Totally confused on how much BM to send to sitter. HELP!
We start going to the sitter next week. LO will be 14 weeks. Here is the issue. He usually eats off one side at a time. I have a bit of overactive letdown and what I think may be oversupply? I have over 150 oz of BM stored up. I cannot go by how much milk i pump when double pumping bc that is usually like 9 oz. When DH gives a bottle we usually do 4 oz and do the paced feeding method. Baby doesnt seem overly hungry after but he rarely goes longer than 2 hours without eating. When I tell people i give him 4 oz bottles they act like this is starving my LO. I planned to send 3 4 oz bottles to sitter, but now i am second guessing that. PLease help me figure this out ..Im totally confused and I dont want to under or over feed my baby. Thanks
Re: Totally confused on how much BM to send to sitter. HELP!
Rule of thumb is 1.5 oz of expressed milk per hour of separation. Babies will sometimes take more than that- particularly during growth spurts- and sometimes less. Three 4 oz bottles would total 12 oz of expressed milk, which would be just right for an 8 hour workday. You might want to consider leaving the same amount in smaller bottles, since that will lessen the chances of overfeeding. You could try sending 4 bottles of 3 oz a piece, which would be just right for a baby who eats every 2 hours. Or you could leave a lot of 2 oz bottles and some 1 oz "top-off" bottles.
People only think 4 oz bottles are small because they're used to formula-fed babies, who tend to take much larger amounts than breastfed babies do.