How do you know when to quit pumping?

[bowies]

My supply has tanked. I'm trying to recover it but I'm not hopeful. I pump about the equivalent of one bottle a day when I'm at work. I've really never been able to keep up with DS since he's been at daycare so we have combo fed for the past 3 months. We are at a point now where he's getting more formula than breast milk, even at home.

I don't want to be done. I'm very emotional about it. I don't think he's ready to be done either. If I back off pumping at work can I still feed him mornings and nights? How can I know if my supply will completely disappear or not?

I think 90% of this is my sorrow that the first year has flown by (he's 9 months). Head pats? Advice?

[rbp]

I have a lot of the same feelings as you. I can nurse at home with no problem, but pumping is becoming an exercise in futility. I kind of want to quit pumping, but I'm not prepared to give up nursing...sigh.  (hug)bowies (hug2)

[badtzmaru22]

I'm wondering the same thing. It's my second kid, and I'm a good pumper, but I just effing hate it. I'm about to go all Office Space printer on it. DS is 8mo.

[demandypants]

If you don't like pumping quit. I nursed DD in the morning, after work and before bed from 12 to about 18 months after I quit work - day pumping. You have done a great job, don't feel guilty over backing away from the pumping

[mcfelix]

It was very hard for me to stop. I could barely keep up with what DS needed and it was really stressing me out. I finally realized my mental health was suffering. I felt so guilty about it but after one day of giving him one bottle of formula at daycare, his teachers said he was fine with it. That made me feel so much better. Ending pumping was really life changing for me. I was so much happier and less stressed once I stopped. I stopped pumping a little after 8 months and just stopped nursing at 20 months.

Eta - pat yourself on the back for pumping as long as you did. It's tough! What's most important is that your little one is happy and cared for, not where he gets his milk.

[ssmjlm]

You can quit pumping and keep nursing. I stopped pumping at 10.5m and we stills nursed at home and weekends no problem until 14m.

[runblondie26]

I stopped pumping around 8 months. I was getting maybe 8oz total from 4 pumping sessions a day.

It was the middle of the summer and I was half marathon training, so keeping up with my hydration was problematic and probably played into it. I was just ready to be done.

[fallriverjenn]

I think the thought of stopping pumping is so much worse than actually stopping. Nothing is better than that first day of work without the pump.

[arch01]

My already low supply was going down even further. It was time. I was getting half of what I had been and it wasn't worth the effort for only producing 30% of his daily intake.

Whatever you decide-don't feel like you failed. You're not quitting. You're stopping. You have succeeded-be proud of that.

[hockeywife]

I stopped pumping when I really, really started to resent it. I was pumping 2 times at work and barely getting enough for 1 bottle. It was stressing me out and making me miserable. It just wasn't worth it to me.

I still pumped at home for a while, so my supply was still there, despite dropping the mid-day sessions.

[VillainV]

I stopped pumping at work about 2 months ago. It was getting harder and harder with my schedule, and I just kind of hit a wall. My supply was okay, but emotionally I was just done.

At that point I had enough in the freezer for one bottle of BM a day until about a week ago (about two weeks shy of his first birthday), and the rest has been formula.

We still BF after work and on nights and weekends with no issues. It was a great compromise for me. BFing at those times is still going great!

[Deleted]

I quit pumping about 2 months ago when DD started refusing bottles. I still nurse mornings, evenings, and weekends. It really was wonderful to stop pumping!

[motzie]

When you are killing yourself to get an ounce or two, it's time to stop. By the end I was pumping for an hour to get such a tiny amount of milk. I wanted to keep going but it was a losing battle and I was making myself crazy over it. It was such a relief to not have that stress anymore when I finally stopped.

[smock]

Mar 26, 2015 20:59:52 GMT -5 @starry said:

anecdotally I think a lot of people quit around the 9-10 month mark because of big pumping output drops.

I definitely saw a big drop in output right around the 9 month mark; I ended up pulling from my freezer stash but calculating that it wouldn't last me until she was 1 year at that rate.

However, my supply did come back up a bit and now at 10 months I'm typically just barely able to cover her daycare bottles (which is not a lot; she eats 8oz at daycare) in 2-3 pumps. 

So it might be a temporary dip--but really, you should quit if the pumping isn't worth it any more. 

[Queen Mamadala]

How much of both is he getting? Does he regularly eat solids?

I pumped for 5.5 months with ds2. I also nursed at night and in the morning, but the bulk of his feeding were from pumped milk. Then I stopped pumping (really disliked it), weaned my right breast (he refused that side due to its dysfunctional letdown), and nursed from my left breast and supplemented roughly 10-12 oz a day with formula.

Toward the end of pumping, from 5-5.5 months, I pumped four times a day and got 28 oz or so (the bulk from my left side). He nursed from my left 6+ times a day and received formula until 12 months or so.

You can certainly still breastfeed if you have to stop pumping and switch to formula. You can nurse at night and in the mornings. My son was a one-sided nurser until 21 months.

I also exclusively nurse from my left and supplement with my LO. Pretty much the same thing I did before.

[magpie]

I quit pumping when DD was about 10 months. I had already been combo feedings to keep up with her demand (usually, I could pump 2-3 of her bottles and she took 1-2 more bottled of formula/day at daycare). For me, I had already set a goal (to get through a school year) and decided that I was not going to pump after coming back from summer break. I still nursed her when we were together until she was 13.5 months old, when she weaned. I'm not sure how much she was getting from me during those post-pumping months, but she had bottles of formula during the day on the weekends (I tried once to nurse her through the weekends, but she seemed really hungry, so I think not pumping did change my daytime supply), nursed mornings and evenings and ate lots of solids and continued to grow and seem generally satisfied with life. I'm happy with how it worked out.