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Myths About Breast Pumping

A breast pump is the best thing that has been invented for mothers who need to feed their babies with breast milk. This device helps to pump and store the milk to ensure a baby is fell fed when a mother is away. However, all its advantages are over-shadowed with various myths with regard to its usage.

Popular Myths

Pumping is not breastfeeding

Some believe they are not really breastfeeding when the milk is pumped and bottle fed. It is the same thing and a baby could be bottle fed by holding close your breast. The father is also able to assist in the feeding process and bond with his baby.

Pumping is Painful

It takes a little while to get used to pumping it correctly. If the device is operated the correct way, pumping will not cause any breast pain unless the nipples are sore or cracked. The device should be started with shallow pumping and gradually increased according to one’s comfort zone.

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Sharing breast Pump

A breast pump is considered as a single-user medical device by health authorities and recommended not be shared to avoid the risk of cross-contamination and sometimes the performance of the device’s motor could also get hindered.

Reduction in milk supply

Pumping increases the flow of milk and the best way to achieve this is by pumping in between feeds. In reality, a mother’s body is capable of producing more milk according to a baby’s demand or pumping.

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Bottle fed breast milk result in breast rejection by baby

The perfect way to avoid such a crisis is to ensure baby is soundly accustomed to breast milk before being introduced to the bottle. Once the nursing goes smoothly, switching from breast and bottle becomes easy.

Breastfeeding ends when a mother goes back to work

Exclusive breastfeeding or breast milk for the first six months and continued thereafter for 2 years and beyond has been recommended by the World Health Organization. With assistance from your workplace, pumping can help continue your milk supply and breastfeed your baby along with the pumped out breast milk when your away at work.

Baby will not get enough antibodies from bottle fed breast milk

As per research, it is a known fact that when a baby comes in contact with the mother during breastfeeding, it produces antibodies in the breast milk to increase baby’s immunity. However, even if a baby is fed by bottle, skin-to-skin connections such as kissing, hugging, cuddling or breathing the same air helps a mother’s body to react and produce the required antibodies in the breast milk.

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Stored Milk is Unhealthy

Although there is a difference between direct breastfeeding and stored bottle feeding breast milk, loss of nutrition could be minimized by storing the milk according to proper guidelines such as refrigerated in sterilized glass or BPA-free bottle and thawed before feeding. Always remember not to reheat, refreeze or microwave and feed milk that has been used once before.

Breast pumping hampers Mother and baby’s bonding

It is a common fact that not all mothers are not able to breastfeed their babies. However, they are able to do all other acts such as cuddling, bathing, and much more body contact with a baby which produce oxytocin that helps to strengthen the bond between mother and baby.

Author Info

Ross Wallace