Hellobee Boards

haha, this is great! Xander drinks BM, so here are the rules that we follow (that I can remember off the top of my head)

- If baby started a bottle and didn't finish it, we leave it out (room temp) and offer at next feeding or toss it. We don't re-refrigerate/rewarm.
- Only store in fridge for up to 8 days (then use or toss (or transfer to the freezer, muahaha))
- Use thawed milk within 24 hours (or 48 if baby didn't drink it when he was supposed to!!)

Not sure about these "rules" but I do these:

- Pump directly into already refrigerated milk
- Transfer milk that's been in the fridge for 6 days to the freezer (haha, I know, so bad, but hasn't hurt Xander yet!)
- Give thawed milk more than 24 hours after thawing (If Xander doesn't drink it the day it's thawed, I'll give it the next day)
- Store frozen milk in freezer door (I know, so bad, but I do this)

We haven't fed formula but I would say I'm relatively lax about breast milk so long as it passes the sniff test. I do try to freeze as soon as possible if I know I'm going to be freezing the milk, and use any thawed frozen within 24 hours.

We go two hours on formula and then dump or refrigerate.

When we used bm I didn't know I wasn't supposed to reuse it, so we did because supply was limited. He's fine.

We don't give her a lot of bottles, but when we do, if she starts a bottle if breastmilk and doesn't finish, I will save it for the next feeding (like, 5 hours max I guess). I do put it back in the fridge- wonder if I shouldn't?

I use or freeze within four days of pumping, don't pump into refrigerated milk (never pump more than once a day, otherwise I probably would). I keep the milk in the bak and bottom of the freezer, but we don't go through it quickly so I feel it's more important than if we cycled through it faster. An I rarely sterilize the pump parts and bottles- just wash with hot soapy water.

But she gets maybe a couple of bottles a week so I might be different if it was more.

We're entirely BM. I'm very strict but only because I had a good oversupply going for a few months that gave me a large freezer stash - so if in doubt I don't feel too sad about throwing out. The only rule I'm somewhat lax on is rewarming since I'm not really clear on the rules there - I'll rewarm within an hour or so of initial warming if I jumped the gun on bottle prep or if baby barely drank any.

For some reason I trust BM more than formula so I will let M finish bottles of BM over a few hours whereas I am strict with the 1 hour limit of half-finished formula. I also don't have a problem with letting BM sit out at room temp for 8 hours (although it has never lasted that long with my hungry girl). But with formula I follow the rule of not letting an untouched bottle sit out warm for more than 2 hours. I never reheat BM or formula or put either back in the fridge. I add fresh pumped milk to already cold fridge milk. I freeze after a few days in the fridge. Haven't used any freezer stash yet but BM is liquid gold in this house so assuming it passed the sniff test I'd probably use thawed (refrigerated) milk a little longer than 24 hours if she hadn't finished yet.

I followed the rules, I'm a crazy person when it comes to expiration dates on everything so I'm not going to risk it with my child's formula/milk! (disclaimer, she also had vast stomach issues and vomitted a lot so I was always very careful of what she ingested!)

@kjpugs: Ugh - I feel ya about the low supply. At 5 months I was pumping 4 oz total after pumping for 6 hours a day - that's not even a full bottle for her!!! I have nightmares about pumping now...

I was pretty much lax on all the BM rules, but really strict about the formula rules. If formula has been sitting out for even just 30 minutes, it starts to smell a little funky to me

I'm pretty lax on the BM rules. The only thing I really adhere to is using thawed within 24 hours. I also don't add frozen milk to fresh milk (is that even a thing?). But yeah....

I transfer BM from fridge to freezer after 3-4 days.
I pump directly into chilled milk.
I leave BM sit out at room temp for 6-8 hours.

@T.H.O.U.: i wouldn't feel the least bit bad about feeding her milk that had been outside in the cold all night! if it makes you feel better, i was a breastfeeding conference (NMC) a few years ago & when they were going over the 'rules', we were told that the reason it's 'ten hours at room temp' is because when they were testing the breast milk, it was done when the lab opened, then it was left all day and at the end of the ten hour day, it had less bacteria than it had when it was first pumped in the morning! they made the cut off ten hours because the lab was closing, no one was there to test past that. if it can last that long at room temp (up to 72 degrees) and have less bacteria, i'm sure 12hrs in the cold was perfectly safe! at 60 degrees, it is still considered good for 24hrs. human milk is so cool! (yea, i'm a dork, but nature is pure genius)

@Anagram: i love that you donated your extra milk! what a beautiful gift you've given! my mom was a nurse in the nursery when my brother & i were babies & would letdown every time the babies cried (poor mama!), luckily they had pumps she could use & she donated what she pumped while she was at work. i love to hear about women helping others by donating their breast milk!