So, I've always read that your breast milk changes as LO gets older.. but this kind of worries me. I've been building a freezer stash for the past 4-5 months. I try to cycle through it, but I still have some milk from December. If I give my daughter frozen milk, does that mean she wont gain as much weight because there isn't enough fat in the milk??
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just mix half of it with your current milk. that's what i did!
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In a deep freezer the milk only stays for six months. So I would start using some of that frozen stuff and then freezing the fresh stuff.
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@Mrs. Bee: What about when you stopped pumping?? I'm hoping to pump for a full year then use the freezer stash in addition to cows milk, but what if I don't make to a year?? If I feed exclusively from the stash will she not get enough??
LO is almost 6 mo. old if this helps..
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I wouldn't worry unless you are giving her 100% old frozen milk. My LO gets frozen milk on Mondays and fresh the rest of the week and is thriving.
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@LaineysMom: if it were me, i wouldn't worry about it. she will get nutrients from solids as well.
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@LaineysMom: if you start using frozen it will keep it more up to date. So the stuff you have now was from when she was 2-3 months old. Start using that and freezing the pumped milk now. (6months).
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@T.H.O.U.: I've been cycling through it and have been able to use about 150 oz., but it's kind of a pain in the butt. I have all if my milk in a chest freezer, so the CDC and LLL say I have up to a year. I'm not really concerned with it been spoiled, just concerned with it not having enough fat.
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@T.H.O.U.: You replied 19 seconds before me!
I started pumping when she was 1 week old because she had to be readmitted to the NICU. I've cycled through all of my October, November, and half of the December milk. She gets one bottle of frozen milk every couple of days when I feel like loading a couple of bottles with milksicles.. She's been gaining weight well with this plan, I'm more worried about if/when we have to start feeding exclusively from the stash. Our ped appointments will be every 3 months after her 6 mo. visit, so I'm worried I wont know how much she's gaining.
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@mamabolt: This is what I'm worried about..
Not yet, but maybe in the future..@Mrs. Bee: Thanks for the reassurance. I think I need to ask her ped about it in a couple of weeks..
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@LaineysMom: we stored ours in the deep freezer kept at -4 for a year per the CDC/LLLI guidelines with no problems!
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can you give her frozen milk more often (1 bottle a day) so that you can cycle through the older stuff?
you can always get a scale if you're worried about weight gain.
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@Mrs. Bee: that's probably what I should try to do.. I'm just so lazy.
Defrosting frozen milk means more fresh milk, which means more bottles to wash and more milk to freeze. Haha. Can you tell I'm so over this exclusively pumping thing? -
@anbanan15: thanks! I'll double check to make sure ours is set that low.
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@LaineysMom: you can also ask if you can stop in for a weighing at the doctors office. Usually they don't mind if you ask to use the scale.
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@T.H.O.U.: thanks for the suggestion! That sounds like a good idea.
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If anything it works the other way around - the early milk would be the fattiest ...
"Also, the fat content of mother's milk changes as the baby grows. The older infant needs fewer calories per pound of body weight than does the younger one, so by a wonderful quirk of nature, the level of fat in mother's milk gradually decreases to lower levels in the second half of the first year." Quotation from Sears' "The Breastfeeding Book,"
I started pumping when she was 1 week old because she had to be readmitted to the NICU. I've cycled through all of my October, November, and half of the December milk. She gets one bottle of frozen milk every couple of days when I feel like loading a couple of bottles with milksicles.. She's been gaining weight well with this plan, I'm more worried about if/when we have to start feeding exclusively from the stash. Our ped appointments will be every 3 months after her 6 mo. visit, so I'm worried I wont know how much she's gaining.
Not yet, but maybe in the future..
Defrosting frozen milk means more fresh milk, which means more bottles to wash and more milk to freeze. Haha. Can you tell I'm so over this exclusively pumping thing? Reply
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16 comments