Hell hath no fury like that of a hungry baby. So, mama, let us make sure that you are appropriately armed for battle.
This post covers nursing pillows, nursing bras, comfy seating, bottles, bottle warmers and burp cloths.
If you are exclusively breastfeeding all you need are your boobs, nursing bras and a nursing pillow. I used the My Brest Friend. Why do you need a nursing pillow? Why can't you use the abundance of pillows and cushions that you have strewn about the house? Allow me to paint you a picture. It is feed time. Your infant is making her presence felt in no uncertain terms. Folks living in the next county are aware that the baby wants food and wants it right now. Your boobs are responding, letting down and possibly, to add to the fun, leaking. You have the little squaller in one arm, you sit down and start to build your nest. You need pillows to rest your arm on. A pillow to put your baby on (unless you have really large boobs that will reach down to your tiny baby). A pillow at your back. So, you start to pile them up. Sometimes they stay put. Sometimes they playfully fall over. Your baby turns it up a notch. You break into a cold sweat. You finally get into position and start the feed only to discover that the pillows were squishier than you thought and you don't have the support you need and you are losing feeling in your arm and with your luck this will be one of those dreaded forty minute feeds. And just wait until your baby is done with one boob and you need to offer her the other, pausing mid feed to readjust the nest. This is the stuff of nightmares.
Get a nursing pillow. It will be money well spent. This is what the My Brest Friend looks like:
I liked this pillow because it was nice and firm. You buckle the pillow around your waist and you're off to the races, arm and baby nicely supported. It even has a nifty pocket for you to stash burp cloths and your phone. You can stand up to burp your baby and the pillow just stays around your waist for you to continue the feed on either boob.
There will be spit ups and that cover will need to be washed. It is really, really difficult to get it on and off the pillow. I'm talking twenty minutes of struggling, cursing and sweating to make two inches of progress. Then I went to a breastfeeding group meetup and discovered that you can get this slick, waterproof cover for the pillow. It prevents the foam from getting ruined and makes it a snap to slide the other soft cover on and off.
On to nursing bras. First off, what exactly is a nursing bra? It is a bra that gives you access to your breasts without requiring you to take off your bra. How does it accomplish this magical task? The front flap of the bra, the part that goes over your breasts, is attached to the shoulder strap of the bra via a little hook. Unhook said hook, and voila! You will be spending a lot, practically all, your time in a nursing bra for as long as your breastfeed or pump. You don't want to make the girls who are keeping your baby alive slum it, so allocating a healthy part of your budget to this purchase is a good idea. I own five different brands of nursing bras. The clear winner is the Bravado Seamless nursing bra. It took me a while to get used to these bras - I was used to bras that had altogether less material (e.g. these ones have 5 hooks at the back. 5. 5!) - but over time I have come to love the support, feel and sheer hardiness of these bras. The Bella Materna is the most comfortable nursing bra of all - but it has two significant drawbacks. One, it is hard to use in conjunction with a pumping bra and two, it looks lumpy under clothes. The other bras I tried were various brands from Target - much cheaper but nowhere near as comfortable and none of them lasted anyway near as long as the Bravado bras.
Ok, lets talk bottles.
If you are going to supplement with a bottle, or bottle feed, you'll need a bottle. If you are breastfeeding and bottle feeding you will want a bottle with a nipple that most closely approximates the breast. If you get a bottle that requires too little effort to extract the milk, your baby is going to be a smarty pants, take the easy route and reject your breast forevermore. Also, a breast fed baby is not initially a fan of a synthetic nipple, so the closer you can get to the breast the more likely your baby will switch back and forth. At the lactation class I went to they recommended a number of bottles for breast feeding babies. Sadly, I don't remember the entire list. I know that two bottles that were on the list were Tommee Tippee and Comotomo, both with the slow flow nipples. We tried both with my daughter, and, to my dismay, she much preferred the pricier Comotomo. You might be lucky enough to birth a more frugal minded infant.
You can't use a microwave to heat a bottle. A microwave can create hot spots that may burn the baby and heating a bottle on the stove is a pain in the ass if you are holding a baby in one hand or if you need to do it in the middle of the night. Get yourself a bottle warmer.
If you do end up with the Comotomo (aka the chubbiest bottle known to mankind) note that it will not fit into Dr. Browns bottle warmer. It took some finding, but the Kiinde Kozii warmer is what you need for the Comotomo bottles. Sadly, it is much pricier than other bottle warmers.
You're going to be doing a lot of feeding. A lot of rocking. All through the day and through the most unholy hours of the night. Where will you sit for these events? By your bed? In the nursery? And what will you sit on? We used a Storytime chair. You could visit your local baby store and sit on a few. Or consider the (very ugly but oh so comfy) La-Z-Boy chairs. My point is this: you need a plan, so spend some time thinking about this one.
The only other thing you need are burp cloths. Lots and lots of them. You can buy them or just repurpose any old cloths you have at home. Just make sure you have them in abundance because there will be spit ups and you don't want to get spit ups on your clothes. Spit ups smell much, much worse than you would expect. Nasty stuff.
I'm afraid I can't help you with infant formula because I didn't have to use any. I can tell you this though (at the risk of sounding condescending, but I didn't know this B.E*, so I'm really just trying to be helpful), you can't feed your baby milk from any animal source and you can't feed your baby water. It has to be formula intended for an infant.
Happy Feeding! I wish you a huge, quick burps, the smallest spit ups and a satiated sleeping baby.
