Hi, everyone, welcome back. I've, you've come to my kitchen. And we're going to go through some sterilization, and the different sterilizing processes that you can use, formula preparation, and just some information on tapes and flow and all of that kind of information. It's interesting, I was actually researching online before I did this to kind of see what sort of advice is out there for you when you have a little baby. And it was very confusing. There was really not a lot of consistency of information for a new parent to figure out how to sterilize how long to sterilize for what was the difference between do i do it for six months or 12 months or once a day, or every year, which is really confusing.

Different states have different advice. So we're just going to go with logic. And let's just use our brains and think logically about things. And so I've got the boiling method. So if you think about it, why do we need to sterilize bottles and tapes? What, why?

Why are we doing it just to fill up our day with stuff. And in reality, and this little baby of yours hasn't got a very good immune system, they haven't really been exposed to a lot of the bacterias that we have in the world. And suddenly, like a bottle can transport some bacteria to that baby that they haven't got a defense mechanism for, that you already have. But maybe your baby doesn't. So you can imagine a milky substance sitting inside a bottle, whether it's breast milk or formula can grow bacteria quite quickly. And so sterilizing is really about very good claiming because you know, your boobs aren't zero if you breastfeeding.

So we can't achieve, you know, clinical sterilization that they do in surgery. Nor is that necessary. So that's our general principle is taking away that growth of bacteria so your little baby doesn't get sick unnecessarily. Now, generally, if you think of a six month old baby, that baby's putting everything the dog toys, their feet, their hands, they're dummies, it's dropped on the floor, in their mouth. So they've building up a good resilient bacterial load. Yes.

So do we need to keep sterilizing everything? No. Even though some of the advice will say to continue to keep sterilizing for 12 months, and that's completely up to you, but in reality, you know, if that baby's eating its fate, and you know, the ball, that the kid next next door eight, then do we need to keep sterilizing their bottle, and that's completely a parent's choice. So here, method one is sterilizing, so it's called rapid boil sterilizing. Now we've done the first aid section, so obviously rapidly boiling water quite dangerous. You probably not going to do this method.

When your baby is on you, or near you, and you're going to be very careful about how you do this, which is why we have our tongues. So this is in an imaginary stove. It's been boiling rapidly. And then I'm going to pick out my bottle drying off so it's been rapidly boiling for 10 minutes, and the bottle is not just sitting on top, you actually kind of push it down so it's whoops, it's under the water. Shake it off. And then you might get yourself a clean tea towel and and pop it down.

Now, is it gonna be hot? Yes. Are you gonna let it cool down because you don't want to burn yourself. So you take a bottle and I've just put a sample bottle in there so you'd kind of put it on a clean area, let it cool down so that you can touch it and you might dry it off with this tea towel and then hopper into a clean containers or you might just leave it on the towel or you might refill it and store it with the bottle, boiled water ready for the formula to go back in. Or you might pop it in a little container with elite. or potentially put that tweet out over the top just to stop pollens and dust and everything coming on top of that.

So if you did these process, and you kept it in this clean container, we would say that it's clean for about 24 hours. So it's not like you can do it once and then keep it sterilized for weeks on end. So that's a rapid boil method. Now you can use this for that first six months if you're only expressing every now and then and you think God this is going to take up a lot of room in my kitchen. This is a micro sterilizer you know, get your pot out, fill it up with oil and water and boiler. And so rapid, foil technique, sterilizing in as deemed sterilized.

Which means that you would put some water in the bottom of this. And in the instructions that will tell you what to do. So say this is about 120 meals you typically in and put the bottles in, and you put the lid on and clip it closed and pop this in the microwave. It's normally for about five to seven minutes, depending on what it says with this. So the water boils at the bottom of that the steam rises and the steam sterilizer sterilizes your equipment in there. What doesn't make any sense to me is that the manufacturing information says as long as you keep it in here, it's considered sterile.

