How to Choose Top Nursing Bras – A Buying Guide

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Choosing the Top Nursing Bras – A Complete Brief Buying Guide

If you are about to give birth and want to be set up properly into parenthood, chances are you are looking for the best nursing bra. For those who don’t know, a nursing bra is a specialized bra for women who are breastfeeding and lactating. It allows you to comfortably breastfeed without the need to remove the bra since the flaps of the bra can be opened to expose your nipples to your baby. There is normally some kind of flap or clasp that holds the flap closed. When you go through your pregnancy, your breast begins to prepare for lactation and they will grow in size.

When to consider top nursing bras?

Most changes will happen to your breasts within the first four months of gestation so around 4 months is a good time to start looking for a nursing bra. Don’t get nursing bras confused with maternity bras, which are very closely related. Maternity bras are designed with soft cotton lining to support your larger breasts comfortably and have wider adjustable straps with extra hooks to adjust their size throughout your pregnancy. Meanwhile, nursing bras are slightly different from maternity bras in that they have panels that can be removed to allow for easy breastfeeding. Nursing bras also allow for room for your breast to grow. It is important to wear nursing bras that fit well and have room to expand.

If the bra fits too tight, the milk supply can be reduced and you may even experience pain, infection, or plugged milk ducts. During nursing and breastfeeding, your breast size will change considerably so you may have to buy additional nursing bras with different sizes. Nursing bras vary in design and all have different underwires, soft cups, types of flaps, materials, and different comfort levels. It is important to take all these factors into consideration when searching for the best nursing bras.

Choosing A Top Nursing Bra – A Buying Guide

It is important to choose the best nursing bra for your needs because ultimately comfort is an important issue when you are going through your pregnancy and nursing. Not only is it inconvenient to have an uncomfortable bra, but also it is a bit unhealthy as it can slow down the flow of milk and lead to various health issues. If you use a breast pump, maybe you can get around the milk flow issue, but we wouldn’t push it.

The best nursing bras will be specially tailored to breastfeed your infants as they support the extra weight and size of your breasts and well as have some mechanism for quickly removing the cup without taking off the entire bra. There are quite a lot of features to think about when deciding on the best nursing bra for you. We have listed some things to think about below.

Comfort

The comfort level is the most important feature of your nursing bra. If your nursing bra isn’t comfortable, you will have a miserable time, and may even hinder your ability to produce milk. Many women don’t understand that your breasts can increase during both pregnancy and lactation/nursing. Additionally, your ribcage can expand a bit as well. Instead of purchasing the size you are normally used to purchasing, re-measure the band size and buy the new size and perhaps even a size larger. You should also consider a cup size that is one size larger than what you are normally used to account for breast size fluctuations.

Support

There are many things to consider when calibrating the support for the best nursing bra. Keep in mind that support is different from comfort in that those bras with the best support may not be the most comfortable. The band size is probably the most important factor in determining support. A band size that is too large will not hold your breast up and won’t do you any good. Also, the cup size can’t be too large either or your breast won’t hold up. You shouldn’t be able to move your breasts around too much in your bra. Also, the general build and features such as an underwire affect the support of your bra.

Type of Nursing Bra

There are many types of nursing bras. Nursing bras with an underwire have the most support while a seamless nursing bra with no flaps is the most comfortable but provides the least support. In general, you can have nursing bras with or without flaps and ones with and without underwire. The flap is a removable cup that allows you to swing the cup aside with one hand and discreetly breastfeed without having to remove the entire bra. Nursing bras that don’t have flaps are seamless and don’t support a lot of weight. They are for women with small breasts and are light and stretchy. You can also decide whether or not you want an underwire or not. Underwires are great for women with large breast sizes because they provide more support, but they are also uncomfortable. So to sum it all up, you have to decide between comfort and support level knowing that very rarely do you get both.

Flap Type

There are actually two kinds of flaps you can get for your top nursing bras. You have middle flaps which connect at the center of the bra and upper flaps which connect at the top of the bra. It is important to pick a flap that is convenient to open and one that opens with a wide enough angle, regardless of the type of flap you choose. In terms of connections, you can either have snaps or hook and loop. Snaps are more expensive, more durable, and harder to manage to open with one hand. Hook and loop are definitely more affordable and easier to manage with one hand, but they are not very durable.

Material

Ideally, you should pick a nursing bra material that is light and durable. Light fabrics also tend to be breathable, stay cool for a long time, and have a lot of movement and comfort. However, the trade-off is they don’t offer that much support. Heavier padded materials are stiffer, so naturally, they have more support. The trade-off here is that they are a lot less comfortable and can get hot.