Occasionally I have heard of the milk supply reducing when a mother is ill, especially if the mother’s illness causes her to become dehydrated herself. In all these cases the supply has bounced back up again once the mother is on the mend and feeling well again.
Once your milk supply is established the way breastfeeding works is that you replace the milk removed. When we talk about a low supply – it isn’t really that you have no more milk but rather that the flow of milk has reduced. Babies get used to the rate off flow of their mothers whether this is fast or slow. (This is way giving bottles is a problem as the rate of flow from the bottle is often faster than from the mother – especially in the second part of the feed.) If for some reason, like being ill, the flow decreases and it takes the baby longer to get the milk, some babies will complain.
The way to increase the flow rate (commonly known as increase the supply) is to get the baby to feed on the empty breast. This might be difficult it f the baby isn’t cooperative.
One way is to try as the baby is sleepy – sleepy babies are often happier to suck on a slow flowing breast.
If supplementing is required I’d suggest using a lactation aid, supply line or a supplementer (all the same thing but different names!)
There are instructions for using a supplementer at,
http://www.breastfeedingonline.com/5.html
There is also a video on the web page
http://www.breastfeedingonline.com/newman.shtml
Under the title Lactation Aid.
(In this video Dr Newman just uses the tube and puts it straight into the bottle. This works just as well as the Supplementer that Medela sell but it doesn't look as nice. Obviously for Medela to sell them to mothers more design had to go into it!)
If you want to buy a supplementer ask for "Supplemental Nursing System" or a SNS.
There is a picture of one at
http://www.meridianhk.com.hk/special_feeding_main.html
Medela also sell the feeding tube #8F and you can just get this and use the same method as Dr. Jack Newman if you want.
This allows all the feeding to be done at the breast and so will keep the baby at the breast even though the flow has slowed down – thus building it up again.
If you have any questions about this please call me at 2548-7636
Best wishes,
SARAH