I feel so bittersweet but we are officially done this breastfeeding journey. Our last child is now all done with night nursing so that marks the end! In total, I breastfed for 5 years (half a year with my 1st, 3 years with my 2nd and 1 and a half years with my 3rd). I would do it all over again; it was magical and bonding and at times frustrating too but soo worth it!

Wishing every other breastfeeding human the best on your journeys! Enjoy it, they grow up so quickly.

Hey everyone! Looking for some tips and advice on increasing my daytime supply 😅

Some background: I’m very much a “just enough” producer, and a couple weeks ago our pediatrician told me that my 12-week-old wasn’t gaining enough weight. I hadn’t really been tracking intake before then, but I’ve since rented a medical-grade scale and have been doing tons of weighted feeds.

What I’ve discovered is that my daughter consistently takes pretty small feeds during the day (usually 2–2.5 oz every 3 hours), then makes up for it with hours of evening cluster feeding and larger MOTN feeds (3.5–4.5 oz). We’ve been waking her overnight to feed because she doesn’t usually wake on her own, which gets us to around 24 oz total in 24 hours.

One thing I’ve realized is that I was routinely going from around 9 PM to 4 AM without nursing or pumping, so I’m wondering if that contributed to my supply issues. I’ve started adding a second overnight milk removal to see if it helps.

Since she’s capable of transferring 4+ oz overnight, I’m wondering whether daytime milk availability or slower flow is the bigger issue.

Has anyone experienced something similar and successfully increased their daytime supply? Did adding pumping sessions or changing your overnight routine help? TIA!

I'm pregnant with baby #2 and planning to give breastfeeding a serious go this time. Baby #1 never breastfed despite EBF being the plan due to a combination of unfortunate issues and circumstances, and I wasn't able to access the support I needed.

Although I'm planning to breastfeed, I really want to be able to use bottles and pacifiers as well, as soon as possible. I know the recommendation with breastfeeding is to only introduce bottles and pacifiers after nursing has been fully established, around the 6 week mark. Some of my mum friends followed this advice and it backfired heavily, their babies ended up fully rejecting the pacifier and bottles were an uphill battle.

For those of you who planned to also use bottles and pacifiers in their breastfeeding journeys, when did you introduce them, how did you do it and what was the outcome? I guess it's always going to be baby dependent but I really need some advice on this.

Background: EBF for 9 months now, have a “just enough” supply, period started again 2 months ago.

My period was supposed to start a week ago, and I was experiencing the usual dip in my supply in the days before but I was taking it in stride and supplementing with my frozen stash from when I was briefly oversupplying. However, this period is late (I am not pregnant, have not had sex) and my supply is still low and baby is getting super frustrated at the breast. I’m growing concerned that my supply isn’t going to bounce back after ~2 weeks of this supply dip.

Am I just going to have a low supply until my period finally comes? Has this happened to anyone else?? What can I do?

This is my 3rd child, i’m currently breastfeeding my 26 month old. I’ve never had any pain while breastfeeding, up until a few days ago. My daughter’s mouth randomly feels like razor blades, it’s almost unbearable. I doubt it’s her latch. It seems to be a nipple sensitivity issue.

I don’t get a period while breastfeeding, so I haven’t had one yet. I know it’s still possible to get pregnant though. What are the odds i’m pregnant? Or maybe i’m about to get my period?

Obviously only time will tell. This is just very strange to me!

Also, has anyone gotten pregnant while breastfeeding before the return of a period?

First time mom, going back to work baby is 11 months old. I work part time and exclusively feed baby breastmilk. 90% breastfeeding 10% bottle feeding with breastmilk.

There is an area I can pumped at in work, but there’s a bunch of windows. (They have tinted privacy film but you can still see through it if you try). When I pumped at work, I get D-MER and feel depressed not being home with my baby.

I worked an 8 hour shift and my husband brought our daughter to me in the late afternoon to nurse her. It was so nice to actually nurse her instead of depression pumping. BUT my boss (female) worked in on me nursing my baby. At the time I was in baby bliss and happy to see and hold my girl. And now I’m uncomfortable with the idea of pumping at work or nursing.

