Milk monitoring

I don't normally monitor or record how much I pump but I thought I'll need to do it now since now that I'm back to work (can't pump as and when I like). In fact I realised that I'm able to get more milk if I pump on a regular timing basis. A typical day of pumping session will be 1 pump at 7am, 1 pump at close to 1pm, 1 pump at about 7pm and last pump at about 12am. I could not pump during the day since my office building does not have a nursing room dedicated to lactacing mummies. Yes, I go to the nursing in either Suntec or Bugis BHG EVERY lunch hour be it rain or shine. This is how devoted I am to giving breastmilk. I do not join my usual lunch kaki/s anymore. Prefer to have my private time.

Eversince I went back to work 4 weeks ago, I've had to use my frozen stash almost every other day and it was kind of depressing and worrying for me. Then I decided to record how much I expressed each day. I was getting between 415ml to 650ml the second week I returned to work. Lesser on weekends, especially Sundays as I try to latch Princess for her first 1-2 feeds in the morning. Since the volume was barely enough for her consumption, I decided to squeeze in more pump in the evening at about 930pm. Guess what?? The extra session helped to yield more milk! Needless to say, I was elated. I was getting between 540ml to a whopping 740ml in the third week. That was a brand new record. I have never ever gotten so much milk before. The forth week (this) was great. Since my supply had increased, I was getting minimum of 660ml each day. Friday's "collection" was 775ml and I didn't even manage to squeeze in the evening session. Hehe... so no more worrying about not enough milk. I'm freezing some which Princess not able to finish. At the same time, I also use frozen ones once every few days just to "rotate". I try not to keep frozen ones over 2 months eventhough I've read that frozen milk can be kept up to 3 months. By the way, I mix thawed milk with fresh. Thawed milk have this slight fishy/rancid smell so by mixing, Princess can't tell the difference and she will gladly drink it.

The intention of my post is to encourage new mummies who think they are not producing enough milk to express/latch more often to establish the milk supply. It's not easy I know. Took me a good 5 weeks to properly latch Princess (more or less lost it before 3 months anyway) and 5-6 weeks before she was able to be on total breastmilk. Before I also had to supplement with formula milk. I'm still in love with my Avent manual. Ameda dual is usually for my first pump or when Avent is not yet washed and sterilised.