Foremilk! Hindmilk! Baby MUST feed for 20 minutes a side.

“You need to nurse for 20 minutes on the first side and then move baby to the other side for twenty minutes.” Did anyone ever tell you this? What if your baby only nursed for ten minutes? Did you ask what would happen? I suspect you may have been told that is not long enough for your baby to get the hindmilk (higher fat milk). Is 20 minutes that magic “long enough” time frame? What if baby wanted to be there for 25 minutes? What happens then? Do you have no more milk?  

Have you ever expressed breastmilk? What does it look like? Have you expressed more than one time? Did your milk look the same each time? I suspect it varied from thin, watery and blue, to yellow and thick. Did you notice a difference with the time of the day you pumped? How about before a feed or after a feed?

What does the research say?  In point form the basics are:

·   As the baby feeds the content of the milk the baby receives is higher in fat

·   Each feeding can vary in fat content

·  The fattiest part of one feed might actually contain the same fat content of the start of another feed

·  Milk is milk; no real need to differentiate foremilk and hindmilk. Some is more concentrated, some less so, but your baby needs it all.

·   Babies all stay at the breast for different lengths of time and what satisfies them varies

·   The breast is not a reservoir. It is never “out” of milk. If babe hangs out nursing more milk will “let down”. It will flow faster if you switched breast, perhaps, but there is no rule to have to take a baby off one side to put him on the other

 

Is there a time when we might pay more attention to foremilk and hindmilk?

·  Is there an issue with baby sleeping at the breast?

·  Is there an issue with baby being fussy at the breast?

·  Is there an issue with babes weight?

·  Is baby swallowing at breast?

·  Is baby relaxed, with wide open hands and content at the end of feeds or no?

If there are any of these types of concerns, seek out an IBCLC to address the concerns. It may be somewhat related to the so called foremilk/hindmilk. It can sometimes be ONE factor to take into account for the whole picture when some of the above issues are seen. But it would not solely be a foremilk/hindmilk issue.