My Milk Is Nearly Gone Please Help! Its Causing My Depression to Worsen.

Drink lots of water and keep feeding her...the supply should come back.

Don't stress, relax and give it a little time....

If Mom wants to help then have her clean or do laundry or make dinner. You work on feeding that little one and relaxing. Take a nap right after you feed baby and then let mom entertain baby...but not give a bottle.

Good luck and best wishes!

You have great advice to help you with the breastfeeding part. It will work. My thought is, you must have really needed the break and some rest. THAT is always a good thing! Next time you will know to take pump, and to redirect Mom. You know what they say, Hindsight is 20/20. Hang in there!

I'm positive you'll get some great suggestions on how to increase your milk supply and reestablish latch / feeding routines.

So I wanted to offer some unsolicited advice:
Try to be gentle on yourself if you can. Try taking a hot bath and just letting it all slide away for a few minutes. Give yourself permission to just let it go - even if for a few minutes. Do something nice for yourself, a cup of your favorite tea or a nice new journal.

You are NOT alone.

Your baby is going to be okay no matter what. This phase (the littles) is not going to be forever and you'll both come out strong. Big hugs. I hope you feel better soon and that baby starts drinking up your breast milk with gusto!

Keep nursing her. Your body will catch up to her demand. All babies go through this and they're fine. As my kids grew, it usually only took one feeding to catch up to their extra demand. They would seem extra hungry but my body would catch up. Sometimes if they didn't nurse as much, my milk would decrease but then increase again when the demand was greater. Your body will adjust and your baby will be fine. Good luck!

There's nothing wrong with "topping her up" with a bottle until your milk is back. Just be sure to nurse her often and make sure that she really empties your breast each time. You could also nurse her from both sides at each feeding to give her a little extra....just make sure you let her nurse for at least 15 minutes on the first side to get all that good, fatty hindmilk and then start her on the side she had last at the next session. (so, if she fed right, then left at 9am....feed her left, then right at noon - or whatever times.) Best of luck to you!!

I broke my leg when my son was 6 months old. I was in the hospital for three days unable to pump or nurse. When I got home my supply was diminished. I didn't give formula once I was back with my son. He was fussy and nursed all the time for two days. After two days we were back to normal. I promise if you nurse often and stop giving formula in a few days you will be fine.

Don't give anymore bottles to top it off after a feeding. Your breasts NEVER empty, they just give a minimal amount until it can get back to the fulll supply needed by your child. The more you have her use a bottle, the less your body is stimulated to make more. Even if it's a 10 minute feeding every hour... you need to do that and let her suck on her hands. Your milk will quickly get back to the full force needed. Don't tell yourself your milk is drying up, because it is NOT. Just keep feeding every time she shows signs of hunger, even if you JUST fed her. Let her use your nipple as her pacifier and let her suck on her hands. Sucking on her hand isn't always a sign of hunger and neither is crying. She could have gas, simply need to self soothe with sucking her fists... etc Stop beating yourself up and just get going to doing what you need to do to get to where you want to be.

A few missed nursings can be fixed very quickly. Just have her nurse a lot and you'll be back up to speed within a couple of days. Does she use a pacifier, that might help keep her calm in between feedings.

I have no advice on the milk supply as mine never came in with either child. My advice to you is this: As long as your child is eating (breastmilk or formula -- either is fine) and growing, it's good. This time in her life is a blip on the radar screen, although it feels like an eternity while you are living it.
Don't beat yourself up. Just go with it.
Think about it this way: If formula fills her up and lets her sleep the night, you get sleep, too. Sleep is so important. Find the positive and focus on that.
LBC

Updated

I have no advice on the milk supply as mine never came in with either child. My advice to you is this: As long as your child is eating (breastmilk or formula -- either is fine) and growing, it's good. This time in her life is a blip on the radar screen, although it feels like an eternity while you are living it.
Don't beat yourself up. Just go with it.
Think about it this way: If formula fills her up and lets her sleep the night, you get sleep, too. Sleep is so important. Find the positive and focus on that.
LBC

Make sure you are getting enough calories and enough water.

Pump when she's not eating.

Don't give up. Keep insisting that she stay at the breast. It's harder work to get milk out of you than out of the bottle. It just oozes out of the bottle and she's gotta work hard to get it out of you. So don't give up!

