After a bout of mastitis my supply never fully returned so DD has formula before bed. She has also (mostly) dropped one night feed so only one feed between 7pm and 6am and my supply seems to be dropping again so figuring my BF journey may be coming to an end although hoping to maintain at least a couple if BF per day if I can.


am assuming it won't be long before my cycle returns but wondering if therefore any tips (other than fully stopping BF) to help AF return as we would like to TTC#2 ASAP. Are there any herbs, supplements etc? Am going o see my accupunturist and naturopath in a few weeks but wondering if there is anything to try in the meantime?

TIA

Hi Aphraell!

I don't have any tips about what you can do to bring AF on, but I just wanted to let you know that while you're still feeding that often, it might be a while before it does return. From about week 5 through to week 10, I wasn't really breastfeeding, just expressing twice and then once a day... about 2 weeks after I stopped completely AF returned. So, given you're still feeding way more than I was expressing, it may still be a while for you.

Hope there's something you can do to get things rolling again, and good luck with TTCing!

Fee

You generally need to drop enough BF so that there is a noticable dip in your hormaone levels. For some women, this means dropping at least two, if not three, consecutive feed. Mostly it's the night feeds. ANd for some women, it's not until you are down to 3-4 day feeds only.

For me, with my first child, AF didn't return until I was down to only 2 day feeds (AF returned at 12 months). But with DD2, AF returned after 9-10 months when bub had dropped all her night feeds (fed at 7pm and then no more boobie until 6am). For most of my friends who BF, AF mostly returned when they had dropped at least 3 consecutive BF, usually all the night feeds (so anywhere from 5+ months onwards).

Thanks Yodathewrinkled, you have answered a question I was going to ask about whether it was normal not to have AF by 9 months