Antenatal Expressing of Colostrum - My Experience of Colostrum Harvesting

This week I'm writing my colostrum harvesting 34 weeks pregnant entry much later than planned. I've had a very busy couple of weeks where I've been handing over at work to a lovely lady who is covering my maternity leave and also I've been very busy nesting and organising stuff around the house in preparation for baby and generally my own sanity! Overall, everything has been fine. I've been feeling ok; a little tired hear and there obviously, because I'm getting much bigger and it's coming towards the end of my pregnancy, which is a very normal set of feelings to experience.  The colostrum I'm expressing has increased quite a lot in volume which is due to my diet. I've recently been more interested in eating sugary and fatty things like chocolates, hobnob biscuits, slices of bread with Nutella, oat biscuit bars and raiding the sweetie tin frequently!  I've also had a few tired days. One day I wasn't able to express and just wanted to slee

So, I'm 32 weeks pregnant now with my second baby and I've been expressing colostrum roughly every other day since week 27 to relieve breast discomfort and to provide a small stash for my baby which will greatly help with breastfeeding and minimising baby's weight loss in the first few weeks. It's been going really well so far and I've experienced no issues or any signs or pre-term labour, which is a risk for some women.  From this point in my pregnancy, I've decided to express once a day as I'm now a bit closer to my due date and want to gradually start to increase colostrum production, however I must emphasize that I'll be taking a very gradual approach , so as not to induce any signs or symptoms of preterm labour. At week 36, most medical sources online say you can start expressing colostrum 2-3 times a day which is what I plan to do when I reach that stage in my pregnancy. At 32 weeks pregnant, I'll continue to hand express instead of