Storing Breast Milk
Breast milk is very nutritious for babies so even if new moms (for some reason or other) are not breast feeding, they can always opt to still save their milk and storing them for their babies’ consumption. Here are some tips on how to store breast milk properly:
Prepare the bottles you will use. Make sure that you wash them well with hot, soapy water and a brush. Rinse and dry well before you put in the milk.
If you’re using plastic bottles, use opaque ones which are made of polyethylene. Clear plastic bottles made of polycarbonate may leach chemicals.
Express milk from your breast using a breast pump (doesn’t matter whether it’s manual or automatic, whichever you use is fine). Pour the milk into the clean bottles you’ve just washed. Better to divide the milk into 2-4 oz portions so that they can cool down quickly. Cap the bottles tightly. Label each bottle with the date and time of milk extraction. You can use sticker labels for this.
Make sure to refrigerate the bottles of breast milk as soon as possible after collecting. Freeze if possible. Refrigerated breast milk can last up to 72 hours. Frozen breast milk stored in the freezer compartment of single-door refrigerators can last up to two weeks, while those stored in double-door
refrigerators can last up to three months.
If milk has been at room temperature for more than 6 hours, throw it away. Do not risk your baby’s safety.
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