Breastfeeding

There's no denying the benefits of breastfeeding. But it takes alot of effort, willpower, time and energy to breastfeed exclusively for at least 6 months as recommended by WHO. Be it latching baby directly or pumping to feed.. i prefer direct latch but then i wouldn't know how much baby drank, and he seems to be hungry soon yet again. But when i pump, now at day 19 post-partum, i can get 120ml from both breasts, more from my right side.. Half the time, he would latch on one side and fall asleep. Sometimes i would switch sides then he is good to rest.. by latching, i also don't hqve to wash up pump parts after that, saves time, water and energy.. babies can latch for anything from 1 minute to an hour, so be warned.. at night, to save your energy and sanity, do occasionally top up with formula milk. My boy is up  2-3 hourly and feeds between 3am to 7am seem like never-ending and felt like i never slept a wink, as after feeds are the mandatory burps, and poops.. and each cycle takes about an hour each time.. it leaves you a panda before 2 weeks is up.. relatives dont even need to go to Mandai to see the ones loaned from China ...

Power pumping

They are supposedly the way to go for building your supply, but it's too time consuming so I didn't follow it through. I got by with just enough and then topped up with formula.. less stressful.. at one point, I had quite a stash because I was pumping and storing , baby had jaundice and giving formula milk was the trick for clearing the jaundice as breast milk compounds inhibited breaking down of the jaundice stuff.. when I cleared jaundice and went full on breastmilk, the stash disappeared and so did money for milk powder.. At some point, I got lazy so supply dwindled.. but it's ok, i did mix feeding for my gal and she's growing up fine, so I'm gonna aim to do the same for my boy til about 6 - 7 months as well. 

There's lots of info out there about breastfeeding, building supply, two useful info from the internet for reference. 

Do note that when breastfeeding, the diet is highly important. What goes in comes out as milk for your baby. So do watch it. Some baby are more sensitive than others, a little more broccoli or chocolate can cause a gassy tummy and whiny baby for the day. 

I got a US set Phillips Avent dual electric pump from Amazon back in 2013. Using it till now, but the wire is a little spoilt because I curl it quite tightly after use and also when i pump in the office it gets snapped in the doorway and the socket outside the door. I've gotten a Spectra M9 from Qoo10 which works quite ok, Best thing is that it's portable, quiet but less powerful than the Avent. I've also tried the MEdela Swing Maxi from my colleague when I forgot to bring my pump to office or when my Avent broke down, very small and handy too but needs a power source. Do research around before you find your preferred pump. A good one will take you a long way.. Happy pumping :)