Starting a New Chapter - frozen breast milk

[cheryllynn]

Hi All -

Wondering how someone would deal with this. We have only frozen breast milk at this time. Tomorrow will be her first day. I don't really have an idea how much to thaw. I have 16 ounces thawing tonight for tomorrow.

How do you know how much to thaw for a 10 month old? If she is thirsty, should I give her water? Juice?

What if I need more milk NOW and it's frozen? What is the best way to thaw it?

Thank you.

[illumini]

I'm not sure your story but I can tell you what we do real quick. We freeze our milk in 2-3ozs so they are rather small. They can defrost under running lukewarm water from the faucet. If it needs warming more we just warm up the faucet water. Hope that helps!

[cheryllynn]

Hi Lauren -

A bit about us, My beautiful DD was born last May. We were successfully nursing until about October when I started hitted supply issues. Problems continued with supply getting cut in half and then half again. Then I started with health problems where I need to be on supplements that are Not Recommended for breast feeding. I had hoped to have enough stashed in the freezer, but my supply was so low, pumping only 2 ounces during work day, that we started on the freezer stash. I have located a few donors, bless them!, and now have a small deep freeze with breast milk. My dental appt was yesterday where they removed two silver/mercury fillings and now we are looking at a freezer with frozen breast milk, as Olivia is now officially weaned from the breast, but still has hopefully 4 - 6 weeks of breast milk stored for her.

In my reading, I've been confused how to thaw the breast milk. If I am supposed to have it all thawed in the fridge the night before, I'm wondering what to do when she is hungry and milk is still frozen. Obviously taking it out to thaw won't be fast enough. So warm water is ok?

Thank you -

[groovyem]

Hi! I am an exclusive pumper who has been using her frozen stash of milk for awhile now, still freezing, just using up older to replace with fresh. My little girl is 7 1/2 mo and drinks about 25oz a day. I do make up her bottles the nite before (at midnight) but you want to use thawed milk within 24 hrs of thawing due to loss of nutritional value. I thaw mine in really, really warm tap water in a big glass measuring cup for about 45 min. The water is cool by this point. I thaw 3, 4oz bags at a time. After a few days you will get into the swing of things, knowing how much she'll eat, I let mine eat as much as she wants in one sitting (4-6 oz), so that will tell you how much to thaw. I keep only 4 oz in the bottle and then if she wants more I add to it (she'll drink it cold) so I don't waste any. I will take the bottles out of the fridge anywhere from an hour or 2 before she normally eats, she really doesn't care about temp, I'm VERY lucky in that respect. When and how much to thaw is up to you. To suit your schedule her your little ones appetite. You could do it 2x a day, then there would never be any waste. I do wind up dumping some down the drain everyday, but not much. Good luck!