advice on supplementing

kwilson158

Hey ladies,

I have been thinking of supplementing along with my BM because I am afraid my supply may be dropping...  lo has 3 four ounces bottle during the day and nurses at night...I use to be able to pump an extra bottle for his  just in case bottle at daycare and now it sometimes seems to be a struggle to get his 3 must have bottles? If I choose to supplement to try and build up my supply how do i do it?? Can I mix formula & my  BM in same bottle??? Or should Send two BM bottles and 1 formula bottle????  My goal when i decided to BF was make it atleast 3-4 months...lo.was 3 months yesterday and i am not ready to give it up...

 Any suggestions would be appreciative and any ideas to help boost supply would be great too.. 

mork

I suggest not mixing, mainly because mixed formula only has a life of 24 hours, and it would suck if you or daycare threw out unused BM. I never mixed and DD didn't have any problem switching back and forth when my supply started to drop. I also suggest giving specific instructions on which to use first, and to not waste BM. (I had a friend just find out that daycare was pouring any undrunk BM down the sink when her LO didn't finish the entire bottle. Not cool.)

I don't have any useful advice on increasing supply, as I tried everything short of prescription meds and was never able to increase my supply.  

big_noise

I wouldn't mix either. I don't think it's recommended and yeah, dumping out bm is the pits. I did plenty of supplementing with DD#1 and it usually equated to at least one formula bottle/day, mostly b/t 4-6  months, when she was eating the most. We usually did the formula at night and either me or DH would give her the bottle. However, I mostly pumped and bottle fed DD. If you want to work on your supply, it might be better to try to still nurse at night, so you could send one formula bottle to daycare then. However, if you want to switch off bedtime routines, having the bottle and both parents able to do bed time is nice too.

Missa_g

theresat858:

It sounds like your supply is just regulating...why do you need to give formula at all if you're still able to pump enough for his bottles at daycare and have a stash from before when you were pumping more?There is also a big growth spurt around 3 months that will make you pump a bit less because LO is draining more when he is with you but if you can nurse on demand, your supply should catch up.I had to pump every 2 hours at work for a week or two to keep up when my LO was being overfed at daycare she went from 912oz to 1517, and really only needed 12 once we switched to a more BFfriendly provider she did go up to 15 at 5 mo, but I was able to boost my supply then, too.nbsp; I always pumped once a day on the weekends as well for some back up, and sometimes at night after LO was in bed when things were really coming up short.Some things that were successful for me in boosting my supply:Flaxseed. This one is huge for me and worked really well.nbsp; Flax muffins or put it in a smoothie or make lactation cookies the first recipe on google isn't bad or add it to oatmeal.Oatmeal. I have it every morning for breakfast.Brewers yeast, or a dark beer once a day I dont like beer. the yeast isn't yummy but can be hidden in lactation cookies.Mother's milk tea drinking 3 cups a day helped my supply.Power pumping pump for an hour total, 20min on, 10 off, 10 on, 10 off, 10on...do this for 3 days and you should see an increase; you don't have to keep doing it.This weekend do lots of skin to skin with baby and nurse as often as possible, at least every 2 hours during the day.nbsp;And if you do opt to use formula but since your LO is under 6mo read about the virgin gut theory first, don't mix b/c then it has to be treated like formula and the bottle can't be reoffered.

I was with PP until the stupid virgin gut comment. Tons of women, myself included, FF. There is nothing bad about it if you need/want to and all of our kids are doing just fine. Otherwise she had good suggestions for boosting your supply if that is what you want. Power pumping was a huge help for my supply. No matter what you decide you are doing a great job!

ellebelle2384

mork:

I suggest not mixing, mainly because mixed formula only has a life of 24 hours, and it would suck if you or daycare threw out unused BM. I never mixed and DD didn't have any problem switching back and forth when my supply started to drop. I also suggest giving specific instructions on which to use first, and to not waste BM. (I had a friend just find out that daycare was pouring any undrunk BM down the sink when her LO didn't finish the entire bottle. Not cool.)

I don't have any useful advice on increasing supply, as I tried everything short of prescription meds and was never able to increase my supply.  

This.  Power pumping helped my supply a bit when it dropped around 6 months, but we did end up supplementing with formula from 7 months - 12 months.  I felt guilty at first, but then focused on the fact that DD was getting the nutrition she needed and that was what was important.   Hugs mama, you have some great suggestions here.

lauralew

Missa_g:

theresat858:

It sounds like your supply is just regulating...why do you need to give formula at all if you're still able to pump enough for his bottles at daycare and have a stash from before when you were pumping more?There is also a big growth spurt around 3 months that will make you pump a bit less because LO is draining more when he is with you but if you can nurse on demand, your supply should catch up.I had to pump every 2 hours at work for a week or two to keep up when my LO was being overfed at daycare she went from 912oz to 1517, and really only needed 12 once we switched to a more BFfriendly provider she did go up to 15 at 5 mo, but I was able to boost my supply then, too.nbsp; I always pumped once a day on the weekends as well for some back up, and sometimes at night after LO was in bed when things were really coming up short.Some things that were successful for me in boosting my supply:Flaxseed. This one is huge for me and worked really well.nbsp; Flax muffins or put it in a smoothie or make lactation cookies the first recipe on google isn't bad or add it to oatmeal.Oatmeal. I have it every morning for breakfast.Brewers yeast, or a dark beer once a day I dont like beer. the yeast isn't yummy but can be hidden in lactation cookies.Mother's milk tea drinking 3 cups a day helped my supply.Power pumping pump for an hour total, 20min on, 10 off, 10 on, 10 off, 10on...do this for 3 days and you should see an increase; you don't have to keep doing it.This weekend do lots of skin to skin with baby and nurse as often as possible, at least every 2 hours during the day.nbsp;And if you do opt to use formula but since your LO is under 6mo read about the virgin gut theory first, don't mix b/c then it has to be treated like formula and the bottle can't be reoffered.

I was with PP until the stupid virgin gut comment. Tons of women, myself included, FF. There is nothing bad about it if you need/want to and all of our kids are doing just fine. Otherwise she had good suggestions for boosting your supply if that is what you want. Power pumping was a huge help for my supply. No matter what you decide you are doing a great job!

Ditto Missa.  A fed baby is best. 

FmrAFBrat

I'm there with you. I've been using fenugreek to up my supply. My other advice is to drink lots of water.

I'm doing better with BF than I did with my 1st, since he had to be combo fed due to jaundice and weight issues. But I'm not going to be sad if I have to break out some formula next week when I go back to work. I'm only getting 2 to 4 ounces each time pumping right now.

I'd love to see if there was anything else though bc formula got to be expensive.