Caffeine and Alcohol While Breastfeeding

Hi S.-
I have 3 children and I have breasfeed all three- still nursing the third. I belive a glass of wine or a cup of caffeine a day is okay. Even my uncle, who is a doctor told me that. Other doctors have told me that a drink here and there is very safe. My girl friends who are nursing as well all agree on this. Breasting feeding is wonderful, but it shouldn't stop you from your few fun drinks. Everything in moderation is the key.
Hope this helps.

L.

Ok, maybe I'm not as careful as others, but I drink coffee every morning. I make myself a cup and a half and it doesn't seem to affect my son. He was not a great daytime sleeper to start (he has just started taking regular naps at 8 months) so I experimented alot with skipping caffeine for a few days or having it to see if it made a difference in his daytime sleep habits and I couldn't dectect any difference. I also occasionally have a diet coke in the afternoon.

As far as alcohol, the breast feeding class I took before I had my first son said I could have 2 glasses of wine, as long as I had 2 big glasses of water with them, and waited an hour or two after before feeding the baby. So far, this has worked fine for me. I often have a glass of wine before I go to bed, the baby nurses around 12:00 or 1:00 (I go to bed at 10:00 usually).

Check with your doctor or midwife, they should have info for you as well.

J.
SAHM to 2 year old Charlie and 8 month old Joey

I gave up them both after giving birth for over a year, but with the arrival of number two, and number one still breastfeeding, I craved just one drink of alcohol. I asked the woman I worked with, who had been teaching pregnant/parenting teens for years, what the most current research said to do. (They always had experts coming in to talk to the girls.)
She said, of course, the best thing to do is not indulge at all. (Cigarettes are the biggest problem for these girls, but alcohol and caffeine are in the same category.)
The next best thing to do is to pump and dump. This is for those who wish to have a night of complete unrestraint.
However, if you would just like "a drink", plan it for when you have just fed the child, so that it has a chance to work out of your system before the next feeding time. I will warn you, however, for a very young infant, feedings happen fairly frequently, so make sure your schedule is pretty well set.

I will drink up to 2 beers after my daughter goes to bed, not every night. She is 6 months old so she sleeps a little longer than a newborn. If Im drinking a lot I will pump and then dump. I read on the Le Leche League website that it can take up to 6 hours to get out of your system if you have a lot. Im not sure what is true but I usually pump a couple of times after I drink a lot. You could ask your doctor, to be on the safe side. If you have a beer just remember it helps increase your milk so you may feel fuller after drinking,especially, if you have a few.

With Caffeine, I would just watch how your baby reacts. I once got a huge latte at 4:00pm and my baby didn't want to go to sleep that night. But, I would usually have a cup or two of the regular stuff in the morning and we'd both be fine. Believe me, you're going to need a pick-me-up those first couple of months. On the Alcohol, you really only need to pump and dump if you feel tipsy right before you go to nurse. Otherwise, one beer or drink isn't going to hurt and you'll probably need one of those once in a while too!!!

I'm very careful. My daughter is 10 months and I've had two outings where I drank 1-2 drinks in the hour and that's it nothing more after those 1-2 drinks. I think if you have more hour after hour you should pump and toss then you should be okay. I just don't like wasting milk so I avoid having more than 2 total drinks when I'm able to go out. Check with a lactation consultant. You can call a local hospital and talk to one for free I think.

Congrats! I have 2 little boys. With my first, because of medical issues I wasn't able to breastfeed at all. With my second, after a very rocky start (he wasn't latched on correctly and I was bleeding--NOT fun!) I ended up nursing him for almost 2 years! (It was tough weaning him.)

Anyway, I had a cup of coffee in the morning because if I didn't I couldn't get through my day. :) I rarely had alcohol--maybe a glass of wine or beer on special occasions. I think if you wait 2(?) hours afterwards it's already gone through your system?? I can't remember the timeframe, but I timed it so it wasn't an issue.

S.-
I have nursed both of my children, ages 2 1/2 and 9 months. While breastfeeding I would occassionally enjoy a drink. They say that it is ok to consume small amounts of alcohol while nursing. If I would plan on having more than 1, I would feed them a bottle of previously expressed milk. It is nice to be able to go out to dinner and enjoy a drink once in awhile. Good luck with your delivery:)

I had a fair amount of tea when I was breastfeeding. I tended to avoid having it towards evening. With my second and third child, I would have the occasional can of coke/pepsi/etc. but I had to stop because there was a marked difference in how well they got to sleep and slept if I had one.

I stayed away from alcohol entirely - that seemed scarier to me than caffeine - but I remember my breastfeeding class said that you could have one drink once in a while if you "pumped and dumped" - i.e., after you got home from the restaurant, etc., you pumped out the milk you had and pitched it. Guess you'd have to pump a bottle before you went out, to use when you got back.

I agree with the other poster who said to talk to your doctor/midwife about it. The hospital where you deliver should have a lactation consultant who'd also be a good resource.

The La Leche League has a page dedicated to the topic that looks very informative: http://www.lalecheleague.org/FAQ/alcohol.html

THERE IS NO NEED TO PUMP AND DUMP WHEN DRINKING ALCOHOL!!!!!!!!! I thought this too with my first pregnancy however it isn't necessary. What is in your bloodstream is what is in your milk. it does NOT get trapped there!!!! I wish i would have known this with my first child. So pretty much when you feel ok.....your ok to nurse. as for caffeine I don't drink it very often only if i'm work.You'll have to experiment with that.