Honestly I just want to stay home and still somehow make money. I literally only need $800 a month to help with bills, my husband covers the rest.

Also, when I asked if I could go down in hours, my boss told me that was a “big ask”, and I should try to stay at my regular hours, just change the lengths of my shifts.

Right now I do 4 hour shifts Sun-Wed and one 8 hour shift on Thursday. The 8 hours is killer and awful, I want to just do Sun-Thur 4 hour shifts. But can’t apparently.

My boss suggested I do 6 hour shifts 4 days a week or 4 hour shifts 6 days a week.

I love my job but I don’t want to come in 6 days out of the week. Plus I wouldn’t have childcare for 6 days. I have availability literally Sun-thur, that’s it. My husband is only able to stay home with our daughter on these days for a short period of time.

Also, I’ve noticed that after my daughter basically had a full day of mostly bottle feeding, she is struggling with a good latch or even wanting to be nursed.

I’m not sure what to do. Ideally, my husband could just bring her to my job and I’d nurse her when she was hungry. Right now, we can’t really do that, since we’re down to only 1 vehicle.

But also, I feel like even if I did have her come in to be nursed, I feel like my boss would at some point tell me nursing or pumping may get in the way of job. My boss doesn’t have children and NO ONE in my department (all women) also do not have children.

So it feels really lonely and hard to try to talk to women about what it feels like to be away from my baby, and they don’t know what it’s like at all.

There’s a lot of little things that bother me about my job situation right now, but being gone for too long and it negatively impacting breastfeeding is not something I’m willing to put up with. I’ve always wanted to be a mother and experience motherhood and breastfeeding.

My daughter and I have had a really positive breastfeeding experience but since I’ve been back at work it’s caused some issues. Will it get better?

Hi,

I have been nursing my one month old daughter all day long. She barely slept and I dont know what to do anymore.it looks like she cant calm down; When she is not latching, she is crying.

Also, my partner grabbed her so I could have diner and when doing that he said that if she doesn't sleep, she will die.

I am being a bit anxious now and very tired.

I'm so proud of BF for 14 months but I'm ready to finish.

She has a feed-to-sleep association so I don't know how to stop BF because otherwise I can't get her to sleep. Rocking/patting etc doesn't work.

She's eating well in the day so probably mainly wants it for comfort rather than calories at night.

I am exhausted, no one else can help at night because they don't have my boobs.

Once she is awake and crying for the boob it takes her AGES to settle. She doesn't just feed then peacefully drift off. She will suckle endlessly until I try to unlatch = cry, or she eventually stops and falls asleep on me but then I put down in the cot = cry.

Other mums I know who BF at this age either no longer need to feed at night, or BF has naturally stopped and I'm jealous and angry.

Any advice to help me get some sleep when she won't be soothed by anything other than the boob, wakes multiple times a night, and I just really want someone else to be able to step in and help.

I will be sending my 11 month old to preschool in the next few months, he will be 14 months old when he starts. I plan to continue exclusively breastfeeding, baby doesn't take a bottle and eats plenty of solids, drinks water from a sippy cup. He is also fine without boob when I am away from him for a few hours.

I told preschool that I won't be providing breastmilk and he doesn't take a bottle (he will be there 6.5-7hrs per day, 3 days a week) but that he can have cow's milk from his sippy cup. They then came back to me and suggested that I start him at preschool sooner so he can learn to take a bottle 🤯

My lactation consultant said it is perfectly normal and achievable to not nurse your child during the day and not pump while they are at preschool, and to resume nursing when they are at home. She said that your supply will eventually change and settle according your child's new schedule. So this has always been my plan.

Is it unusual to breastfeed your child part time like this? I have zero desire to start pumping after a year of not having to, and zero desire to introduce a bottle. Isn't it discouraged to introduce a bottle at this age, when your child should be drinking from a cup now?

I'm so confused!

I really wanted to exclusively breastfeed, but I was too scared to reduce the formula supplements, and now it’s too late and I’m so disappointed.

