Do you wonder how many times you can reheat breast milk?
You understand how difficult it can be to express and properly store breast milk if you are a breastfeeding mother. You really don’t want to see that priceless liquid gold wasted because it takes a great deal of effort to follow safe storage guidelines when you’re half asleep from a 3 am feed or running late for a 10 am meeting. What happens if you heat a bottle of chilled expressed milk but your child doesn’t finish it? The response varies and is influenced by a number of variables. Continue reading to find out more.
Benefits Of Breast Milk
At a WIC or obstetrician appointment, most people hear the benefits recited, but they often seem to slip their minds. We are all aware that breastfeeding is better for infants. Understanding WHY breastfeeding is best is crucial, though.
Fewer Illnesses
Your child’s immune system gets a head start when you breastfeed them. This is because viruses and bacteria have no chance of surviving in breast milk due to its high antioxidant content. Overall, your child experiences fewer illnesses as a result. Additionally, fewer visits to the doctor result from this.
Less Digestive Issues
It is well known that breastfed babies experience fewer digestive problems than other babies. Because breast milk proteins are simpler to digest, this is the case. Because your baby can handle it when you breastfeed, you won’t ever have to worry about switching to formula.
You’ll also experience less diarrhea than mothers who breastfeed using formula.
Fewer Ear Infections, Pneumonia, And Respiratory Infections
Particularly, your child will consume less of each of these than a baby who is fed formula. For instance, compared to infants who are exclusively breastfed, formula-fed children are five times more likely to get a respiratory infection.
This is brought on by breast milk’s abundant supply of vitamins, nutrients, and antioxidants.
The high concentrations of vitamins, including ascorbic acid, antioxidants, and other nutrients present in breast milk are responsible for all of these remarkable advantages as well as a number of additional ones.
This is why it’s crucial to comprehend the proper method for heating breast milk and the limitations on how many times you can reheat breast milk. Heat, especially overheating or frequent reheating can be fatal to them.
Breast milk offers babies a significant reduction in nutritional value when it is overheated. You must also watch out not to heat the milk excessively.
Can I Reheat Breast Milk?
The quick response is that you can reheat breast milk safely, but only once. Reheating ruins the beneficial bacteria and nutrients in breast milk. Furthermore, since bacteria from your baby’s mouth could contaminate it, it is best to reheat that same milk within four hours.
How Many Times Can I Reheat Undisturbed Breast Milk?
You should only reheat the bottle once, regardless of whether your baby drinks from it or not, and regardless of how much it was left outside. Because heat destroys vitamins and nutrients in breast milk, this is the case.
Why ruin breastfeeding by destroying the beneficial bacteria and nutrients in breast milk when you are most likely doing it to give your baby all the health benefits that come with it?
TIP: Overheating breast milk can destroy its nutritional value.
How Many Times Can I Reheat Partially Consumed Breast Milk?
If reheated in less than four hours, just once. You should put your baby’s breast milk bottle in the refrigerator right away if they only drink some of it. Within the following four hours, it can be heated up a final time.
It cannot be heated up if it is allowed to sit at room temperature. It is preferable to discard any leftover breast milk. After a baby drinks from a bottle, harmful bacteria can grow there. At room temperature, they grow alarmingly quickly.
Giving your child a bottle that has been out for more than 30 minutes is not safe.
Throwing the leftover breast milk away is the best course of action in this circumstance. Use a fresh baggie of chilled breast milk from your stash if your baby needs to be fed again in an hour or two.
By doing this, it is ensured to be free of dangerous bacteria. Additionally, it guarantees that you aren’t overheating nutrients.
How Should Breastmilk Be Reheated?
Breast milk can be warmed in a variety of ways, some of which can be harmful to your baby. Even if this is the first time you have heated breast milk, keep in mind that it must not become overheated in order to prevent the nutrients from being destroyed.
You also need to adhere to some additional dos and don’ts.
Never Thaw Breast Milk At Room Temperature
It is not recommended to let frozen breast milk thaw and warm up at room temperature. When the milk has finally defrosted, it will be at the perfect temperature.
But in the interim, it will be warm enough for bacteria to grow. This makes it a dangerous practice.
Bottle Warmers
Warming breast milk is possible with bottle warmers like the Munchkin Speed Bottle warmer, which are readily available on the market. These can be adjusted to a specific temperature to prevent breast milk from becoming overheated.
Additionally, they heat the milk evenly, preventing hot spots. If you have extra cash, these are a wise investment. By using them, you can avoid worrying about the milk getting too hot and save time.
Do Not Use The Microwave
Breast milk should not be reheated in the microwave due to the risk of the milk becoming overheated. Allow the milk to cool, but remember that this won’t make the nutrients that were already destroyed reappearance. They won’t!
In addition, breast milk can develop hot spots. There might be a small area of the milk that is too hot even though it feels like the perfect temperature. This could hurt your child. Depending on how hot the milk is, this burn can be mild to severe.
Bowl Of Warm Water
Use a bowl of warm water as a substitute if you don’t have a bottle warmer that warms breast milk. By doing this, the likelihood that you’ll overheat the breast milk is reduced. Rather, it will warm the milk gradually so as not to overheat it.
When doing this, pay close attention to the water’s temperature. However, breast milk will become much hotter if it is placed in a bowl of boiling water that you have just removed from the stove than if it is placed in a bowl of warm water. Just use the warm water coming from the faucet.
When Should Breast Milk Not Be Heated Up?
Indeed, reheating your breast milk is alright, however, there are times when you shouldn’t, for example;
- When breast milk appears to have been sitting outside for more than 30 minutes, try to avoid reheating it. Your baby shouldn’t consume breast milk because it might have recently become contaminated with harmful bacteria.
- You shouldn’t reheat and use breast milk that has gone bad due to improper storage or being exposed to the elements for a very long time. Breast milk smells sour, so you’ll be able to tell if it has changed.
- Breast milk loses its immunologic qualities when reheated, so if your baby is ill, avoid using it again. It’s best to give your baby a recently prepared bottle of breast milk from the refrigerator.
- Never reheat previously frozen milk because thawed breast milk only contains a tiny amount of living immune cells that guard against contamination.
Conclusion
If you are pumping breast milk for your baby to store and reheat later, you should think about the unused milk and determine if you can reheat it and feed it to your baby again later. While this is legal, there are some specific things to watch out for to make sure you’re giving your baby high-quality breast milk.
I believe this article answers your query, “How many times can you reheat breast milk?” Following these suggestions will help you stop worrying about overfeeding your baby pumped milk now that you fully understand how to reheat breast milk correctly.
Please leave a comment below if you have any queries or would like to share advice and experiences with reheating breast milk. I would adore hearing them.
