How long does my wife have to wait to breastfeed after drinking?

Alcohol does not have to "clear her system" for your wife to be okay to breastfeed. When drinking moderately (which is not the case here), one breastfeed right before drinking and is usually fine within an hour.

In other cases, when alcohol is taken more liberally, the mother (or you) needs to monitor her condition. In general, if she is okay to drive, there should be no problem breastfeeding.

The alcohol in breastmilk is the same as the alcohol in the blood system and dissipates through the blood. Not very much gets to the baby, but we don't know how much is safe for the baby. It is likely not a problem in small amounts.

"Having more than one drink is more difficult to do safely when you're a breastfeeding mom. The more drinks you have, the longer it takes for the alcohol to clear your system.

For example, according to researchers who have charted the clearance of alcohol from breast milk, if a 120-pound woman of average height consumes three drinks in one hour, it will take seven and a half hours for her breast milk to be alcohol free. For a 175-pound woman of average height, it would take about six hours.

If a 140-pound woman had four drinks in an hour, it would take about nine hours for her breast milk to be alcohol free. For the 175-pound woman, it would take about eight hours.

If you're a breastfeeding mom limit yourself to an occasional alcoholic drink, and no more than one a day. For a 130-pound woman that means no more than 2 ounces of liquor, 8 ounces of wine, or two beers in a 24-hour period.

If you have too much to drink and become intoxicated, don't nurse your baby until you're sober. If you need to pump, throw away the expressed milk."

Some other solutions suggest pumping milk before a night out so you have extra milk on hand, and to also consume lots of water while drinking to help keep your body hydrated so resuming breastfeeding after a night out is easier on your body.

She should NOT be drinking alcohol.

when breastfeeding.

Levels of alcohol in breast milk remain close to those in the mother’s bloodstream. Levels will be at their highest between 30 and 60 minutes after drinking, or 90 minutes if you’ve been drinking with a meal. It takes two-to-three hours for a unit of alcohol (a small glass of wine, or half a pint of ordinary-strength beer) to leave a nursing mum’s milk.

While large amounts of alcohol in breast milk can have a sedative effect, it’s more likely to make your baby agitated and disrupt sleep patterns. Alcohol inhibits a mother’s let-down (the release of milk to the nipple). Studies have shown that babies take around 20% less milk if there’s alcohol present, so they’ll need to feed more often – although infants have been known to go on ‘nursing strike’, probably because of the altered taste of the milk.

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breastmilk is constantly changing in the body so by the time she breast fed there would not have been alcohol in the milk. while I don't recommend drinking, if she is going to do it often maybe you guys should buy these strips that test the milk to see if there is alcohol in it.

You should wait 6 or more hours and let it get out of her system. Otherwise it might harm the baby in the long run.