how long is ok between feedings w/o compromising supply?

[ericaness]

background: son will be 6 weeks old tomorrow. the first 2 weeks of his life and BFing were super hard on us, he was jaundiced, did not wake up on his own at all to feed, we had latch issues, he lost more weight than i was comfortable with, etc. i received a lot of advice from several different people/professionals, some helpful, some that left me worried and tearful for days. during this time, we lived by the clock, and i was routinely waking him up every 2 hrs day and night to nurse. anyway, sometime in that 2nd week, everything just clicked, latch was fine, feeding became much easier, and he started to wake himself up, gain his weight back. now he is happy and chubby, and we feed on demand instead of living by the clock.

during the day he will go anywhere between half an hour to 3 hours between wanting to eat. this seems fine and natural to me, and i feel much better about following his needs and hunger cues. at night, he was wanting to eat every 3 hrs or so. for the past 2 nights though, he has gone one stretch of 5 hrs, which kind of freaked me out. is this ok? i am not really so much worried about him being too hungry as much as i am worried that at this early in our breastfeeding relationship i do not want long periods of sleep to have a negative effect on my milk supply.

how long can we safely go between feeding and not lose my supply? i have not had supply issues thus far, but am pretty nervous about everything due to the really rough start that we had. am i overthinking this?

[Katsmamajama]

My DD2 does that occasionally, and so far my supply still seems to be normal. I haven't pumped to check, but even with the 3-7 hour stretch (I wouldn't wish that 7 hour on anyone, ouch!) she's clicking away when she actually latches, and I'm letting down on the opposite side.

[PatioGardener]

I would worry about going longer than 5 hours, but one 5 hour stretch between feeds should be OK. Any more than that and I worry about plugged ducts, mastitis etc. Is your baby OK with doing a 'dream feed' while still asleep?

So good to hear that you over came your rough start and are doing well!!!

[lucifugous]

My daughter did the same thing. Although we didn't have much of an issue with latch and she started gaining right away, I noticed things clicked into place after a couple weeks and we nursed more efficiently and comfortably. She started sleeping for nice long stretches really early and it freaked me out. Unfortunately, a year and a half later, she is waking much more frequently . If you are becoming uncomfortably engorged, definitely pump. If they are super full and not getting emptied, that's when the body is really going to say "woah, slow down production!" Plus it's hard for a little baby to feed from an engorged breast.

[Bookworm?]

Just make sure to nurse 8-12 times every 24 hours. So one longer (5-6 hrs) stretch of sleep is okay as long as you are nursing frequently the rest of the time.
Congratulations on the birth of your baby and making it to 6 weeks breastfeeding?

[jillmamma]

DD is 7 weeks and goes 5 hours at night between feedings. She cluster feeds during the evening hours though, so "tanks up" from like 6ish till 11ish (every 1/2 hour to hour or so), then feeds again at like 4ish and then again 7ish. During the day she cluster feeds for an hour or two, and then goes 2-3 hours before eating again. I figure she is doing fine because a) she looks healthy, b) I am changing a lot of pee and poopy diapers, c) she has gained > 2 lb since birth, and d) she is developing normally (getting smiles now! ). So if he is doing the above, I would not worry about it, and just go with the flow.