# alcohol in breast milk



## PookieMom (Jan 16, 2007)

I went out New Year's Eve and had way to much to drink! I had enough breast milk frozen ahead of time for my mom to feed dd till I was sure it was out of my system but what do I do with the breast milk I pumped throughout the night of drinking to keep my supply up? I went ahead and froze it and wrote "booze milk" on the bags but my question is whether the alcohol will leave the milk so I can use it later or should I just trash them.


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## chi_mama (May 25, 2008)

in my(one-time) experience the milk I pumped while intoxicated curdled while in the fridge overnight. I'd probably toss is unless you want to make soap or something non-ingestible with it. There is no way for the alcohol to be removed from the milk.


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## lindsayncadence (Mar 27, 2006)

I was at babies r us last week and they actually have strips you can use to test the milk for alcohol...just a thought. I am not a big drinker but I would like to go out for my best friends birthday after the baby so that is an option for me...I do not know how accurate they are though







HTH


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## birdie22 (Apr 1, 2005)

Make White Russians out of it?


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## happyhousewife06 (May 26, 2008)

I like birdie22's Idea.


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## milkybean (Mar 19, 2008)

I have no advice as I became a mega-lightweight after starting my nursing "career", so drinking too much means a very different thing nowadays than it used to.

But OMG how did you drink so much, and still be able to pump? If I'd drank to extreme excess and tried to pump I would probably have ended up with pump "hickies" all over my chest LOL.


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## happyhousewife06 (May 26, 2008)

I have those test strips. and have used them once... after having 2 drinks. I wasnt feeling buzzed or anything and it showed negative. Good luck I might thaw it expecting to use it and test it first and if its positive then use a different one.


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## PookieMom (Jan 16, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *milkybean* 
But OMG how did you drink so much, and still be able to pump? If I'd drank to extreme excess and tried to pump I would probably have ended up with pump "hickies" all over my chest LOL.


Okay, so maybe I wasn't that bad,







I pumped a bit earlier in the evening and again about 6 hours after my last drink. I think I'll trash the first bag and hang on to the second and maybe get some of those test strips or just keep it in the back of the freezer for dire emergency.

Thanks for all the responses!

I read some pretty interesting things about those strips. I don't know if they should be trusted.....but that's for another thread


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## Emily's Mama (Apr 22, 2007)

When the alcohol is out of your system, its out of the milk. So if you are no longer intoxicated the milk isn't either. It sounds like if you pumped early in the evening and then 6 hours after your last drink then that milk would only have a VERY low amount of alcohol in it. Personally I'd use it later, but then I know some people are not comfortable with ANY trace amounts of alcohol in the milk. If you have a decent freezer stash then just throw it out if your not comfortable.

Once I had a couple drinks, pumped and then I kept that milk in the fridge, pumped totally okay milk the next evening (after no drinks) and combined the two and then froze it, thus halving the (albeit small but unknown) alcohol amount in that milk.


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## PatioGardener (Aug 11, 2007)

Even if you were completely toasted, the amount of alcohol in the milk would be really really small. There was a thread about this lately - I think one Mama said that at 0.4% blood alcohol you die of alcohol poisoning, and non-alcoholic beer is 0.5%, so even if a mom was pumping as she was about to die of alcohol poisoning, her milk would still have less alcohol than non-alcoholic beer.

I like Emily's Mama's idea - if you don't have much of a stash, and are worried about the alcohol content, you could mix it with other milk to dilute it to a point where you would be comfortable.


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## Biscuits & Gravy (Jul 17, 2008)

I pumped once when I was not sure if I should nurse. The next morning I opened up the container of milk and it totally smelled like alcohol, so I dumped it. I didn't want to send that milk to daycare!


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## peainthepod (Jul 16, 2008)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *PatioGardener* 
Even if you were completely toasted, the amount of alcohol in the milk would be really really small. There was a thread about this lately - I think one Mama said that at 0.4% blood alcohol you die of alcohol poisoning, and non-alcoholic beer is 0.5%, so even if a mom was pumping as she was about to die of alcohol poisoning, her milk would still have less alcohol than non-alcoholic beer.

Yes, even if you get so wasted you black out (and still somehow manage to pump, lol) your milk has only minute amounts of alcohol in it. But if it makes you uncomfortable, that's okay! Personally I wouldn't worry.


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