My Best Breastfeeding and Pumping Tips

1. Unfortunately, breastfeeding will initially hurt for a while. Like, I would have to suck air through my front teeth for about 10 seconds when baby first latched on. Be strong! This feeling will not last forever! Power through it, and soon you’ll be at the stage where every once in a while you’ll have to check to be sure baby is still latched on because you can’t even feel it!
2.  It will get easier! I went out to eat with several other nursing mothers, and one was astonished how quickly I was done nursing. It wasn’t that my baby and I were any better at it. We were just a little further along in our journey. At first, you’re feeding a floppy baby and neither of you really know what you’re doing. After a while, baby gets really efficient at getting the milk out, and they are able to support themselves in the correct position with you using one arm rather than two. Eventually, they can even independently unlatch and relatch.
3.  Lanolin is great! Use it liberally, especially right before a shower. It is, however, hard to get out of your bra. If you spray a bunch of Shout on it, though, it will come out. Or use nursing pads. I would only buy one small tube. You’ll only need to use it for a month or so, then nursing will feel completely normal.
4. Change baby’s diaper before you nurse the baby.  With some new babies, they’ll tell you to keep them upright for 30 minutes after eating if they spit up a lot. You can’t change baby’s diaper while holding them upright.
5. Along those lines, go pee before you nurse the baby.
6. Babies are people, too! We have routines, but exact schedules, not so much. Sometimes you eat dinner at 5:30, sometimes you’re not hungry until 7:00. Give yourself and baby a break if she’s not acting interested. Also, if she’s not “scheduled” to eat for another hour, but she’s going nuts for milk, feed her! Think about it: do you always eat when you’re super hungry? Sometimes, it’s because you’re dying for some fried chicken or chocolate cake. Same with baby. My favorite “comfort nursing” was when my sweetie would act desperate to eat, eat for 1 minute, then let out a huge fart and not be interested in eating anymore! Ahh, that’s better! She would also nurse for a minute until she pooped or fell asleep. It’s all normal!
7. If your baby is a major spitter like mine, you’ll end up with chunky milk everywhere wondering where to start the cleaning. (I mean the kind of mess where your clothes, baby’s clothes, the couch, and the carpet are soaked.) I took home a bunch of the hospital receiving blankets and used those as burp cloths. When she ate, I covered her with one. If she spit up during or after, I just sat her up and let the mess go all over the blanket. Then I tossed it into the laundry.
8. Bibs are great for baby spit up, too. Change a bib instead of an outfit!
9. Vitamin D drops – If the pediatrician recommends them, get the single drop kind. (They sell it at Whole Foods.) It’s just too hard to get a baby to drink a vial of colored liquid. Set an alarm on your phone that reminds you to give it. My phone chimes, “Prenatal vitamin, Vitamin D!”
10. Nursing/pumping takes up a huge chunk of time.  It’s great for mom and baby to sit quietly and gaze into each others’ eyes. It’s nice to watch TV or get on your phone to text, get on Pinterest, etc.  I like the Duolingo app, which helps me improve my German skills and makes me feel like I actually “did something”. I also spend quite a bit of time planning meals and making grocery shopping lists.

Pumping Tips

1. If struggling to get baby to use a bottle with pumped milk, try starting with freshly pumped milk instead of reheated or cold.
2. If you’re doing a lot of pumping, get a nursing tank top (like a Glamour Mom tank) that is tight and has holes in it that will hold up your pump stuff.  With hands-free pumping, you can more easily hold and entertain baby, type on the computer, balance the checkbook, etc.
3.  I have cats, which means that they get on the countertops. At first, I would wash and sterilize the pump parts, then hear my cats batting the parts around on the floor five minutes later. (Insert weeping or angry face here!) I learned quickly that that wasn’t going to work for me. I cleaned out a shelf in the cupboard, put down a cloth, and put pump parts directly onto the cloth to dry after pulling them out of the microwave. Problem solved!
4. Don’t waste pumped milk! If you don’t end up using it, find a Mother’s Milk Bank and donate. When I found out that the smallest premie babies can’t digest formula and that their mothers have a hard time producing milk, I realized that I could spend a few minutes every day pumping and feed those precious little ones!

Bonus Tip: Okay, so this worked for me, but it might be a strange fluke. (But it’s so worth a try!) Anytime I feel like my period is coming back, I spend a few extra minutes that day on pumping and the feeling just fizzles out. Also, she still nurses at night, which might have a lot to do with it.  I haven’t gotten a visit from old Aunt Flo yet, and little LB is going on 10 months!