All Our Best Nursing & Pumping Advice
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As you know, after the recent survey we decided to mix up the morning post schedule a bit. Now it’s basically a two-week schedule, with Maternity Monday alternating with Nursing/Pumping Tuesday. We already have a little sentence with links that we run on Maternity Mondays to direct pregnant readers to older “dressing professional while pregnant” advice — and since nursing/pumping posts will be only once every two weeks, I decided to direct readers to all our best nursing and pumping advice for working moms. So: I spent yesterday morning consolidating all the links and making two pages, one focused on Nursing Clothes for Working Moms, and one focused on Tips for Pumping at the Office. Please check them out! (Both pages are also linked on our “Start Here – Best of CorporetteMoms” page.)
For discussion today: Is there any aspect of these topics (nursing or pumping, or breastfeeding vs. formula feeding in general) that you’d like addressed in more detail, or updated? (Readers who formula-fed their babies exclusively or combined breastfeeding and formula-feeding: anyone care to write a guest post with tips?) I know readers have shared tips on pumping in your car — should we turn that into a post so it’s easier to find? (I think one reader in particular broke it down, and we don’t have an email address for her — if you’re reading, MAY we turn your advice on pumping in the car into a post?)
If you’re curious for the whole new CorporetteMoms morning post schedule, this is what we’re going to try for a while:
Week 1:
- Maternity Monday
- Accessory Tuesday
- Washable Wednesday
- Budget Thursday
- Family Friday
Week 2:
- Beauty & Makeup Monday
- Nursing/Pumping/Postpartum Tuesday
- Washable Wednesday
- Organizing Thursday
- Family Friday
There was a lot of interest in adding recipes in general to the content mix, which Kate and I may try adding into each Weekly News Update. As I’ve noted in the past, my own recipes are repetitive, non-photo-friendly, super-lazy dinners (“dump chicken breasts, salsa, chicken broth, and two cans of beans into crockpot. Eight hours later, put into bowls and add cheese and sour cream as desired.”), and recipe/food blogging is an entirely different thing (with different tech to make recipes printable, different social media, etc.) that ultimately I don’t think is my main strength. But we will try to add in some Recipe Open Threads on a regular basis as well for you guys to discuss and share.
Sales of note for 2/14/25 (Happy Valentine’s Day!):
(See all of the latest workwear sales at Corporette!)
- Nordstrom – Winter Sale, up to 60% off! 7850 new markdowns for women
- Ann Taylor – Up to 40% off your full-price purchase — and extra 60% off sale
- Banana Republic Factory – 50% off everything + 15% off (readers love their suiting as well as their silky shirts like this one)
- Boden – 15% off new season styles
- Eloquii – 300+ styles $25 and up
- J.Crew – 40% of your purchase – prices as marked
- J.Crew Factory – 50% off entire site and storewide + extra 50% off clearance
- Rothy’s – Final Few: Up to 40% off last-chance styles
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
- Talbots – Flash sale ending soon – markdowns starting from $15, extra 70% off all other markdowns (final sale)
And — here are some of our latest threadjacks of interest – working mom questions asked by the commenters!
- The concept of “backup care” is so stupid…
- I need tips on managing employees in BigLaw who have to leave for daycare pickup…
- I’m thinking of leaning out to spend more time with my family – how can I find the perfect job for that?
- I’m now a SAHM and my husband needs to step up…
- How can I change my thinking to better recognize some of my husband’s contributions as important, like organizing the shed?
- What are your tips to having a good weekend with kids, especially with little kids? Do you have a set routine or plan?
I AM LOVING how many posters here EBF’d #1 and are planning on combo-feeding w/ #2. My second mat leave will be much, much shorter than my first and I’m likely going to take this route as well (also because, hey, sleep is awesome and being a sleepless martyr is the pits). Such a great counter-narrative, I love it.
Yes please to combo feeding tips! I EBFed my son, now two years later pregnant again and considering combo feeding to reduce the stress on me and to make sure dad can bond with the baby faster/better than he did with our son. I got up every night with our son for 11 months and not sure I can handle that again.
Also a day late to this conversation – I had to exclusively pump for months as my baby wouldn’t latch. Get a pump that doesn’t have to be plugged in. I have the Spectra S1, but I know there are others. I bought it based on advice I got here and am so glad I did!
Just getting to this now – but does anyone have advice on how to broach the combo-feeding subject with a pediatrician who is militantly pro-EBF? I was all excited about a specific practice in my town (recommended by my OB, spoke to a mom who was a nurse there and whose kid went there from birth) but their website is intimidating to say the least when it comes to EBF. It actually said something like “breastfeeding means fewer pediatrician visits in baby’s first year!”
