I need to nail down what my daughter is eating for daycare so how do I keep my supply up while doing it? She's on no schedule at home but I work and daycare is over feeding her (I assume) and I need to know for sure before I feel confident telling them they can only give her x ounces every 3-4 hours. At home she starts the day around 6 and goes to bed about 8. She eats once over night normally around 3 or 4 and then eats at 6 and starts the day. So should I pump at 6, 9:30, 12, 2:30, 6, 9 and 3 or is there a better suggestion? She'll be 12 weeks Thursday!
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How old is your LO?
I think that’s fine you just need to get as many pumps in as you can for the first 12 weeks I believe to establish supply.
Here is what mine looked like
A few days… maybe a week
12am (midnight), 3am, 6am, 9am, 12pm(noon), 3pm, 6pm, 9pmThis schedule went out of the window though and I was just trying to get 8 pumps in every 2-3 hours for the first few weeks. It was all over the place because I was just trying to stuff done and have time to pump.
At about week 3 I went down to 7 and this is what it looked like for me
5am, 8am, 11am, 2pm, 5pm, 8pm and 11pmThis still killed me so I believe at 1.5 months I just went down to 6 and never looked back which looked like
5am, 9am, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm and 11pmThen when my milk established at 12 weeks or so… I went down to 5 pump
I have always gotten around 26-32 ozs a day though if that helps.
I do only 4 pumps at 6.5 months with about 27 ozs a day. I hope to go down to 3 pumps sometime soon.
BTW I hate pumping.
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@Raindrop: she'll be 12 weeks on Thursday! Bahaha, I'm not really a fan of pumping either but I've got to figure out what she's eating so daycare will stop overfeeding her
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Pumping output isn't an indication of what she takes from the breast. I always followed the 1-1.5 oz per hour I'm gone rule and never had an issue. She never took more than 12 oz in a 10 hour day. I left 3 oz frozen at daycare as backup for the first few weeks until I was comfortable we had it down. Teach them about paced bottle feeding if they aren't aware.
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I always followed the 1-1.5 oz for every hour she was away from me and it worked out well. At one point, she was taking 15 oz in eight hours, but that went down once we started solids and offered water at meals.
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Ditto Catomdoo. Every baby is different, but my LO (12 weeks) is taking three 3.5-4oz bottles while at daycare (8am-5:30pm), and we have about 5 nursing sessions a day. Have you checked out Kellymom.com? In general it says EBF babies take about 25oz in a day, so divide that by how many feedings you have to get how many ounces per feeding. Here's a link... http://kellymom.com/bf/pumpingmoms/pumping/milkcalc/
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How much are they feeding her that you think is too much?
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@catomd00: @LC: she took 6oz at 8 and noon and was breastfed at 6am today. I really believe she is probably being overfed but I do not feel comfortable asking my daycare provider to cut back what she's eating unless I know for sure that she doesn't need 6 oz every 4 hours. My daughter is small for her age and was super duper fussy all weekend, at the breast, so maybe my supply is not where it needs to be. I know pumping isn't a good indication of what she gets at the breast but I need to check this somehow and so pumping for a week is my plan, I just want to make sure I can still breastfeed next week
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@jetsa: wow you have been doing this for 12 weeks already... you go girl!
ditto what catomd00 said.
My pedi told me once that's hard to over feed a baby... though I have since read that it is possible.
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@Truth Bombs: we breastfed at 6am and she was fed 6 oz at 8:15 and 12:15. The daycare provider says she stops to burp every ounce and she is still sucking, LO is a binky baby and I think she is just misinterpreting her clues but because she is small I want to take a week and determine what she needs. She was also breastfed exclusively friday-monday and was crazy fussy. She's in a wonder week but idk.
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6 ounces every 4 hours doesn't seem crazy high (1.5 ounces per hour). For most of her infancy my LO took 4 ounces every 3 hours (1.34 ounces per hour). But the fact that she took 6 ounces two hours after nursing does seem like too much. If they could push that feeding back and have her take 6 ounces at 10 and at 2 that would seem more reasonable. Or bump it to 4 ounces at 9, 12 and 3
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@jetsa: Still sucking isn't a fair indicator for all babies. My kid would suck down 10 ounces in a bottle if you let her. That whole "babies won't overeat" didn't apply to her.
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@avivoca: Yeah, Jack always took 3 - 5oz bottles while I was gone and I made just enough, 3 - 6 oz bottles I'll never be able to sustain. I currently pump 12-13 ounces a day. Wondering if she's getting enough is my least favorite part of nursing especially since she is small, Jack was always big so I assumed he was fine lol.
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@jetsa: If it makes you feel better, H was always small too (still is) but is following her own curve just fine and meeting all of her milestones.
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@Truth Bombs: Exactly, last week she took 6 ounces at 10 and 2 and I was fine with that. I agree that sucking is not an indication of being hungry my first son would eat until you stopped feeding him. LO2 does not tend to be that way but I wonder if the wonder week does not just have her wanting to be held and daycare is missing that cue.
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@avivoca: being small mentally screws with me for some reason. If J hadn't always been a giant maybe I would not feel that way but who knows. J is and always has been in the 95th percentile, D is in the 25th her pedi isn't concerned but I worry.
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My son at 12 weeks was on somewhere between 5-6 bottles a day. When it was 6 bottles, it was 5oz each. When it was 5 bottles, 6oz each. Same amount overall - 30oz a day. He went to bed at 730pm but we had a dreamfeed at 1030pm and he slept overnight until 730am. I was able to pump 24-26oz a day and supplemented 1 formula bottle a day. I was doing 5-6 pumping sessions a day at 30 minutes each with aggressive massaging bc I didn't have great supply. I was eventually (by 4 months?) able to figure out my "magic number" which was 4 sessions a day at 25 minutes per session except for the first and last pump - I pumped the full at 30 to empty myself out as much as possible and then the same at bedtime to be comfortable. At that schedule, I was able to make the same amount as pumping 6 times a day. I was pumping at 730am while DH fed DS, then at 1230pm, then at 5pm, then before bed around 10-1030pm.
By the time he was 5-6 months his intake went down and he settled at 24 ounces a day until 9.5-10 months when he went down to about 16-18oz. He's 11 months now and we're at like 12-16oz a day, but he's not super into his milk.
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I actually just stopped in the infant room of our day care when I picked up my son today and asked the teacher what the "standard" is for a b'fed baby. She said she would start with 4oz bottles every 3 hours and adjust as seems necessary depending on whether she's finishing them or not. I obviously have no idea yet if that will work for DD (she starts 8/31), but she said that's the average they see.
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I think you should just play around with her bottles instead of trying to EP for a whole week. That could really mess with your supply, her intake, your BF relationship.
4 hours sounds like a really long time in between feedings for 12 week old. I would start with trying 4 ounces every 3 hours and see how she does. If she's not getting enough, she'll let you know by waking more at night or wanting to nurse more when you're with her.
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@jetsa: our ped suggested 6 oz bottles for T. If he has a 4 oz at home, he eats again very shortly after. You'll find your sweet spot!
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@blackbird: how often does he eat? I wouldn't mind the 6 oz bottles but I can't keep up. Jack was a solid 15oz starting at like 4 months.
@kiddosc: yeah I'm just going to ask her to cap the feedings at 4 oz and we can reevaluate at the end of the week.
All you EP mamas are my heros, I love breastfeeding but I'm not cut out to pump. Today sis decided she needed to eat and LO1 started screaming while I was pumping.
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@jetsa: oh I dunno yet! I go back to work next Friday and DH is going to try to figure it out. I have no idea what we're doing yet.
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