How to Thaw Breastmilk
Expressed breastmilk can stay out of the fridge, on room temperature, for roughly 10 hours. If the milk is kept on a temperature that is a little bit cooler than room temperature, perhaps in a small cooler with ice-packs, it can be kept for 24 hours.
When it comes to fresh breastmilk, that hasn’t been expressed, it can be kept in the rerigerator for eight days. But if the milk has been out of the fridge for some time, before it was put there, storage time is going to be less than 8 days, depending on how long it was out of the fridge. If you freeze expressed breastmilk you can keep it in the freezer from 3 to 6 months, depending on how low the temperature is. When you thaw the milk be sure to remember that you must twirl it before you give it to your baby, because human milk separates into cream and milk. If you want to combine fresh milk with the one you have already thawed you must cool the fresh milk first. You must never, and I meen never, heet the milk in the microwave or on the stove, because when you do it, it leaves hot spots in the milk that can burn your child. Also, you can not re-freeze milk that was previously freezen and thawed, or re-heat milk that was already heated.
If you are wondering how to tell if the milk has gone bad, just cheks whether it has a bad taste or unpleasant odor. When you store milk it tends to alter it’s apperance over time, the fat in the milk usually rises to the top of the container, or on the sides of it. The milk can also change color, as a result of something you have eaten or perhaps from some medications you took. When you fill the bottle or container remember not to fill it more than ¾ of it’s size, because it will expand. It would also be usefull to label the bottles with the date.