* before-ETSMN, pronounced ets-min, the Event-That-Stretched-My-Nethers
This post covers nursing pillows, nursing bras, comfy seating, bottles, bottle warmers and burp cloths.
If you are exclusively breastfeeding all you need are your boobs, nursing bras and a nursing pillow. I used the My Brest Friend. Why do you need a nursing pillow? Why can't you use the abundance of pillows and cushions that you have strewn about the house? Allow me to paint you a picture. It is feed time. Your infant is making her presence felt in no uncertain terms. Folks living in the next county are aware that the baby wants food and wants it right now. Your boobs are responding, letting down and possibly, to add to the fun, leaking. You have the little squaller in one arm, you sit down and start to build your nest. You need pillows to rest your arm on. A pillow to put your baby on (unless you have really large boobs that will reach down to your tiny baby). A pillow at your back. So, you start to pile them up. Sometimes they stay put. Sometimes they playfully fall over. Your baby turns it up a notch. You break into a cold sweat. You finally get into position and start the feed only to discover that the pillows were squishier than you thought and you don't have the support you need and you are losing feeling in your arm and with your luck this will be one of those dreaded forty minute feeds. And just wait until your baby is done with one boob and you need to offer her the other, pausing mid feed to readjust the nest. This is the stuff of nightmares.
Get a nursing pillow. It will be money well spent. This is what the My Brest Friend looks like:
I liked this pillow because it was nice and firm. You buckle the pillow around your waist and you're off to the races, arm and baby nicely supported. It even has a nifty pocket for you to stash burp cloths and your phone. You can stand up to burp your baby and the pillow just stays around your waist for you to continue the feed on either boob.
There will be spit ups and that cover will need to be washed. It is really, really difficult to get it on and off the pillow. I'm talking twenty minutes of struggling, cursing and sweating to make two inches of progress. Then I went to a breastfeeding group meetup and discovered that you can get this slick, waterproof cover for the pillow. It prevents the foam from getting ruined and makes it a snap to slide the other soft cover on and off.
On to nursing bras. First off, what exactly is a nursing bra? It is a bra that gives you access to your breasts without requiring you to take off your bra. How does it accomplish this magical task? The front flap of the bra, the part that goes over your breasts, is attached to the shoulder strap of the bra via a little hook. Unhook said hook, and voila! You will be spending a lot, practically all, your time in a nursing bra for as long as your breastfeed or pump. You don't want to make the girls who are keeping your baby alive slum it, so allocating a healthy part of your budget to this purchase is a good idea. I own five different brands of nursing bras. The clear winner is the Bravado Seamless nursing bra. It took me a while to get used to these bras - I was used to bras that had altogether less material (e.g. these ones have 5 hooks at the back. 5. 5!) - but over time I have come to love the support, feel and sheer hardiness of these bras. The Bella Materna is the most comfortable nursing bra of all - but it has two significant drawbacks. One, it is hard to use in conjunction with a pumping bra and two, it looks lumpy under clothes. The other bras I tried were various brands from Target - much cheaper but nowhere near as comfortable and none of them lasted anyway near as long as the Bravado bras.
Ok, lets talk bottles.
If you are going to supplement with a bottle, or bottle feed, you'll need a bottle. If you are breastfeeding and bottle feeding you will want a bottle with a nipple that most closely approximates the breast. If you get a bottle that requires too little effort to extract the milk, your baby is going to be a smarty pants, take the easy route and reject your breast forevermore. Also, a breast fed baby is not initially a fan of a synthetic nipple, so the closer you can get to the breast the more likely your baby will switch back and forth. At the lactation class I went to they recommended a number of bottles for breast feeding babies. Sadly, I don't remember the entire list. I know that two bottles that were on the list were Tommee Tippee and Comotomo, both with the slow flow nipples. We tried both with my daughter, and, to my dismay, she much preferred the pricier Comotomo. You might be lucky enough to birth a more frugal minded infant.
You can't use a microwave to heat a bottle. A microwave can create hot spots that may burn the baby and heating a bottle on the stove is a pain in the ass if you are holding a baby in one hand or if you need to do it in the middle of the night. Get yourself a bottle warmer.
If you do end up with the Comotomo (aka the chubbiest bottle known to mankind) note that it will not fit into Dr. Browns bottle warmer. It took some finding, but the Kiinde Kozii warmer is what you need for the Comotomo bottles. Sadly, it is much pricier than other bottle warmers.
You're going to be doing a lot of feeding. A lot of rocking. All through the day and through the most unholy hours of the night. Where will you sit for these events? By your bed? In the nursery? And what will you sit on? We used a Storytime chair. You could visit your local baby store and sit on a few. Or consider the (very ugly but oh so comfy) La-Z-Boy chairs. My point is this: you need a plan, so spend some time thinking about this one.
The only other thing you need are burp cloths. Lots and lots of them. You can buy them or just repurpose any old cloths you have at home. Just make sure you have them in abundance because there will be spit ups and you don't want to get spit ups on your clothes. Spit ups smell much, much worse than you would expect. Nasty stuff.
I'm afraid I can't help you with infant formula because I didn't have to use any. I can tell you this though (at the risk of sounding condescending, but I didn't know this B.E*, so I'm really just trying to be helpful), you can't feed your baby milk from any animal source and you can't feed your baby water. It has to be formula intended for an infant.
Happy Feeding! I wish you a huge, quick burps, the smallest spit ups and a satiated sleeping baby.
* before-ETSMN, pronounced ets-min, the Event-That-Stretched-My-Nethers
