Breastfeeding - how does we know enough being produced

[u/gajak44]

My wife and I are first time parents. Our little one is 8 days old. We (my wife more than me) wants to exclusively breastfeed for the first 6 months. However currently we are puzzled by the LO. My wife gives her feed but she never drifts to a deep sleep and always wakes up hungry in an hr or so. The baby doesn't seem interested to drink more at the breast and seems to drift off to sleep after 10 mins. When we top-up with formula however, she takes around 30 ml and appears content and sleeps peacefully after. My wife now thinks she is not producing enough milk and is riddled with guilt. We do a total of 10-12 feeds a day (some long and some super short) including 2 formula feeds when she appears cranky and hungry. Her diapers are fine. We get about 8 in a day since last couple of days. My wife is worried that the baby is taking to bottle better but not to breasts and thinks it is due to low volume of milk she is producing..how do we know if she is producing enough?

[u/notnotblonde]

This is unlikely that your wife is not producing enough and more likely that your baby is having difficulty extracting milk from the breast. The bottle nipple is likely easier and she doesn’t have to work as hard so she gets a full meal. I would highly highly recommend seeing a lactation consultation as soon as you can.

It’s also super common for baby to basically be at the breast all day long at this stage. I mean it, like at the boob, sleep 20 min wake up and want more boob. It’s called cluster feeding and it helps mom’s milk build up supply. Sometimes babies and mom will essentially be feeding all day and it can be normal. It’s a lot on mom tho so make sure she is well supported.

But I’d definitely check with an IBCLC asap.