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Multiples
Twin MoM breastfeeding - is it possible and still keep your sanity?
I am planning on nursing/pumping for my LO's. At our first prenatal class the instructor told us that the only way it's possible to BF twins is to put them on a schedule, not to demand feed. I personally think that waking a sleeping baby is just mean.
Twin mommies, how did you manage?
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Re: Twin MoM breastfeeding - is it possible and still keep your sanity?
Ditto Sara. We have a routine rather than a rigid schedule. We try to do eat, play, sleep although in the beginning there was no play. For the first month they just ate and slept. Now they have a 15-20 minute playtime a few times a day. I feed on demand, but I wake the other baby to eat. During the day they eat about every 3 hours, but sometimes they cluster feed in the late afternoon/early evening. They do a couple of 4-5 hour stretches at night, but initially they ate every 3 hours round the clock. So in the a.m. one will wake up, so I wake the other and change and feed them. They go straight back to sleep and about three hours later we do the same thing, but they do some tummy/activity mat time before sleep. We do that all day and then at night they just eat and go straight back to sleep.
It is definitely harder than bfing a singleton. I nearly gave up and switched to eping when they were 2-3 weeks old, but I switched to bottle feeding and pumping at night instead. It allows me to make sure their tummies get good and full, plus I add one ounce of formula to each of their 2 night bottles. I was beyond desperate to get more than 1-2 hours of sleep at a time and that allowed me to get the longer sleep stretch. I definitely think that feeding on demand is possible to some extent, but if you don't feed them at the same time you would probably never do anything but feed them. Honestly, it will feel that way anyway!
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I do recommend the book Mothering Multiples; it's a La Leche League book with lots of practical advice on BFing multiples (and other aspects of caring for them).
it's possible to do whatever you want- but in the real "twin" world, I can not imagine feeding on demand... even bottle feeding - I'd get nothing else done all day- i'd be feeding babies every minute.
My boys got on a schedule VERY fast - I only wake them if they go past 1/2 hour from the other eating... and can tell you that they almost always wake up at the same time- without me waking them.
it's great because I can feed both (i FF now but was EP'ing for the first 4 weeks)... and then go do things- get out of the house, do things in the house, play with them, etc..... if they didn't eat around the same time- I'd be stuck in the house all day and never get anything done- or be able to play with them together.
It's very possible. If you have two good nursers, it'd be relatively easy. If you have reluctant nursers like I did, then it's more of a challenge. But it's still doable.
Our girls started out in the NICU for 11 days, and although we tried nursing immediately (as much as the docs would let us), the girls were too little/immature to get it, so I had to pump everything for them at first, 12x per day. Then one of our girls started nursing successfully, which was great. So at that point, I was nursing Baby B, then trying to nurse Baby A so she'd get practice, and then pumping for Baby A. Repeat, repeat, repeat. It was really grueling to keep that up for as long as I did, but I got through it. Since we got Baby A nursing, it's been pretty smooth. I'm feeding on demand and it's much more doable than how things used to work. Sometimes I can do tandem feeding, which saves some time and crying. I'm trying to get better at that.
Don't let anyone talk you out of BFing if you want to try it. It can and does work. And if you run into trouble, call a good lactation consultant! If you join a MOMs group in your area, they'll probably have recommendations of LCs who have helped them. That'd be a great place to find one b/c then you know they're familiar with twin issues.
Edited: I feed on demand most of the time, but if we have an appointment and I have to be somewhere with them at a certain time, then I do wake them to feed them. If we're just staying at home all day, I go by their cues. And when one of them is napping too long during the day (more than three hours), then I wake them to eat then, too.
(I'm a little late on this one...)
I've been BF for more than 5 months now. At first everything was scheduled every three hours. (Pedi insisted on waking them since they were preemies, with one under 4 lbs) As they got older, they began preferring to eat every 2-3 hours during the day. I usually now do not wake them in the middle of the night if one is up and the other isn't. Yes, sometimes I do not get much sleep because of this if the other wakes up 1/2 hour later and decides that she wants to eat. BUT, I tell myself that this is only temporary, and I can deal with this disruption for a short amount of time. (It might be worse if I worked full time...)
So, I usually keep them on the same "schedule" during the day since they both like to eat so frequently. They aren't very good nappers, so I usually don't have a problem with this, and I do usually feed them at the same time (and tandem). If one is napping, I do just one at a time, and then for the next feeding someone just eats earlier than she would've asked to eat.
I do feed them a big part of the day, but it's my understanding that BF babies just like to eat more often. And like I said, this is a small portion of my life, and I can deal with it for their first year! Do be sure to work hard at mastering tandem nursing as it can be a huge time saver and it's much better to be feeding both rather than feeding one with one screaming for attention/food.
Good luck!
My personal experience when my twins were first home we did sort of a mixture, when one was hungry I would feed both of them, sometimes causing me to wake one up. And then I would always "try" to get them to sleep at the same time. It helped me keep my sanity as in my own opinion I always felt like all I would be doing was feeding if I let them lead me too much. But like I said I kind of took it from their cues. Now that they are older I do more on demand as they eat a lot quicker so I don't always tandem nurse now. Everyone I talked to who had twins had told me to try to keep them on the same schedule and I definitly agree with that advice if you can. Just so you don't feel like all your doing is feeding and so you can get some rest I would recommend "trying" to feed them at the same time and "trying" to get them to sleep at the same time. Granted they are probably not going to do that for you most of the time ( I found that it was almost like they would tag team, one would fall asleep right after the other one woke up) but if you can get them to do it just part of the time it will help. I just want to say congrats and just remember you can do it! You will find that you will adjust a lot easier than you ever imagined you could and it is such an amazing blessing!!