Lost my entire freezer stash

[Eresh]

DH had corndogs late last night and when he put the box back in the freezer it kept the door from shutting.  He was the last one to bed and somehow didn't notice the freezer door open 4 inches (with the light on).  So my LLL (who was also my MW, so I have her phone number on my favorites still) got a frantic call at 8:00 this morning when I discovered my milk was all semi-thawed and I was about in tears.  So she said what I'd thought, it would be refreezing, so my entire milk stash went into the trash can.  I'm so mad at DH I didn't even say anything to him at all so I wouldn't be hurtful.  But I'm still   Oh, and DS2 is supposed to start daycare on Thursday.

The only good thing ... my LLL leader has someone with 40oz to donate to a needy mama so at least I won't have to send formula with DS2 when he starts daycare.

[HappyMommy2]

Too bad you can't find some other use for it to use it up today .. in baking or something.  Breastmilk muffins for your DC to take to daycare! (or eat on the road)  There are a few threads about other uses for BM around here!

[HappyMommy2]

And what does your day look like?  Why couldn't you feed it to your DC for the next couple days and pump exclusively in order to build up the stash again?? 

I hate to see it wasted, especially since it was only half-thawed, it isn't ruined (yet!)

Good luck mama!

[PatioGardener]

No no no! If it is only semi thawed it is OK to re-freeze!

Will find thread and reference...

ETA: Mama, check out this thread. Many mamas would feel perfectly fine refreezing and giving that milk to a healthy baby. (I would!) Hope you can fish it out of the trash and re-freeze!

[Eresh]

Well, most of it was completely thawed =\  Tho two packets were 50% or more solid.  I did fish them out of the trash and put them in the fridge.  I honestly never thought of trying to bottle feed DS2 and pump ... LOL.  I'll see if he'll take a bottle from me so I can do that.

[PatioGardener]

from that thread "Any fully thawed milk will probably also be ok if you re-freeze it ASAP as long as it has been fully thawed for less than 24 hours. Any milk that has been fully thawed for more than 24 hours is questionable"

I feel for you, Mama!

[MsFortune]

Ugh - that sucks. When I stopped BFing I had a huge stash - probably 2 mos worth. Well come to find out, there was something about my milk (lactic acid breakdown or something) that made it taste terrible when thawed. It's safe to drink, but tasted terrible. I tasted it and it was pretty gross. So DS would not drink it. So much work wasted!

So you have my sympathy

[Eresh]

Thank you mamas.  I put some of it back in the freezer and some in bottles to try to bottle feed and pump.  So far DS2 has just played around with the bottle but he's not all that hungry right now.  We'll see how it goes.

[ASusan]

If your lo won't eat it, I would eat it myself in smoothies. That's what I did with my high lipase freezer stash. (DS would not touch the milk at daycare.)_

(he wouldn't touch my pumped milk at daycare.)

[JudiAU]

So sorry. I have a huge fear of losing my stash.

BTW- I can't recommend highly enough buying a small extra freezer for bm storage. You can sell easily on Craigs List when done.