FL, I am right there with you on this one.

I too have been very reluctant to miss an expressing session, have also been using DP during the day for the bottle top-ups while I express, etc, but not at night...

I agree with Barb - as long as baby is attaching and sucking reasonably well, limit the breast feeds to 10-15 minutes per side, and then give bubs the top-up. I was lucky enough to be able to do the weighing, on proper baby scales, as you know from other threads, and I found out by weighing DS at 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, etc, into a feed (only did that a couple of times, otherwise just before and after), that he's gotten 70% in 5 mins, 95% odd within 10 minutes, and the rest by 15, and the extra time he would happily keep sucking, but really not be getting anything at all - 1ml at best, sometimes nothing in the last 15 minutes. Actually, I suspected as much from looking at swallows, because while there were swallows every 3-4 sucks in the first minute, they only came every 9-10 sucks after that until 10 minutes or so, then nothing... do you know how to see/hear/feel for swallowing? If you do, and can see when bubs is no longer swallowing, you'll feel much better about stopping the feed 'early'.

Cutting down the feeding time therefore made no difference to the milk he got from me, but a huge difference to the time it took for each round of BF/Bottle feed/express. Also, he was far less tired after only 20 mins of breast feeding, and took the bottle feed much more efficiently as well! That meant we knew when he stopped sucking, he was full, not just knackered and too tired to suck more.

So now, I do the whole lot myself at night, and sometimes during the day, but we can do it all in just under an hour. I am very lucky in that DS falls asleep again very quickly at night - He sleeps in the cradle in our room, but I change him first, swaddle him again straight away, grab the bottle on the way back from the nursery, do night feeds in bed, sitting up, and when I put him back in bed, he's usually awake, but quiet. I go to the lounge, where my pump is set up, and by the time I've put the milk away and washed the pumping kit, he'll be asleep. I think that the 'routine' of night feeds in bed, but day feeds usually in the lounge, helps him to know that he will go straight back to bed afterwards if he's fed in the bedroom in the near-dark.

I don't know what the professionals will think of this, but we stopped warming the bottles, too - either EBM or formula, he'll happily take it either straight from the fridge, or with just sitting out for the 20 minutes of the BF. He's not bothered by it at all, and it saves time, energy, water... and when we have to feed when we're out, it makes it one less thing to worry about, too.

In terms of keeping the time to under an hour, especially in the middle of the night, this was really strongly recommended by our paediatrician as well, and supported by my LC, because getting enough rest is also really important for supply. (I noticed on several occasions, when weighing, that at the early evening feed he seemed to get a lot more on the days that I'd had an afternoon nap!) I also think it helps us all during the day, because if he spends less time on feeds, it leaves a bit of alert time for 'playing', ie, lying on the play mat together, or holding him upright face to face with us and 'talking', or tummytime on our chests, or on the floor, etc. When the feeding routine took 2 hours, he was knackered by it as well.

I respectfully disagree with the people who suggest cosleeping with an 'open bar policy', just because if you have to get up to get bottles, and pump, and put things away again in the fridge, and wash parts... it kind of defeats the purpose!

Because I think this is working very well for us, I don't do what I am going to suggest to you - that you put on your double pumping tank/cami/bra top that you made, and do the bottle feeds at the same time as you are double pumping. If you can bend your knees up enough/use pillows to support bubs for the bottle, you then will have one hand free for the breast compressions/massage for pumping.