I have encountered this with my baby. She will consistently take a bottle of expressed breast milk at first, but will stop feeding after about an ounce. She becomes very fussy and is obviously still hungry. I always noticed the milk had a sour (but not bad) smell. Today, my husband dropped some of the milk on my wrist and I tasted it--yuk, soapy! My daughter has never gotten badly sick from the milk but may have had some extra gassiness and once had a VERY green stool (also a sign of ++lipase?).

Thanks for the comment Lucy!

Here is a great article from iVillage.com speaking to the green stool/gassiness issue. According to this article, it is actually caused by a foremilk/hindmilk imbalance. Read on...

http://parenting.ivillage.com/newborn/nbreastfeed/0,,40wl,00.html

Perhaps you need to empty your breast by pumping longer to get the hindmilk? I'm not a lactation consultant, but that is my first thought.

Best,
Wendy
www.PumpEase.com

I've just discovered that my frozen milk is high in lipase. I tasted a drop that got on my finger, and then tasted some more to be sure. It is really terrible. But my son doesn't seem to mind it. I will scald in the future before freezing but in the meantime I have 200 ounces of frozen milk that will all have this sour taste. I have a 5-day trip coming up and I don't have time to collect enough milk all over again so he will just have to deal with this milk while I'm gone. But then I think I'll throw out whatever is left and start fresh with the scalding process.

Thanks for the comment Lauren. It's a good thing that KellyMom.com says that your milk is OK for your son to consume and doubly good that he isn't refusing it considering you are heading out of town. I love happy endings! Have a good trip.

I'm so happy I came across this article. Finally I know what is wrong with my breastmilk! My son is now 8 months old. I've tried many times to freeze my breastmilk always being very careful everything is sanitary etc When I used the milk he would eat a little then start screaming and refuse it... he would still be hungry and eat from breast or fresh expressed bottle but never what had been frozen. It is always hard to get him to calm down afterwards, he seems a little gassy and very fussy. This caused me to start tasting my breastmilk (yuck, i know!) before i fed it to him... but i was so worried i was giving him bad milk. Most of the time my fresh expressed milk is okay, sometimes though it tastes "soapy" and then makes me gag, when this happens now i don't feed him it. Interestingly enough my son had colic for the first 3 months of his life, related i don't know?? I do have a Q though?.. would scalding my breastmilk before freezing it nil the nutrient value in it?

Hi Lorraine,

Thanks for your comment. To answer your question I went back to the Kelly Mom site here: http://www.kellymom.com/bf/pumping/lipase-expressedmilk.html

She says, "Scalding the milk will destroy some of the anti-infective properties of the milk and may lower some nutrient levels, but this is not likely to be an issue unless all of the milk that baby is receiving has been heat-treated."

So no, it does not "nil" the nutrient levels, just reduce them. As I'm sure you're already aware, even with lowered nutrient levels, your breastmilk is still far better for your son than formula.

I hope this helps!

Wendy

After tasting some refrigerated breast milk just now I thought for sure it was off..I even made my husband taste it as well which made him gag! My Son has no issues with it, just glad to know that there is nothing wrong with it. Thanks so much for the info.

@Colleen - always glad to help!

I have just started pumping just to have a bottle for Dad in case he needs it before I get back from running errands. The first time I fed it to him at room temp and it went well. The second day I pumped was this past Monday. I put it immediately in the fridge. We went to use it Thursday night. The baby screamed the whole time my husband tried to feed him. I took it from him and noticed the sour smell right away. I'm wondering if I just leave it for one day rather than 3 or 4 if the same thing would happen. I haven't tried it yet. If the lipase problem is there, does the smell show up as soon as it chills?

Hi Renee,

If you go to the Kelly Mom site here: http://www.kellymom.com/bf/pumping/lipase-expressedmilk.html you will read that an excess of the enzyme lipase can begin to break down the milk fat soon after the milk is expressed (which leads to the soapy, sour or rancid smell). Therefore, it would make sense that after one day your milk could smell OK and after three it may not. It is due to the process of breaking down which begins almost immediately after expressing. Does this help?

Wendy

Thanks Wendy! Yes. This gives me hope. I'll start experimenting tomorrow.

You're wlelcome Renee - make sure you read the Kelly Mom site - it is a wealth of information! :-)

I have this same problem and didn't realize it until my baby was 7 months old. I never fed him frozen milk, only the sitter. I was unaware of the bad smell. I have a whole freezer full of milk. I did not want to throw it away and found that the milk banks will take it. I am donating all my milk (700+ ounces) to the milk bank. I wish I would have found out about this sooner.

@Trish - Thank you for sharing that milk banks will take milk with a high lipase content. I guess because they pasteurize it, it is fine for consumption?? Did they explain it to you? I'd love to hear more!