And so if you kept it in there for a day or two, where it's wet, like how how is that zero, it doesn't make sense. But anyway, that's what it says. You know, my logic would be to to open this up to do the same thing to maybe let it dry or cool down a bit and then dry it off with a clean tea towel and put it into a container. up completely up to you to other methods of sterilizing and mutants, which is not very popular anymore. And so Milton's is a chemical. So basically you get a big container and put this chemical in as per the instructions, and then leave your stuff to soak for an hour.

And so over that hour, it's going to chemically sterilize the whatever you've got in there. And then you rinse, rinse it and then let it air dry. And so the last wave sterilizing is actually not dissimilar to our micro sterilizer, and they're benchtop sterilizing unit, she's the same principles, it's just that it's a continuous unit that plugs into the wall process is very much the same bag inside to leave the products in the sterilizer. And for as long as they're in there, they continue to be sterile. My point again, is it's still a moist environment. And so you know, some people run them like like the use of those units.

Be You don't need to kind of load it up, turn it on, take it out, kind of put them on and push the button and it's got a water chamber at the bottom. And also they're about $100. Whereas I got this from Kmart for $15. So all this is already in your cupboard. So you know, do you need the separate unit that's going to clutter up your benchtop is that going to make your life easier, or is one of these more simpler methods is going to work for you for that first six months, so that is what we would consider sterilizing. But the most important thing that I actually haven't touched on is cleaning.

So what I've got here is a pump that I've taken apart all the little bits, and so we know the world is not sterile. And we know that milk fits in these and you know your breast milk has got lots of components to it formula has got lots of components. We're trying to protect the baby away from unnecessary bacterial acts. exposure. So here's my simulated sink. So I've got some warm soapy water.

And I've used just a washing up liquids. I guess, you know, if if you're always used pair, Molly's, you know, you might use that if you're a bit more conscious of chemical load, then you might use more of a natural detergent. And this is just a standard bottle brush, which tends to have a big big and I'll do a bit so the little bit is for all their little fiddly bits. So this is a part of the breast pump, and where it helps to cause the suction so the milk comes down so it's quite important but very fiddly, so your big bit of your scrubber wouldn't go in there but I can fit my little bit in and make sure that there's no milk residue sitting in there before I sterilize it. So warm, soapy water is actually more important than sterilizing. So give that a little wash and then you might pop it in there.

Again things like This you kind of get under where mood can be trapped and giving it a good wash with the scrubbing brush and trying to do it while it's still warm so that it doesn't kind of stick on and giving that a good wash, like this is very important, paying attention to all the little scrubby beats and then giving it a sterilize after that. So you breast pump itself tends to have lots of components to it. So you want to wash them out well. And then put it in here so that it gets sterilized. Now most parts of the breast pump you will have to sterilize if you think everything that comes in contact with milk needs to be cleaned. And obviously the handle doesn't come in contact with milk generally doesn't need to be sterilized.

So that's kind of the components to it, which and all the different options. It's a bit like anything, you know, if you drive a lot, you would probably want automatic car, if you only drive the car once a week, you probably wouldn't care and just have a manual car. So it's about what is going to work for you what's going to be the most time efficient, so that you can make this process as quickly as possible. And keep that bacterial load as low as possible for that baby. But also knowing that you can't completely You know, there's always going to be bacteria that floats around because on our hands, and they're probably the most important thing I haven't touched on yet is washing your hands. So you know, there's things like your alcohol gels, and that we get you to use before you handle claim bottles before you make formula.

So you can use an antibacterial gel or you can just wash your hands and then dry them off so that you're not transferring. Like maybe you just picked up the dog poo outside, and then you're not going to handle the claim bottles, which is pretty logical. But sometimes you have is known maybe you've got some money out your purse for someone then you're like I've got to do Those bottles. No, there's a lot of bacteria on Monday. So you want to kind of keep your hands clean, and then do what you've got to do. So that's the general principle of sterilization.

And there's gonna be some little tips and tricks that are attached to this if you don't quite understand or you want some more information, so hopefully that makes it easier for you.