Breastfeeding: Hand Expression for Engorged Breasts

When breastfeeding, it’s important to learn how to hand express your breasts if they become engorged. The engorgement phase is often day 3, when your milk comes just in. Your breasts may explode in size and be quite hard, hot to the touch and painful. The baby, who used to latch well, has trouble getting a grip. Hand expression is a critical skill to get the milk out of the engorged breast. We want to be able to release our own breast milk, without a breast pump.

Learn how to hand-express your own breasts and increase milk flow. For a lot of engorgement, try what’s called “reverse pressure softening”. This gets the swelling out of the area – that so full of fluid that the nipple becomes flat. That’s when the baby has a hard time latching.

Simulating the breast every 1 to 3 hours – by baby, pump or hand- will help get the milk to flow. It’s so critical to protect the milk supply in the early days. And that happens by stimulating the breast, preferably by the baby breastfeeding.

View more breastfeeding videos: Breastfeeding 101 and 5 Breastfeeding Positions for New Moms

About Our Expert: Jada Shapiro is the founder of two companies, providing a full range of services to new Moms.
Birthday Presence offers all the classes and services you need to prepare for parenthood – childbirth education, doula matching services, breastfeeding, newborn care, parenting classes and more. Visit: birthdaypresence.com
Boober is an on demand, lactation matching platform for same day, in person, expert, vetted lactation care in NYC and the Tri-State Area. Visit: GetBoober.com