezing some full (6oz) bags from my
morning sessions, and then putting the smaller amounts in an ice cube tray
for consolidation into one bag every other day (still in cube form).

It's probably best to freeze in bags with 2 or 3 oz in each. You need to
label them with the date, so you can use the oldest first when the time
comes. So, if you have 4 oz leftover from pumping in the morning, freeze 2
2-oz bags. If it's more, you can have a mix of 2- and 3-oz bags.

When you're back at work, you're likely to use the fresh milk you just
pumped one day to send to child care on the next, to be supplemented with
frozen milk when you have a low-producing day. I would freeze my pumped
milk on Fridays and send the oldest frozen milk (thawed and made into
bottles) on Mondays.

HTH,
-Patty, mom of 1+2