FertilityZone

Hi Rianon, it feels so sad doesn't it when you reach the end of breast feeding?!

I mixed fed my twins and gradually reduced expressed milk feeds and replaced with more formula. My supply did dwindle naturally but even after I completely stopped I found that I needed to express a few times over the following couple of weeks.

I think this is something where everyone is different so I would definitely hang on to your pump for about a month after and see how you go.

x

Hi Rianon, it really depends on how often you are feeding. By the time I stopped I was only doing one feed a day and had no problems at all. But if you are going from fairly regular feeding a few times a day then its much more likely that you will get a bit of engorgement. However, pumping your milk will still stimulate your breasts to produce more, albeit less so than feeding a baby, so I think your best bet might be just to hand express enough to reduce the discomfort and your boobs should sort themselves out in a day or two. Well done on successfully breastfeeding your LO. Its so sad but also quite liberating to stop!

Rianon, how old is your baby now?

Hi Rianon,

It took me a couple of weeks to stop producing milk altogether - but my circumstances were a bit different. I was solely expressing milk from 10-17weeks old and on top of that formula feeding as well, so my supply had been naturally dwindling. The only thing I noticed about stopping was sometimes I felt full and a little uncomfortable, and on a couple of occasions needed to express just to relieve the feeling. Mrs Jaspers suggestion of hand expressing is a good one - but I couldn't get the hang of that technique!

As for my periods - they are no more! I have been on the mini-pill since the twins birth, as our family is now complete.

Just see how much your LO takes to start with, mine preferred the little and often method and at six months would take between 3-5oz every 2.5-3h hours. I have known friends babies who at the same age would guzzle down a 9oz bottle, which I found astonishing!!

Hope you get over your bug

Sorry for going AWOL Rianon, busy weekend. I agree 8oz seems like a huge volume and because breast milk varies is calorie content to meet her needs, her stomach won't have been stretched the way it would had she been on formula up to this point. Between 6 months and 1 year babies need around 1 pint or 20z milk a day in addition to a varied diet of food. But you can include milk in foods in that too so if you use a bit in breakfast cereal sy, or a cheese sauce then you don't need to include it in what she drinks. When my DD1 was little, she had a combination of breast and formula milk and I tried to demand feed formula, so I would give her a bottle (Ithink the biggest one she had in one sitting was around 5-6oz. If she didn't finish a bottle, I would put it back in the fridge for up to an hour and offer it again before I threw it away. She never had a problem with drinks of different temperatures, I never warmed her milk, it was either fridge temp or room temp. Also, the HV could never grasp that I gave different amounts at different times and when she asked how much milk she had, I would give a total volume over 24 hours. What she drank roughly corresponded to the total amount recommended on the formula tin. I also made an asusmption that their recommendation was based on an 'average baby' if such a thing exists, and that it was in their interests to encourage more to be drunk rather than less! So if she had more some days and less on others, that was fine with me. Hope that helps.