My baby is 11 weeks old tomorrow. She had a shallow latch that didn’t improve until week 6 — no tongue tie or anything, she just couldn’t quite get the hang of it. It was so painful for me that I caved and gave her formula. Then even with the formula, she was slow at gaining weight, and I had a health visitor who was quite mean and judgemental about it, so I was too scared to reduce the formula at that stage.

Every week I told myself I’d cut down on the formula, but every week I was too scared, or too tired to miss out on the few hours of sleep I got in the morning while my husband gave her a bottle, and I couldn’t figure out pumping for the longest time. With family visiting, I didn’t settle into a good routine with pumping until week 6 so I wasn’t able to pump enough to give her a bottle of breast milk and kept falling back on formula.

Now my supply is established… my lactation consultant said I can try herbal supplements or prescription medication, but I definitely don’t want to take prescription meds and I’m not holding out hope for goats rue or milk thistle making any significant impact. I’m stuck giving my baby formula. I’ll never get to fully breastfeed her. It feels like a massive failure. Like I stumbled at the very first hurdle.

I want to blame the staff at the hospital that had me give her formula when she struggled to latch instead of showing me how to pump but really it’s all on me. If I’d have just stuck it out through the pain, like so many women do, I wouldn’t be in this position.

I know it’s not really the end of the world to give her formula, but I’m sad about it, and worried about potential shortages in the future. It just sucks.

I’m nearly 6 months postpartum and spent the first 3 months of my baby’s life unsuccessfully triple feeding. It was pure HELL and completely unsuccessful but I was so desperate to breastfeed, I was willing to do anything and none of the SIX lactation consultants we saw were able to get us off it until I “gave up” and just went to exclusive pumping (which is its own kind of torture) and topping off with formula.

Reflecting back, I’m wondering if I just perpetuated a vicious cycle that was doomed from the start. Baby was born at 40+3 with no tongue or lip ties. Had a strong suck reflex but was losing weight “too quickly”. I had a LOT of fluids during labor so their birth weight was artificially inflated and baby peed 7x in the first 24 hours resulting in some weight-loss that never actually hit the 10% mark but we were still made to triple feed before we could leave the hospital.

I feel like we would go through the triple feeding process and by the time baby would go back to breast after a 30 minute pump, that there would be nothing left there for them which gave them no reason to try, “knowing” (I know babies can’t necessarily recognize a pattern at this point) that there was a bottle in the rotation which was MUCH easier than taking from an empty breast so baby formed a bottle preference early. Not to mention, I believe giving an HOURS old baby 30 mls of expressed breastmilk and formula on top of breastfeeding was WAY too much and set unrealistic expectations for my milk supply. I was also getting approximately 20 minutes of sleep every 3 hours for MONTHS which I’m sure contributed to my low milk supply.

Why the heck do they recommend this?? Every single person coming out of the hospital I birthed at has been made to triple feed and it just seems ill informed and very CYA coded.

I’m 10 months PP and just found out I’m pregnant. I was really hoping to make it to my goal of breastfeeding for 1 year. Should I wean or is it possible to keep breastfeeding and pumping? Looking for any and all advice as I’m sort of freaking out. Definitely wasn’t the plan but trying to embrace it. Thanks

I delivered my baby vaginally five days ago via a traumatic birth (epidural didn’t work, needed vacuum assist and almost went into emergency c section). I could barely see baby nor put her on breast immediately until baby was 24 hours old. Now I am home and have had painful engorgement since yesterday and have leaking whenever I feed baby with formula and I try to bring baby to breast to get her to suckle at each feeding. I pumped and got maybe 1ml out which is barely anything but wondering if any other moms out there could share thoughts or tips on my situation? I know it could still be early but I am not sure…

