Can I drink alcohol during breastfeeding?

Nowadays, exclusive breastfeeding is encouraged, and many pregnant women may need to enter the breastfeeding period after giving birth. Women should be very careful about their diet during breastfeeding and should not eat casually to avoid affecting the quality of milk. But some women also want to go out for a drink with friends after giving birth. So, can women drink alcohol while breastfeeding?

1. Women who are breastfeeding should not drink alcohol. Strictly speaking, breastfeeding women are not allowed to drink alcohol, whether it is wine, pure grain wine or red wine. The ethanol in the wine will be transmitted to the child's body through the lotion and affect the child's liver. The most direct manifestation is that the child gets drunk. Maybe it's not a big problem at one time, just pay attention to it next time.

2. Mothers who are breastfeeding should be careful about their diet. They should avoid eating foods such as bread and cookies. Eating too much of these foods will cause the mother to have no breast milk. Don't eat spicy or irritating foods. Drink more nutritious soups and don't eat too greasy food.

Generally speaking, women are not allowed to drink alcohol while they are still breastfeeding because they still need to breastfeed. Drinking alcohol has a great impact on breast milk. It is very likely that children will get drunk, but adults may not be aware of it. Women should pay more attention to their diet, eat more milk-producing foods, feed their children first, and then after weaning, they can drink whatever they want, of course, not get drunk.

However, some breastfeeding mothers really cannot avoid occasions where they need to drink alcohol. At this time, the mother must ensure the following three things to minimize the harm of ethanol to the baby.

1. Must be limited:

For breastfeeding mothers, the limit here refers to two cans (375ml/can) of ordinary (3.5% degree) wine, or two glasses (100ml/cup) of red wine, or two large glasses (30Ml/cup) of pure grain wine. Mothers should pay attention that this is a parallel relationship, that is, after drinking two cans of wine, you can no longer drink any alcoholic beverages, and the same applies to other drinks.

2. Pump out the milk early:

If the mother knows that she has to drink alcohol in the next day, she should prepare in advance and use a breast pump to extract the milk and freeze or refrigerate it. The frozen milk can be kept for 72 hours and the refrigerated milk can be kept for several months. This will allow enough time to metabolize the ethanol in the human body.

3. After drinking, you should rest for at least 3-4 hours before breastfeeding your baby:

If there is no refrigerated or frozen milk in the home, the mother must rest for 3-4 hours after drinking before breastfeeding the baby, because it takes so long for the body to metabolize ethanol. Some mothers will intentionally drain their milk after drinking, and then breastfeed their babies. However, in fact, the alcohol concentration in breast milk is the same as that in blood. This method of draining milk is of little help to the baby to avoid alcohol.