Pump every couple of hours for the next day or two. Try to double pump when you can. Have her breastfeed for as long as she will each feeding and then supplement first with your milk that you have pumped before giving her formula if you need to finish off each feeding, but don't let her go hungry. You will both get stressed. Don't be discouraged if you don't get a lot with each pumping it will build up plus it is telling your body to make more and it will take a bit to catch up.

Try eating a big bowl of oatmeal once or twice a day. It really helped me.

When I went back to work (son was 3 months old at that point) I had a hard time keeping my milk supply up.
I pumped often as I could at work (which was a pain because the ladies rest room was the only space available to pump), ate/drank everything that was suppose to help keep my supply up, breast fed all I could at home and after 2 months it was just a losing battle.
So when he was about 5 months old I switched to formula and fed him that way for the rest of the time he needed it (he didn't take to solids till he was about a year old).
He was happy, I was happy, he grew/developed/prospered just fine.
Try what you can to keep your milk supply up, but if it's not working out don't beat yourself up over it - you have alternative options about how to feed and your child won't starve. It's great if you can breast feed as long as you want to, as long as your child wants to but not every woman is a great milk producer.

Don't give up! Besides the fenugreek there is the mother's milk tea by traditional medicinals (steep 7-10 min) be so gentle and kind to yourself, take a bath, go for a walk. Now that mom is gone, get back to your routine that you had with your baby.

Fenugreek will only work if taken with blessed thistle. When my milk was very low a friend gave me some tea that worked better than anything I've tried, including any other tea. You have to order it off the Internet. www.sacredteafornursingmothers.com you can read the testimonies. I saw a difference within 24 hours. Hang in there it's not to late. Do a marathon feeding & pumping.

Sorry about your situation. That sounds really frustrating, but there are lactation specialists and consultants who can help. You may have a local La Leche League or your local hospital might have a free breastfeeding support group. I'm in Hayward and there is one here that is run by a very helpful lactation consultant. Maybe you could give her a call or send a message. Her name is Sylvia Boyd and this is her site: http://www.mybreastfeeding.com/index_files/Services.htm

So, as a mom who vowed to breastfeed as long as possible, but not until she gets her driver's license(ha ha ha!), and had a whole bunch of difficulties, including, at times, not feeling like she got enough, here's my advice:

The Fenugreek is a good idea. Keep putting her back on your breast. Her continued sucking is the only way to communicate to your body that more milk is needed. Also, plenty of skin to skin contact. I have heard of bottle feeding to support breastfeeding, but that probably involves pumped milk. I guess there's a point at which giving her formula will have to happen, at least until you re-establish your supply, but always nurse her first. Make sure you are drinking plenty of fluids, nutrition, milk, sleeping enough. I don't think it's too late to recover your milk, but I'm not an expert. Please try contacting Sylvia.

As far as pumping/expressing, I pumped for the first 3 months and mine wouldn't take a bottle at all, so I stopped pumping for a couple of weeks because there was such a huge back up of frozen milk in my freezer. Then, when I tried going back to pumping, I suddenly couldn't pump out much at all, but I knew there was still plenty of milk, but only the baby could get it out, not the pump. I know there was lots of milk because I nursed exclusively until 6 months and then until after age 2 and it was okay despite some worries, so best of luck to you and your little one!

Pump! I think it is 3 extra in a day will help your supply ramp up? If you give her a bottle just make sure you pump for that feeding so your body will try to up your supply. Lots of water, oatmeal and Fenugreek (good brand). You could ask your OB for an RX to Domperidone. It is a GI med that also increases breastmilk supply. But pump. When she stops from frustrations you can offer her a bottle but treat it like the early days, try her on both sides and lots of fluids.

Do not do herbals without reasearch, they are not all FDA approved and can cause problems, been there learned from it, I hear the cookies for nursing moms r great although never tried em. I had a lactation consulant tell me most important is feed on demand, then try "power pumping" and outmeal, now at 9mo I still eat the old fasioned quick oats that I have to flavor, and I eat a bowl right b4 bed at least, trust me I can tell a difference when I dont have it. You will make it through, if you have any ? feel free to e-mail me.

I just got dejavu reading this post - I think I could've written this a few years ago. I was in breastfeeding hell for a while after I had my son. I won't get into it here but trust me I went through alot and it took months before I was able to enjoy it and also feel secure that my son was getting enough to thrive. There are already so many good posts here with great advice, so I don't need to repeat what others have said. I tend to agree with the moms who say you shouldn't be supplementing with any formula BUT not if that means you are stressing out even more.