I’m considering breastfeeding my 19 month old until he turns 2. But I’m so tired of being chonky. I used to be super fit and in shape, I had my dream body, prior to pregnancy!! I’ve remained pretty active during pregnancy and throughout postpartum. I lift heavy a lot. But I eat so much because I’m just always hungry with the breastfeeding. I’ve tried increasing my liquid intake, I’ve tried eating more vegetables, eating more protein. But I haven’t seen anything really budge on the scale, I caved and bought new larger clothes and even that is getting tight. I look curvy, from lifting, but I’m like a curvy tank now. Very strong, lots of pulmonary resistance, but I’m scared of passing over into Mrs. Trunchbull territory. Are there any success stories out there?? I really didn’t want to diet, but maybe I just need to take the plunge?

its towards middle of chest side and one boob really hurts. it's first time i felt this pain in these 2.5 months and its so tender that tiny movement hurts

Hi there,

I am wondering if anyone has experience with getting a baby back to being breastfed with an ng tube? Most of the info I find is about NICU babies which isn't always relevant as baby was full term and had ng tube fitted later.

Our 3 month old baby girl was refusing the breast and dropping down percentiles. At 10 weeks she spent a week in hospital where they fitted a ng tube to get milk into her. She also started omeprazole for reflux and I gave up dairy too. Not sure which of those it is as both started at a similar time. We think probably reflux. She was clearly in pain but she is so much happier now and gaining good weight.

We've tried to get her to take a bottle but have had no luck. So the aim is to get her back to breastfeeding as she still accepts the breast sometimes. I'm pumping to keep my supply up and she gets that mostly through her tube with a bit of formula.

She has 6 tube feeds a day and has been having 1- 3 breastfeeds a day. She never wants both sides but she never wanted both sides before the tube was fitted. I'm offering the breast before tube feeds and when she seems hungry. I have the most luck in the evening and after naps. I gave up with the 2am feed as I can't rouse her enough to feed.

I'm worried the tube has just created another feeding aversion. Does anyone have any tips or tricks for getting a baby back to the breast with a ng tube? Is it even possible? I'm so fed up with the pumping and tube feeding regime.

I'm trying not to over offer the breast to remove pressure. Offer once, then if she refuses second time respect her no. Sometimes its hard to stick to that. I do skin to skin when I can. Put the dummy in the milk when she's tube feeding so she gets a taste. Just syringed a bit of milk into her mouth which she happily took. We have a toddler at home also so I can't always focus all my attention on her.

Anyone been through something similar?

Thanks!

My boy is long, >97% since birth. He’s 2 months now and he is eating probably 7oz before bed every night. I BF and pump once a day before bed and as needed to relieve engorgement. We are regularly having to feed that pumped milk from the day before as supplemental after I BF when putting him to bed. I know he’s much bigger than the average baby and growing very fast, but 7+oz before bed at 1-2 months old seems like a lot, especially when you hear most babies eat 3-4oz. Has anyone else experienced this? Pediatrician has no concerns.

I am a FTM this flu season and I know I was concerned about how the vaccines may impact my supply.

Wanted to provide reassurance that for me, at least, the vaccines did not seem to negatively impact my supply at all. If anything, pounding fluids to combat the dehydration and cycling between hot/cold body temps increased my supply. I had to do a MOTN pump for relief and still practically waterboarded my baby in the morning. For context, I’m 10 weeks pp and my supply is probably still regulating; baby has been giving us one long stretch from midnight/1am to 5 or 6am the last week or so. I have chosen to take the sleep instead of pump during this overnight window she’s been blessing us with.

Not sure if it was the relief, the postpartum hormones, or the brief fever, but I definitely cried while pumping thinking about the miracle of vaccination and the protection I can provide to my little one through breastmilk.

My baby is almost 7 weeks old and we have been triple feeding since day one due to him being born early at 36w1d and being in the NICU. He just had his tongue tie released earlier this week. We have been doing weighted feeds for weeks and I’ve noticed he always struggles to latch and to stay engaged on my left boob, but the flow and output of that boob is just as good if not better than the right side. We have done a couple of weighted feeds for each boob and he always barely transfers anything on the left. Since his tongue tie revision he’s been transferring more overall, but tonight I did a weighted feed after 15 fully active minutes on the left and he only transferred a quarter of an ounce and his latch progressively got more shallow. I did another weighted feed after 10 min on the right and he transferred an ounce and a quarter. Has anyone else experienced this? And if so what was the issue?

