I bf on demand, but I'm going back to work in 4 weeks and I have no idea how much I should plan for bottles at school and how many pumping sessions I'll need. Any ideas/guidelines? My LO will be 8 weeks old when I go back to work.
I bf on demand, but I'm going back to work in 4 weeks and I have no idea how much I should plan for bottles at school and how many pumping sessions I'll need. Any ideas/guidelines? My LO will be 8 weeks old when I go back to work.
pomegranate / 3595 posts
@ktdid23: My pediatrician said to assume 2oz + 1oz for every month of age per feeding. So in your case I would aim for 4 oz bottles. Hopefully by then LO is on a sort of schedule and you should pump for each feeding you miss. We did bottles around 10 and 2 so I pumped then and fed right before drop off and right after pickup.
Kelly mom is probably a good resource too. They said eventually breastfed babies stabilize the number of ounces they need so I sent 5 oz bottles at 3 months and then 5 1/2 oz bottles the rest of the year. Good luck!
apricot / 425 posts
@MamaCate: awesome, thank you! I work in a preschool, so I am trying to figure out how many times I will be able to pump and I'm going to try to work around that (and see what my output is ) so that I can continue to provide breast
milk for as long as possible.
wonderful clementine / 24134 posts
@ktdid23: during the hours you are gone take note how many times you nurse. That should about be the number of pumping a/bottles needed.
persimmon / 1129 posts
@ktdid23: I went back to work at 12 weeks pp. I work from 7:30 to 5:00. The first week, I tried to do 4 pumping sessions a day but that was just too much. I felt like I was spending my entire day pumping. I ended up nursing in the morning, then pumping at 9, noon, and 3, then nursing as soon as I got home. You just have to sort of play around with the schedule and number of sessions to see what works for you. Eventually I dropped to 2 pumping sessions a day when my daughter started solids.
As far as the amount, if you're sending frozen milk, one piece of advice that was helpful for me was to send a few one ounce bags in addition to whatever else you sent. Our daycare had very strict rules that if she didn't finish a bottle, they had to dump it. The first weeks, I sent 3 ounce bottles with a few one and two ounce bags, so if she needed more, they could just 'top her off' without wasting a whole bottle. During those first weeks, we figured out how much she was eating at each feeding and didn't need to do the little bags anymore. She ended up taking 4.5 ounce bottles three times a day, but I'd always send 4 bottles just in case.
nectarine / 2210 posts
When I went back to work she was 10 weeks old. She was drinking 4 4-oz bottles, although I always send a 5th one just in case. At 4 months we went to 4.5 ounces and that's where we still are just before 5 months.
eggplant / 11716 posts
@ktdid23: I work in a middle school and I can't just pump whenever--I could only pump on my planning period and at lunch. Luckily, my planning period was around 9 am, and my lunch was around 12:30, so that worked out.
I started out pumping at 9, 12:30, and then after 3 pm during my commute home...after a couple of months of that, I dropped down to just pumping on my lunch (but started doing lunch earlier, at 11:30) and pumping on my way home.
apricot / 425 posts
@T.H.O.U.: awesome, I figured as much. I'm just not sure how much to put in the bottles. If I'm pumping, I can get 4-5 oz per side each session, but I know he doesn't take that much if I'm nursing....
apricot / 425 posts
@My Only Sunshine: great idea! I will have to send the bottles ready to feed, but I do have a few smaller bottles that I can send an oz or two in!
wonderful kiwi / 23653 posts
I leave 12-14 oz total when I'm at work so she would eat 4oz 3 times. Sometimes she eats less, sometimes more. She is 5 mo now and has never ate more than 5 and has drank as lil as 2.
apricot / 425 posts
@Miss Ariel: Thanks for the response!! That gives me a good idea of what to plan for.
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