Breastfeeding

Got sick/Supply went down

I have never been one of those fortunate people that produce a lot of milk. I have to work HARD for what I get out. I nurse on demand drink until I pee every 30 minutes, eat all the recommended food, and take all my vitamins. I went back to work 11 weeks after DD was born and pumped as often as I could to make sure my body kept up. I finally started producing enough to keep up with LO's appetite and was getting about 10 oz a day at work! Well over the weekend I got pretty sick and now I am lucky if I produce 6 oz in the day and I'm having to supplement with formula. I power pumped twice yesterday and am nursing on demand.  I feel like I'm doing everything I can and I'm getting to the point where I may ask my Dr for some Reglan(sp?) to up the supply, but I know that's only a temporary solution. Is breastfeeding ending for me?  I am at a loss.

Re: Got sick/Supply went down

  • blansawblansaw member
    edited April 2016
    For working moms, how many ounces do you take home each day?
  • It's common to have a supply dip when you're sick. Definitely frustrating! Keep doing what you're doing, and your supply should rebound soon. Even if your supply doesn't quite rebound for whatever reason, you could continue nursing and supplementing if that's what works best for you. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. 
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  • delujm0delujm0 member
    blansaw said:
    For working moms, how many ounces do you take home each day?
    Depends.  At first, when I pumped at work 3x/day (and was having oversupply issues) I was bringing home 15-18oz.  When I recalibrated and dropped to pumping twice a day at work I was getting between 8-12oz.  I dealt with a mastitis related supply drop about 6 weeks ago, and then dropped to pumping once a day at work (DD is 10 months now) and now I will bring home 5-8oz usually.

    DH is on morning shift, so I also pump when I first wake up...as DD gets older (and after the mastitis) I get less and less then too.  Used to be a solid 10-14oz at that sitting but I now get 8-10.  My previous oversupply left me with a decent freezer stash though, so I should be good to get to a year even though I'm operating at a deficit now.

    Should probably note that DD is a big eater and generally takes 24-32oz of bottles/day (and nurses twice in the evening) so good thing I produce a lot.
  • I had this recently too. I will admit that I've always had really great supply though. To get things flowing again I drank five cups of Mother's Milk tea per day, hydrated like crazy, and literally spent one whole day in bed nursing on demand. Even if he was just comfort suckling I'd let him have at it to stimulate production. It worked really well, but take care of your nipples. I was a little sore for a couple days following. 
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  • I had supply issues as well from the beginning. It was steadily decreasing already when my sickness hit (a bad flu) and my production never recovered. :( I tried for 2 weeks post-flu but I was only getting about an ounce from each pumping session. LO was 9 months at the time so I decided to throw in the towel. I hope that's not the case for you! I agree with PPs that if you keep power pumping and keep baby on the boob as much as possible, it should go back up eventually.
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