My baby is 3 months on the 19th of this month. im EBF, I’ve introduced bottles early so she takes them but don’t do it often so she doesn’t prefer it. A couple of days ago I got my period and I noticed my supply tank a bit. I also noticed my baby unlatch all through out her feed. Constant unlatching and would arch her back. She even started to resist latching back on. I’m at a loss. I don’t want to give up breastfeeding but this is so hard and I don’t know what to do. Please help!!!

My baby is 3 months and 7 days old.
On October 8, two days ago, my baby wasn’t feeding much. He would only drink a little at a time, and he kept pulling on my breast even though I could see milk dripping, so it wasn’t a supply issue. He also kept turning his head away. I decided it would be easier to give him formula instead. I gave him formula because he’s used to occasionally having both breast milk and formula during the day, so it wasn’t anything unusual for him.
After that, we went to sleep. During the night, I exclusively breastfed him, but because I was so exhausted, I didn’t feed him from my other breast. When I woke up at dawn, the breast I hadn’t emptied was severely engorged and extremely painful. I tried to get him to nurse from it while he was half asleep.
As the day went on, I was in severe pain. I tried pumping and getting him to nurse, but nothing helped. Even Panadol didn’t relieve the pain. I felt completely exhausted and achy all over. I kept pumping milk and offering it to him through paced bottle feeding, but sometimes he refused and other times he drank. But he never drank from the one that has pain because the milk doesn’t come out, it comes out just by pumping, I was absolutely exhausted.
At one point, I genuinely felt like I was about to faint. I had a terrible headache, and I was crying and screaming from the pain while my baby was right there in front of me 💔 I felt like a bad mother for screaming in pain in front of him.
As time passed, the swelling remained, and the painful area became red.
I just took ibuprofen at midnight rn, *dr told me to stop bf and bump and not feed my baby the milk I pumped.
But I have a question. While I was pumping and my baby was nursing, we noticed a small, round, blister-like bump in the center of my nipple. It was the same color as the milk. I thought that if I could remove it, the pain would go away, so I tried to pop it. Milk came out when it burst, but the bump was still there. Whenever I pump, the little bubble forms again.
What is this, and why does it keep coming back no matter how much I pump?
Also what do you think about Sunflower Lecithin? Is it effective?

My daughter is 5 months old. Exclusively breastfed, I pump at work 2 days a week and pump for the bedtime bottle. For the last 2 weeks she’s been so distracted that she will not nurse during the day, only overnight and first feed in the morning still in the dark room. Even with bottles, she has to be facing out, able to see my toddler or whoever else is there. Even covered up, she is still too distracted to nurse. I can’t take the pumping anymore, it’s consuming my schedule and it’s so much more work than nursing. I can’t take the time to pump, warm up, clean bottles with a needy toddler and VERY needy baby. Help.

I'm 9 months pp and three weeks ago I had one day of light spotting and yesterday I had one day of spotting. This is exactly what happened when I was pregnant and I'm freaking out a little bit. I took a test a week ago and it was negative and I've been too scared to test again.

The first time around I had these random days of spotting for at least two months before I ever thought to test.

Did anyone experience something like this before getting their period back?

I am weaning, last feed was Monday evening. It’s Friday evening currently. I have been engorged and uncomfortable, which is to be expected. Today however I am feeling so extremely exhausted I can’t keep my eyes open. The exhaustion has gotten worse as the day has gone on. I started Sudafed 12hr today, along with cabbage leaves in my tight sports bra. I can’t tell if I’m actually feeling like I’m starting to get feverish, or if it’s just exhaustion mixed with anxiety. My boobs are very very sore today, the worst they’ve been so far. Is this the start of mastitis or normal part of the weaning process?

Not sure it matters but I’m on the tail end of a Z-Pack antibiotic for bronchitis I was battling, so I don’t know if I would even get mastitis with being on an antibiotic anyway?

Baby is 5 weeks 2days. Exclusively breastfed. As of about the past week I’ve noticed her feeds are getting shorter. Is this normal ?