Aunty Lactivist is all of us, people with experience or ideas that might help, or even words of support can mean a lot to someone having breastfeeding problems – please add any helpful ideas to the comments.

These are some responses from the Lactivist Facebook page:

• Expressing isn’t a true indication of how much milk you make and you can never, really tell how much your child makes. The best way to increase supply is to feed feed feed.

• Just follow baby’s lead. Allow unrestricted access to the breast 24/7 & forget expressing. Just keep putting the baby to the breast.

• Oats! Work wonders. Also if you are expressing then that isn’t a true indication of the volume your baby is getting as bfing is much more efficient than expressing. Don’t worry, your supply is still building itself up.
• Baby only has a tiny tummy so doesn’t need a lot of milk yet. But its all about supply and demand. The more you feed or express the more you will make.
• don’t drink peppermint tea. could reduce milk supply

• If you are pumping and using that as in indication of supply, that is a very bad idea. A pump and a baby are not the same thing at all. You child could very well be getting much more milk than that. You should never assume your supply is how much you pump. Some women respond better to the pump than others and no pump is as good as a baby at extracting milk. At 3 weeks, 2 ounces a session is a actually a lot. In fact, it’s right inside the normal range for pumping overall. A child’s stomach is only as large as her fist. Some children do not eat more than 2 ounces per feeding their entire first year. I would encourage you to just relax and nurse your child. The best way to up supply is by letting your baby stimulate your breast and just plain nurse as often as they want! If you are pumping to build a supply, that is fine but there really isn’t any other reason to be doing it this early. You should offer one breast and wait for the baby to unlatch and the offer the other, she may or may not take it. Watch the baby, not the clock. If you are pumping to build a supply for an early return to work, oatmeal, lactation cookies, staying hydrated, and mother’s milk tea can all help. Usually fenugreek is a really good way to up supply, make sure you are taking the recommended amount. But as I said before, the amount you pump is not necessarily the amount your child is getting and if you want to make more milk, you should nurse your child as often as you can.
• Plenty of wet nappies is a good indication that baby is getting enough.

• you always express less than when baby is suckling so as long as bub is putting on weight and is healthy then just keep feeding

• that amount is completely normal! The breast pump can only take a certain amount out of the breast. baby, in reality, is way more efficent at retrieving milk. That’s the amount i pumped at that exact time and i have a healthy breastfed nine month old

• Is your supply really low? U must determine that before trying to increase it
  http://www.kellymom.com/bf/supply/low-supply.html#supply

• 2oz is brilliant! Domperidone, available over the counter for nausea is said to increase milk supply and is recomended by some lactation consultants.

• i was only ever getting 1 oz

• expressing is a poor indicator of supply. I’m wondering why you are expressing? Sounds like it could just be causing more stress than it’s worth. Check your baby’s latch – poor latch can mean inefficient feeding which can reduce supply. And then it’s just frequent feeding. The more often yo feed efficiently, the faster your breasts make milk. Are you having any long (3-4h +) gaps between feeds? And check if supply really is an issue. I your baby thriving? Pooing and weeing a lot? Putting on weight? Developing? If so, it’s likely your supply is enough. I’d suggest calling a bf helpline – supply issues are usually too complicated to help with like this. Good luck!

• I have to say, I was getting up to 4 times that much but I had a double pump and a strict pumping regime. I had to pump in the early weeks for my son. I used a hospital grade pump and pumped every 2 hours day and night, didn’t really supplement my diet with anything either, just pumped and had unlimited skin and breast contact. It’s not something I’d personally advise if your baby can feed from you though as over supply can be hard to deal with which is what I had when he finally started feeding.

• Lots of skin to skin cuddles with ur baby n get lots night time bf in too-hormone levels higher at night time,just feed on demand

• ‎2oz is great! Remember also that if you are going by the amount of formula the tins say babies “should” have its probably more than 2oz, but its completely different to bf. If you do want to express more though for whatever reason, you could try pumping at the same time baby is feeding (though i only did this when mine was older, in case he wanted the other side afterwards!)

• 2oz is loads! I’ve been bf for 13 months and after 30 minutes yesterday I managed 1.5oz! I used to be able to express loads when I was pumping every day but I had oversupply. If your LO is only a few weeks old I wouldnt worry about pumping at all just yet and concentrate on establishing your supply at a level to match what LO is taking. Believe me, oversupply is no fun at all so you dont want to start pumping loads.

• Put down the pump and feed your baby.

• Pumping is NOT an indication of supply IF breastfeeding also. 2oz is lots at this early stage. It can take a week to build up enough for a few feeds what is key is to pump the missed bf otherwise supply at that point will drop if it’s a regular feed. Check out pumping mummies on babycentre

  about an hour agoI think (and could be wrong) the poster is nursing and pumping though – so you can’t really expect to get much between feed like that anyway – even with a double electric, etc. If you dont’ need to pump – then don’t.

• Do not worry about supply count diapers