Suzette's Parenting and Breastfeeding Blog

I have to make a clarification in this post, to many mothers who read some of the articles here, but did not read ALL of them, and failed to bring back their precious frozen EBM.

Recently, I have received a few emails, from different mothers, sharing their failed experience of transporting their frozen expressed breast milk.

Coincidentally, they were all coming back from the same place – the East Malaysia, either Kuching or KK.

All of them, used cooler BAG to bring back their FROZEN ebm.

Now, I have to remind you that, I have never advocated such method. All the frozen ebm that I have ever transported, were stored in cooler BOX (as per the photo below).

In addition to that, I have never ever transported frozen ebm in small cooler box. All the frozen ebm were carried in the LARGE cooler box. Only then, it is insulated well enough, and with proper wrapping and surrounded (all sides) by ice packs or frozen CO2 (dry ice), they could then sustain my 33 hours long journey from Chicago – Newark – Taipei – KL.

With cooler BAGS, I have only ever transported CHILLED ebm. That is because the insulation layer in cooler bags are too thin and not good enough to keep the milk frozen. Even with the chilled ebm, I had to surround the ebm with ice packs to keep them chilled.

For short distance from East Malaysia, use of cooler bag is good enough, but please just chill the ebm, and not freeze them.

I’m sorry if I have given wrong impression to mothers who sought advice here, and failed to bring back the precious milk. I feel sad too that the milk were down to drain!

I wish you success next time.

Before I go on, can I ask for a poll from all of you first? It is located on the right side bar under Nuffnang skyscraper ad.

The question is simple, have your child fell sick often, when he/she started going to school?

Recently Aiyu commented that breastfeeding is very expensive, because her friend (a bfg mom) used very expensive breastmilk storage bags to keep her stock of frozen milk. This is completely opposite of general believe/ knowledge of breastfeeding being a cost saving way. Indeed, what motivated me to start considering bfd was the cost saving part!

You see, there are many ways of keeping your expressed milk. You can use milk bottles, bottle liners (e.g. Playtex), or pre-sterilized milk storage bags specifically designed for breast milk. And for older babies, we even use ice-cream bags – as long as they are food-graded plastic bags, they are all alright to store breast milk.

Picking this photo from MMB, it shows a lot of frozen ebm taken from the fridge in the Paed ICU of a Government Hospital in Kuala Lumpur. As you can see many containers with mothers names labeled –> all frozen milk. These are food grade containers.

In the same article, you will find that Suzany (another MMB member) also used ice-cream Malaysia bags to store her breastmilk. I adopted that technique and our children are all well and thriving.

Aiyu told her friend that I used ice-cream Malaysia bags, and she refused – saying that it is not pre-sterilized.

Okay, my argument is that –> aren’t we all encouraged to breastfeed directly? Any of us go under steam/boiling sterilization process of our nipples? NO! Of course! So, are our kids all having food poisoning as a result of that?

Come on lah! If we protect the kids so much that they don’t get exposed to germs at all, when they go to the school, they surely will get sick in the beginning.

I am guilty of protecting Ian too much as well. When he started schooling, he fell sick very often, and PIL wanted me to stop sending him to school, saying that the school is too dirty for him. Well, that is just delaying the process, doesn’t prevent it!

When it was Isabel’s turn, I learnt from mistakes, and she turned out to be perfectly alright. She seldom fell sick and even if she did, without medication she recover on her own, building up her own antibody stronger.

I just hope that people who want to breastfeed, don’t get yourself too bothered with the sterilization process. BFG is such a pleasant experience that can also save you a lot of money too. Don’t let this marketing gimmick stress you too much.

Well, noticed lately there are confinement services (CL and such) keep posting in comments in this blog, advertising their numbers and services.

Please note that if you are interested to advertise here, please read from the page Advertise. Do not simply post your ‘advertisements’ in the comments as they will be all removed.

Particularly for confinement services, if you are a Confinement Lady, I would like to know your knowledge and attitude towards breastfeeding. I wouldn’t simply allow your advertisement here, without knowing your stance on breastfeeding, knowing many mothers who intend to breastfeed ended up failed BECAUSE OF CONFINEMENT LADY’s INTERFERENCE or DISCOURAGEMENTS.

Anyway, since on the same topic, I would like to also share a sad story here.

