A lot has happened since my last post. Soleil (pronounced So-lay) decided to surprise us 3 weeks early on August 19, 2017 at 4pm on the dot. She is such a cute little peanut and I am so happy she entered our lives. Unfortunately, because she was 3 weeks early she has had some difficulty with feeding. Her jaw muscles aren’t as strong as they would be if she was full term so she has not been able to develop my milk supply as well as we would like, and because my milk supply isn’t increasing she hasn’t been gaining weight as fast as her pediatrician wants. So we started something called Triple Feeding, a process that involves breastfeeding for 20 minutes, then pumping for 15-20 minutes then feeding her a supplement of the breastmilk that had been pumped.

Due to the frequent feeding and pumping I have been slowly building my supply and Soleil has actually been gaining the 1 oz per day the pediatrician wants. This is encouraging, but it is difficult when I don’t see an increase in what I am pumping for her in between feedings. Looking at the prices in the store for these cookies is discouraging. A pack at target is almost $25 (insane!), so I decided to research lactation smoothies and cookies and none of them looked really appetizing, so I decided to make some cookies myself.

I used my favorite double chocolate chip cookies recipe and added some milk producing ingredients like flax seed meal and brewers yeast. You can also add some oatmeal to increase the lactation potential. I also made a non-lactation batch for my husband, because he deserves a yummy snack for all of the hard work he has been doing to help us out. He is a lifesaver!

I thought the brewers yeast and flaxseed meal would make the cookies taste chalky or like cardboard, but they suprisingly held their chocolate flavor. The chocolate pudding package helps a lot with the flavor. I am very happy with these cookies and will have to keep myself from eating too many of them!

I had to search for the flaxseed meal, but found it at the grocery store in the aisle with the flour and sugar. It is the Bob’s Red Mill Whole Ground Flaxseed Meal and you can buy it online on Amazon if you can’t find it at the store. I had to buy the brewer’s yeast from GNC, which I read is more expensive then if you buy it from a nutrition store like whole foods or again online at Amazon.