My Baby Review Blog

Posts Tagged ‘Milk’

You have had your baby. Now the real fun begins! Bringing your baby home from the hospital is a big event. Your life will never be the same again. Hopefully, you have prepared for the baby’s arrival during your pregnancy. Now is the big day. What kinds of things can you do to make your transition go more smoothly?

Rule number one is sleep when baby sleeps. New parents often think to themselves that they will do the laundry or make dinner while the baby naps. For the first two weeks after you come home from the hospital, you need to sleep when baby does. There is no two ways about it. To be a good parent, you need to feel well rested.

If you cannot stand a slightly messy house, you have two choices. You can either hire a housekeeper or get used to things not being perfectly cleaned like they were before baby. It is extremely tempting to try and do all of your chores when the baby is asleep. If you find yourself doing this, please remember that you need to sleep as much as you can. Your main purpose in life at this moment is to care for your newborn.

Stock up on diapers before the baby is due. Diaper services, if you are using cloth diapers, deliver ahead of time you just need to let them know when you want a delivery. Make sure to have at least one bag of disposable diapers even if you are using cloth. If your baby is going to wear disposable diapers, having four bags at home will make life easier in the long run.

New mother’s milk does not come in for a day or two after birth. Your baby will still be hungry. To avoid frustration about not being able to fully feed her, have a can of baby formula on hand. You can supplement your nursing with formula until you can feed her 100% on your own.

During the night, in order to increase the amount of sleep you get, it is easy to bring the baby into your bed to nurse. Some families with sleep with the baby in the parents’ bed, others are not comfortable with this. If this is the case for you, purchasing a small crib or basinette and letting the baby sleep right next to you will make night nursing easier. Just reach over and bring the baby into your bed. When you are finished, put the baby back in his basinette.

A new parent often worries about the baby’s safety. Purchasing a new dect baby monitor prior to bringing the baby home will enable you to hear the baby sleeping or when she wakes up. Another way to make sure she is safe is to purchase a baby bath that fits easily into the sink instead of trying to bathe her in a large bathtub. You will be able to keep her slippery little body safely in your hands with a small baby bathtub.

Make sure you spend time with your baby. Even though having a newborn is difficult, you will look back fondly to the time you spent with your baby at the beginning of her life. Babies grow up very fast. Your chores will always be there.

Many premature babies are not routinely fed their mother’s milk and are instead fed infant formula. However, a recent study now stresses the importance of breast milk for preterm babies and urges that all premature babies should be fed theirs mother’s milk when at all possible.

A lot of women think their milk supply is low when it actually isn’t. Thinking this can happen if you lose the feeling of fullness in your breasts or if the milk stops leaking from your nipples. Babies that go through growth spurts may want more milk than usual, and these more frequent feedings may leave your breasts less than full.

According to experts the top tip for increasing the supply of breast milk is more frequent baby feeding. There are two ways of doing this. Firstly you could offer a quick top up feed of 5-10 minutes around 20-30 minutes after the baby’s normal feeds. Secondly, offer the baby feeds every two to three hours for just one or two days.

Wear two-piece outfits with easy access to your breasts. A loose top that can be pulled up from the bottom makes breast feeding and breast pumping more convenient. Another choice would be a dress or shirt that buttons all the way down the front. Buttons that go down only to the waist are not usually sufficient for double pumping because you need to be able to open the shirt wide. Also you could buy nursing tops or dresses with discreet slits at the breast for convenience when nursing or pumping.

Observing how a baby suckles his/her mother’s milk, Dr. Hartman has confirmed that the method happens in two successive steps. Initially, the baby pulls in the milk rapidly, which augments the flow of breast milk, whereas in the second step the suction slows down but it is still intense, allowing more milk to pour out per suckle. The Twin-Phase Expression technology of Medela pumps acts on this principle.

Breast milk is the first food that babies take in after birth. The milk is nutritious enough to allow a baby to grow and survive taking nothing else but breast milk alone. Also, breastfeeding is one of the moments wherein a mother can show true maternal love. Some experts say that a child who was breastfed develops a closer bond with her mother than those who were not. In any case, breast milk and breastfeeding are very important elements in rearing a child.

Every mother should know that when feeding a child with breast milk, it is not enough that she will just squeeze her breasts in any manner. This is because improper ways of squeezing the breasts may cause prolonged pain later or it may cause only a little discharge of milk. The proper way of squeezing one’s breasts during breastfeeding is known as expressing.
Expressing milk is done either by hand or with the help of a manual or electric pump. Expressing offers another benefit in that the milk can be stored in a container and be given to the baby later, much in the same manner that other women do with milk substitutes.

Benefits of Expressing Milk

* Expressing milk is very important especially for mothers who are working or those who have a very hectic schedule. For example, a mother may be away from her baby for a time and being health conscious, would not give her child anything but breast milk. In this case, expressing milk is significant because it allows such mothers to feed their babies anytime without the hassle associated with preparing milk substitutes. This way, the baby can still obtain the needed nutrients, even though it may not be the mother feeding the child.

* Another benefit of expressing milk is that it releases some of the air in the breasts that may be causing pressure. Once the air is released, the breasts will be allowed to process more milk, filling the breasts. In this case, it allows the baby to “breastfeed” for a lot longer even though you cannot do so especially when you are taking medications that may be harmful to the baby.
What Are the Ways to Express Milk?

* The best, common, and most efficient way is to squeeze through the hands. This is inexpensive because it does not require any equipment to assist in the release of milk. On the other hand, the process is time consuming. However, most mothers will not mind this as they know that in effect, they are also giving some sort of massage to their breasts. When using the hands, place the thumb about 5 centimeters away from the nipple and the rest of the fingers beneath it to form a “C” on the lower hemisphere that surrounds the nipple. Afterwards, start to squeeze in a circular motion.

* Another way to express milk is by using electric or manual pumps. To do this, one will need to place a suction cup over the nipple to extract the milk.