My sister’s friend’s sister (whatever), just jumped off a tall building, on CNY eve. When she jumped off the building, her baby was only a couple of weeks old. The news was in SinChew Daily.

She is a lecturer in UniTAR, a supposedly cheerful person, looks very young from her photo in SC.

She planned to beastfeed her baby but faced tremendous pressure. She lives with parents in law and grandparents in law. She had a CL too. All did not give her moral support, kept saying she had no milk (common remark from ppl without bfg knowledge). When milk came in, she had engorgement, but milk couldn’t come out (probably due to the same reason my sister faced — milk blister).

When she had the problem, unfortunately Dr. Koe was away for holiday and would be back a month later.

She developed depression soon, and sneaked out of the room on CNY eve when everyone else were busy and not noticed, jumped off a building somewhere else.

Honestly, in my first confinement, I nearly got into depression too. I used to live on 13th floor, and many times the thought of jumping off the building flashed in my mind. All thanks and no thanks to the CL I had. Well, that CL wasn’t even a person with strong character! I just can’t imagine those people who have CL with strong character (like my SIL had once), and living with in-laws who give sarcastic remarks on bfg attempts (thank God my in-laws are very supportive!!). I only had that soft-spoken CL who had no knowledge of bfg, not very approving my attempts –> and that could already cause me into near depression. If I had been living like that poor lady my sister knew, I guess I would have jumped off the 13th floor too.

Whatever it is, the morale of this story is that:
1) If you intend to breastfeed, don’t give yourself too much pressure. Remember, the intention is good for your baby. If you get into depression because of that, it will do no good to your baby, so defeat the purpose!

2) Before you do something bad to yourself, think of the baby first. When you are not around, what would happen to your baby?

3) Have good talk with the people and get their support, before the birth of your baby. Get their consensus and educate them first. If can’t, be mentally prepared to face the pressure to come, but don’t stress yourself.

4) Husband’s support is utmost. Seek his support first.

5) Get contact of more than one Lactating Consultant:

Dr. Koe (She is the most popular/favorite LC amongst breastfeeding moms because she is also a paediatrician.)
Address: 73 Jalan Mega Mendung, Kompleks Bandar, 5th Mile Jalan klang Lama, 58000 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03-79830539
Consultation Hours :
Monday-Friday: 9.00 am – 1.00 am/ 6.00 pm – 8.30 pm
Thursday: 9.00 am – 12.30 pm
Thursday Night / Sunday / Public Holidays – Closed
Saturday: 9.00 am – 12.30 pm

Dr. Pearl. This is another LC that you can use in case Dr. Koe is not accessible. Recommended by Busymum. Dr. Pearl is a GP, who is also an LC. She is knowledgeable enough to help you, but not that preferred because she is not a paediatrician (and I was old that she doesn’t have any children yet).
Telephone: 012 3045534/ 03 62032837

6) Mix with people who have successfully breastfed, talk to them whenever you face any challenges. Mothers would know mothers better.

I want to reiterate, water is NOT necessary for babies who are 100% breastfed. I have written before, in detail, explaining why breastfed babies shouldn’t be given water at all.

It is not that we are obsessive of what we give to our babies, but it has medical reasons why water should not be given to babies.

Remember, it does more HARMS than goods to the babies. Do NOT give water at all to your babies, if he/she is 100% (exclusively) breastfed, okay?

If you plan to give birth in the hospital, you might be worrying what to pack and what to bring. Here is a place you can find printable checklist for things to be brought to hospital, i.e. what to pack for your Hospital Bag.

When I gave birth to Ian, I had a checklist from Pantai Hospital, so I didn’t really need this. I’m not sure if they still give out similar list or not. No harm checking this out.

I would add one more item to the list though, from my experience with the epidural. After the epidural’s effect is gone, you will feel nauseous. You might want to bring some candy to suck, to reduce the feeling.

One tip to release the ‘wind’ in your stomach after the epidural, is to drink this ginger soup. I know, I know, not to take too much of ginger post delivery, but this soup is very useful. It ‘saved my life’ before. I was reluctant to drink, but nearly vomited in the delivery room post epidural. I drank it, immediately burped out the ‘wind’, and then nauseous gone, I was completely okay after that.

This soup is made this way:
- Extract the juice of 1 large pc of old ginger.
- Boil it with a chunk of lean meat (pork or beef).
That’s it. No need seasonings, already tastes good, and effective too.