My nursing and pumping stations, small space living and in our new house! Plus, maximizing the insurance-provided breast pump benefit
I started out with breastfeeding and pumping at our tiny apartment, and now have a few more options for where I do it... but that small space setup helped me figure out the essentials and how to make it fast and easy. I have some serious hacks now!
This post is sponsored by Aeroflow, who does ALL the work for you of getting you a breast pump you qualify for through insurance. I'll share more about that later on, because they made it SO easy for me to get the pump, and now replacement parts every 90 days, without doing any of the legwork of dealing with my insurance company. I got this pump and it has been great!
This post contains affiliate links.
Breastfeeding/pumping station: small space living
At our tiny apartment, I found the best place to pump was the sofa. We used this space as our living room, dining room, and even sort of nursery (often had the Rock N Play next to the coffee table, and our dresser/changing table right there, too).
You can see it was a pretty tight fit!
I kept the pump and all the accessories under the coffee table in this basket. I also got this hands-free pumping bra (nursing bra attachment) which is amazing! Didn't have it at first so I had to hold the horns on the whole time. Ha.
I also use this breast milk storage bag system which I will also share more about later... I pump directly into the bags that click into this bag holder/nipple set so the bag turns into a bottle.
Except the cord--that, and the phone charging cord (also sometimes an essential at the pumping/feeding station) stayed plugged into the wall and tucked between the sofa cushions!!
We only had one bedroom at this place, so Otto slept in his bassinet swing in our room and I fed him there at night.
During the day, I kept my breastfeeding pillow leaning off to the side. (I talked in this post about why I am so glad I have this pillow!!)
In it I kept some must-haves... aside from a glass of water and something to read, I often found I needed lip balm when trapped sitting with a baby on my lap. So I put that, and a burp cloth, in the pocket of the pillow. I also found that (especially when Otto was really little) the best time to clip his nails was when he was eating, so rather than leave the clippers out on the coffee table all the time, I tucked them in the pocket, too. To this day, every time I wash the cover, I move those three items to the other cover!
I also used couch pillows when Otto was really tiny to prop under the breastfeeding pillow.
This setup was all-in-one convenient, but still left our living/dining/everything room functioning pretty normally!
(You can also check out my newborn essentials post here for some of the other pieces you see!)
Breastfeeding/pumping in our new house
In our larger house, I have more options. I feed Otto at bedtime in our rocker in the nursery rather than our bedroom (and he sleeps in his own room now), but during the day I move around.
It worked okay, and is comfy, but...
Nowadays at home I pump before bed when I'm (unfortunately) often on the computer anyway, and we have a simple desk setup in our dining room which is basically centrally located and not far from the fridge or my husband if he's in the living room. So now I mostly pump here:
I always, always tuck the tubes up like this for some reason!
To be honest... I've also found that I can get a lot of milk, save time, and reduce my stress by pumping in the car on the way to and from work. It's far from glamorous but those benefits outweigh the cons. (Also, I just got this wearable milk collection system/pump add-on that should help--I'll share more after using it more.) So nowadays rather than the basket, I store/carry around my pump and parts in a tote bag!
I'm still working out my pumping schedule but being back to work, it's been a little hard to always have a huge store of milk and sometimes only produce 3 full bags in a day. So I'm increasing the pumping times on the weekends/days off as well. I pump after feeding Otto in the mornings when I'm at home, plus at night before I go to bed. On work days, I get a ton pumping in the car on my drive in (cause I can do it for 20 minutes without stressing I'm missing something or going to be late), then take 2-3 breaks during the work day, then pump for longer again on the drive home.
Getting my pump and replacement parts through insurance
I am really excited by how easy it has been to get my pump and supplies, so it's so cool that Aeroflow wanted to sponsor this post! I heard about them a while back on a podcast and remembered when I was pregnant, and checked them out probably 5 months into my pregnancy. I went to their "qualify through insurance" page and entered my info. A few days (I think) later, I got an email from them with a link to a page on their site customized for me, showing which pumps my insurance would cover at 100% and which I could choose for an upgrade fee. I did some research in a couple mom Facebook groups I'm in and found that people who had tried multiple ones preferred the Spectra S2PLUS.
The pump arrived a couple months before Otto was born and I finally opened it up and tried it out a little before my due date. I was so glad to have it when he was born since the lactation consultants had me pumping immediately to help my milk come in (and it was a walk in the park compared to the first week or so of breastfeeding). Been using it all the time since! I even brought it to a concert when Otto was about 2 months old and we had a date night and left him at home with my parents. Plus now that I know I can pump in the car, it opens up more opportunities... I brought an ice pack the other day on a long errand and pumped while I was out!
I am SO grateful for a service like Aeroflow and have been telling my pregnant friends! Because who wants to deal with the stress of more calls to your insurance company when you're pregnant and dealing with a million new details before the baby comes?? Plus, I didn't even realize my insurance would cover new parts ever 90 days, but I just got an email from Aeroflow 3 months in offering them! I wouldn't be able to track that and call every 90 days for the whole time I'm breastfeeding, but Aeroflow takes care of it for me! (By the way--even if you didn't get your pump through Aeroflow, you can still use their resupply help. Learn more here!)
Thanks again to Aeroflow for sponsoring this post, and I hope it was helpful for you in setting up your pumping and breastfeeding plans!
Shop the other products I use here!
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