I have been wondering what others of you have experienced with using the
Starter SNS.  I haven't seen if mentioned much, so I assume that it is not
that popular.  I first saw it in the spring of 1994, when it was new.  I was
nursing my fifth adopted baby at that time, and had extensive experience
with both the Lact-Aid (my favorite) and the SNS.  A local Medela rep gave
me one and asked if I would try it out and let her know what I thought of
it.  I thought that, with all my experience with supplementers, I should be
able to get the thing to work if anyone could.  However, I found it to be
very difficult.  I had to struggle to get any milk into the little bulb on
the bottom (as worn), and then keep doing that.  Joseph was seven months old
then, and pretty happy go lucky at the breast, but in many situations,
having to keep messing with the device to get it to flow would frustrate the
baby, not to mention Mom.  The only thing I could think of was that it might
be useful for a mom whose baby had gotten used to the immediate flow from
bottles, and needed just a little supplement, as encouragement to suck at
the breast long enough to stimulate letdown.  However, something like the
Starter SNS, which is far from cheap, would be overkill for someone who just
needed to provide a little bit of supplement at the beginning of a feed.

The best way I can see for using the Starter SNS, would be to take all of
the pieces out of the inside, and just use the little stopper to keep the
milk from flowing until the baby was latched.  This would provide a
consistent flow, but would probably be faster than would be optimal, in most
cases.  Another method would be to use it with the bottle upright, cut the
tube off and pull it down through the hole that it was cut from, so that it
was barely reaching the bottom.  Of course, the same could be done with a
tube threaded through a regular bottle nipple, so paying for a Starter SNS
to do that with would be a waste of money.

Has anyone found any better ways to use it?  I have also thought that the
Medela finger feeder looks like it would work better at the breast than the
Starter SNS.  Has anyone tried it?

Best Wishes,
Darillyn

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