Like if I have to resort to formula I’m going to make my kid sick? Or if my kid gets sick it’s my fault for not being able to EBF?? I know they mean that EBF = better immune system for baby, but it came off very judgmental. I plan to EBF but who knows what the future brings.
Someone asked recently and got good feedback on dealing with the hospital/OB if you want to formula feed from the start but I haven’t seen much on dealing with pediatricians.
Would love to read tips, tricks and hacks for prepping bottles for daycare. With my first, I remember the endless slog every morning of making up bottles until our daycare provider told us to just bring the water, and can of powder and she would mix it. Hallelujah! My second baby is 3 months old now. I went back to work when he was a week old and luckily my mother has been helping to watch him, so she takes care of the bottles. But I’m always forgetting to defrost milk!
Also tips for washing and organizing bottles and pump parts. I feel as if half my kitchen counter is being taken over with bottles and pump parts.
Suggestions for stylish pumping bags? How to travel with formula?
I’m combo feeding my 4.5 month old. I had a breast reduction in high school and while I’ve never regretted it, my milk supply isn’t and never will be great. At this point I’m almost exclusively pumping (my milk comes out so slowly and the baby gets impatient) and my daughter gets 14-17 oz breast milk plus morning nursing, and the rest formula. I’ve found almost no resources on combo feeding despite the fact that so so many of my friends and colleagues combo feed. Would really love a feature on this! I was so sad about it at the beginning and cried with every bottle of formula, but it’s been such a good decision for our family. I love that my daughter gets the benefits of breast milk but the pressure is off me to produce every calorie she ingests.
I credit this site with being a big part of the reason I’m approaching 11 months EBF my son. So many of my questions and concerns have been addressed with common sense and compassion on here. I experienced a big supply issue around 6 months that had me in tears, and the good advice and permission – if you can call it that – to rely on formula if needed got me through it. We ended up being able to address it and bounce back, but having this group (and not just my husband) tell me I’m not a failure was really helpful. Also, I recently posted about how frustrated I am with pumping and I’m so over it and how I need to push myself to pump more than once a day and people all chimed in with, “Why not pump once a day?” And I have been, and it’s been awesome.
Having an outside perspective, a nonjudgmental one, especially from those experiencing it alongside me (or having experienced it in the past) has really been amazing for me. So grateful to all of you and Kat!
With DD1 we combo fed from birth, my supply never established well in part to due a major hemorrhage after birth, and in part due to DD1 being jaundiced, and not wanting to put in the effort to breastfeed. (and it took me more than a year to stop blaming myself for that. The guilt associated with not EBF is a beast. I wish I had more supportive resources about combo feeding in those early days.)
With DD2, I’ve been able to EBF, and pump enough to maintain this. While this has been great for our budget, DH is missing out on some of the shared baby feeding duties. While I can pump and DH can give her a bottle when I’m away, she won’t take a bottle if I’m nearby. We had split baby feeding duties so much more evenly with DD1, and he’s missing out on some of that bonding time.
We’ve got enough parenting duties to go around with 2 kids that this hasn’t really changed the overall distribution of our parenting duties, but I can see how easily with a first kid the bulk of the parenting could fall to Mom because Dad can’t do the middle of the night bottle. Apart from all of the hows and wheres of nursing, if you’re looking to have a more equal parenting set up, there’s a lot to be said about formula/combo feeding.
I’m a mama who has been supplementing with formula since my baby was born, due to low supply & also breastfeeding issues. I feel stuck between two worlds – I’m not exclusively breastfeeding but I’m not solely giving formula. I have a pumping system that seems to finally work, after I tried numerous electric and manual pumps, plus various supplements. I’d be happy to write about my routine now around pumping and supplementing, and give reviews on the pumps that I’ve tried.
i’d be interested in reviews on the newest breast pumps coming out from those that have tried them. i asked last month about the naya and no one seemed to have tried it. the willow also looks intriguing.
I’d be happy to write a guest post on my wonderful experience combo feeding on purpose.
The assumption is that “everybody” will try to EBF, and combo feed only as a last resort, with the formula served with a side of tears and extreme guilt. As a result, there is almost no information on how to do it on purpose, and what’s out there is really paternalistic, like you don’t know what’s best for yourself and your family. I just had a great experience with it and would be happy to write about that.
I think it would also be helpful for someone who exclusively used formula from the beginning to write a post about how that went, how the milk-drying out process went, why she decided to go that route, etc.
Maybe a post about the differences between the different types of formula? And nifty inventions like those formula on the go sticks that are kind of like “crystal light for babies” as my childless friend called them. I didn’t use those all the time, but they were great to stick in the diaper bag when I was traveling, etc.