My two cents? I'd emphasize the importance of eating well and drinking plenty of fluids (for the record I did find that herbs like fennugreek helped me although they make you smell like Indian food) but the #1 thing that effected my ability to produce milk was stress. And it is a vicious circle because what is more stressful than thinking you aren't making enough milk to nurture your baby? I won't give advice about how to decrease stress, that is something you need to figure out for yourself. However, one thing you can do is remind yourself over and over that you are a woman, you are a mother, and you are inherently able to make as much milk as your baby needs. If you are able to relax and truly believe this, it will happen.

For me pumping was incredibly stressful and I would always freak out because I would never be able to get the same amount of milk that my son would, and so I would be convinced that he was not getting enough. Plus, my boobs were tired after all that nursing! I would feel angry just looking at the pump (not a good way to start). Sometimes, you just need a break from it and if formula will get you through enough time to calm down about the situation, then give yourself that break. SO much of milk production is psychological. Best of luck!

I don't have good milk supply advice, but it seems like you've gotten plenty of those. I just wanted to chime in to urge you to ease up on yourself. You are a mom. Being a mom is hard. If you needed a break and to sleep all night, than that's OK. Your baby will be fine. You will be fine. We all do what we can to cope and early parenting is HARD.

Good luck!

Try hands-on pumping in between feedings as well as hand expression. You don't have to sit and express for 15 minutes. Just tell yourself that every time you do x activity (go to the bathroom, take a shower, get a drink, whatever and as many as you want), you'll give your breasts a couple of rubs. You won't get any milk out at first, and don't worry about the few drops you may get. It's not about collecting the milk you express; it's about the extra breast stimulation.

Dr. Jane Morton has done extensive research regarding hands-on pumping and hand expression, and she just came to to speak to Nursing Mothers Counsel (with whom I'm a peer BF counselor) a week ago. It was FANTASTIC, and the website to her videos is http://newborns.stanford.edu/Breastfeeding/index.html. She really opened my eyes, and I'm so glad I have all this wonderful info to use to help moms in the future!!

Ease up on yourself; you're every bit as important as your baby!! It generally takes 3-4 days of increased breast stimulation to increase your milk supply, so you probably won't see an instant increase. Rest, relaxation and drinking to thirst will go a long way towards helping with your milk production and flow. If we feel stressed out, it affects our letdown and how long it takes, which can make baby very fussy at the breast.

I also want to say that you can go back and forth between breasts as many times as you want. Baby only takes on average 67% of the milk out of a breast, and there are many subsequent letdowns during a breastfeeding. The initial letdown definitely provides the greatest volume and flow, but that doesn't mean you don't produce beyond that. Nurse as often and as long as you can handle it (sometimes, we just need a break!).

Happy nursing :)

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Start pumping on a regular schedule and put the expressed milk in her bottle with the formula. Then your milk will be full flowing again soon.

It isn't too late. You should try to get a supplemental feeder (you might have to talk to your pediatrician or a lactation consultant to get one.) You put the formula in a little bag that you hang over your shoulder and a little tube goes to your nipple. Your baby nurses, and gets the formula in addition to stimulating your milk supply. She won't be frustrated if your milk supply is currently low, because she'll also be getting the formula. As your milk supply increases, you can decrease the use of the supplemental feeder.

At this point I've got close to 9 years of nursing experience with 3 babies. My best advice is to nurse her any time she seems hungry. Don't worry about nursing too much. Nurse all the time. Really. That's how you build your milk supply. I would always nurse completely on demand for the first18 months or so before trying to taper off at all (though they all started solids at about 6 monthsish). She could be hitting a growth spurt (you didn't say how old she is) and they get very hungry at those points. I remember times when my little ones would nurse for 2-3 hours, sleep for half an hour, and then nurse for another few hours. I felt like Mommy-the-human-pacifier, but it's normal for a breastfed baby to do that. Don't let anyone tell you it isn't. It helps to have some sort of a sling that they can nurse in, but you get good at doing things one-handed while nursing a baby. Make yourself a nursing basket with a bottle of water, a snack, a good book, perhaps the remote for your tv, and if you have one, a cordless phone, and grab it when you settle down to nurse. Make yourself a comfy little nest, and devote yourself to nursing for a few days. Keep yourself very hydrated -- make sure you drink water every time you sit down to nurse.

Good luck, and feel free to message me.

You will probably get your milk back, but if for some reason you don't, don't be depressed. Your daughter will be fine on a bottle.