Check out theses sites!
http://www.breastfeeding.com/helpme/helpme_asklc_ans9.html
http://www.llli.org/FAQ/alcohol.html

I hope it helps otherwise call a lactation specialist or your Peditrician.

I totally agree with Kristi L about the alcohol. It does not sit in your breastmilk. So, it's okay to have a couple of drinks and nurse.

Also, hops, which are found in beer, are helpful in milk production. Our general practioner told me to go ahead and have a couple of drinks if I wanted.

Caffeine on the other hand isn't great for mom's or babies. So, you probably want to limit that if you can.

I was never able to give up caffeine while pregnant or breastfeeding, but I did cut back considerably. I am not breastfeeding my daughter anymore, but I am pregnant with #2 and I still indulge in a cup or two of coffee each morning or a soft drink later in the afternoon if I miss my morning coffee. For what it's worth, my first daughter was the mellowest of kids, despite being breastfed by a mother that drank a caffeinated beverage daily. :)

As for alcohol, I think it depends on your comfort level more than anything since there is a lot of conflicting information about alcohol and breastfeeding. While I was breastfeeding, I drank occasionally, but I made a point to not drink any alcohol until after my last nursing session for the day. At that point, it was usually a good 6-8 hours before I would need to nurse again, enough time for the measly one drink to work its way through my system. I wouldn't have been comfortable with drinking a maragarita and then immediately nursing my infant, however.

I agree with Kristi- NO NEED TO PUMP AND DUMP! In the book, "The Ultimate Breastfeeding Book of Answers" (recommended by Lamaze international) Dr. Newman states, " I despise the expression "pump and dump" because it treats breastmilk as if it were some sort of disgusting fluid...in many jurisdictions, you are considered too drunk to drive if you have .08 percent alcohol in your blood...this is a blood level of alcohol that can cloud your judgement when you operate a vehicle, agreed. But if the mother has .08 percent alcohol in her blood, her milk will have .08 percent alcohol. Now this is a completely different situation. Wine is 10-12 percent alcohol, beer 3-5 percent and hard liquor approximately 40 percent. So called dealcoholized beer actually has .6 percent alcohol or seven times more than mother's milk will contain if she has a blood level of .08 percent. You can drink a liquid that is .08 percent alcohol all day and night and it won't affect you. So how is this likely to harm your baby? The formula the baby would receive-while the mother is throwing away her milk is know to put the baby at greater risk for a host of illnesses and problems..."

I hope this helps. There is more information in this book as well but I thought this might help you. Obviously you shouldn't drink a lot or all the time, but as Dr. Newman states-then the baby would more likely be at risk from neglectful behavior than from the acohol in breastmilk.
Look at many other countries where many woman will even have a glass of wine with dinner when they are pregnant. I'm sure everyone will think I am a bad mother for writing this but I say go ahead and enjoy a beer, glass of wine or even a cocktail-even with the baby at the breast. Why not-you have to digest the alcohol before it goes through your bloodstream and into your milk anyway. You will soon learn that your breastmilk is way, way too precious to pump and dump. I greatly enjoyed my first beer when I got home from the hospital, my daughter is now 2, can count to 20, say her ABC's, talk in full sentences, identify letters and numbers. I don't think my drinking while nursing affected her development. But it sure helped me relax and get some sleep those first few months:)

enjoy your new baby!

Hi S.,
I am still currently breastfeeding and I waited until my baby was about 2 months old to drink any alcohol. According to Parenting magazine, and I think they had some doctors write in on this article, you should wait 3 hours after you have one alcoholic beverage. If I had any more than that, I would either pump and dump or I would just wait until the next morning or like 6 hours to make sure it was out of my system. My baby has never shown any sort of effects from it. (I rarely drink).
As far as caffine, I think it is more harmful to the baby inside than it is breasfeeding. I don't drink a lot of caffeine but when I do, it doesn't keep my baby up or anything. Hope this helps!

Okay I am a barttender and have been to many serve safe classes. I want to tell you that with alchool you need to wait 24 hours even if you only have one. alchool stays in your system for that long. If you go to the minnesota servesafe web site it will tell you all of the information you need to know. Please do not breastfeed your baby only 2 hours after having a drink.

Hi S., congratulations! I can't really address the caffeine because I avoid it (I did even before pregnancy/breastfeeding). But I can tell you what I have been told and read about alcohol. I took a breastfeeding class, which I HIGHLY recommend doing, and they said that it was ok to have 1 glass of wine/ 1 beer while breastfeeding. It may even seem to help your milk production, probably because you are more relaxed the next time you nurse. Dark beer especially is rumored to help increase milk. However, you have to be careful....since you have been avoiding alcohol for the last 9 months your tolerance for alcohol will be very diminished. Go slow. I was told that if you feel a small buzz from your drink that's fine, anything more and you will have to do a "pump and dump." Once you are breastfeeding you will feel like your milk is precious gold and won't really want to have to waste any of it. My baby is 2 months old and so far since birth I have had one glass of wine and one beer, on separate occasions. Each time, I had it with a meal and I did not notice any consequences. I hope this opinion helps and I wish you the very best!