labeling fridge bottles
hi! im a ftm to a 7 weeker (1 week in the NICU, FGR, he’s still under 9 lbs).
when we came home from the hospital, we labeled EVERYTHING we put into the fridge after pumping. now, however, since week 4ish I usually produce enough for a whole bottle on each side, so I devised a system where I didn’t label and just arranged 3 bottles in a row, put the newest pumped milk in the back, and instructed my husband to always pull from the front. i did test it a few weeks ago and the back bottle was used within 6-9 hours.
(if there is extra milk from a pump that gets put into a different shape bottle and usually gets bagged up and frozen within a day.)
HOWEVER husband recently told me he doesn’t always pull from the front (sometimes amounts vary slightly and he sometimes chose based on that, as afternoons he eats more that nights etc.). I am now in a panic that there could have been a bottle in there LO got fed over the last weeks that somehow got shuffled around long enough to exceed the 4 day safe window and was bad. I think this is super unlikely but still worried (we did dump the bottles currently in the fridge for bath milk to be safe). He’s has had GI upset since he was born (they told us reflux in the NICU, we now are investigating intolerances) so I’m worried we just would not even know!
anything to make this anxious mom feel better? and, is this method ok if we stick to it or should i be labeling 15+ bottles every day? (we label all freezer bags.)
(husband is excellent, takes great care of baby, we just weren’t thinking likely due to sleep deprivation.) thank you!!