Sorry for the long post. I obviously needed to let it all out more than I realised...
DD3 (DC4) was 9lb 13oz when she was born. She was considerably bigger than my other babies which the midwife has put down to me having steroids at 27 weeks pregnant then being on bed rest until 34 weeks. Anyway, DD3 is EBF just like her three older siblings were. When she was weighed at 7 days old, she had dropped to 9lb. She was then weighed at 12 days old and was 9lb 12oz. Because she wasn't over her birth weight, the midwife asked me to get her weighed on day 15 so that we could be discharged to the HV. She weighed 9lb 12.5oz. I was utterly deflated and had a little cry on the way home.
I've never had a baby not recover their birth weight within the two weeks. In fact, my babies all have climbed the centiles then settled around the 75th centile for their first year of life.
Now I don't know what to do. She is fed on demand and I always offer her the second breast. She is very alert when awake and very settled between feeds. She has plenty of wet and dirty nappies and seems to be totally healthy.
I have asked on numerous occasions to have her latch checked in case it isn't perfect but I'm continually told that I will be fine because I have so much BFing experience. The first week of BFibg was awful as I had bleeding nipples as a result of DD3 being tricky to latch on (didn't open her mouth very wide) but now BFing is pain free and my nipples no longer look compressed with a line down them when she comes off. She can sometimes latch herself on now but at other times it takes us quite a few goes as she doesn't open her mouth very wide and tends to have her tongue on the roof of her mouth as she is already 'milking' before she has the breast in her mouth (probably because my milk has already let down so I dry us both off and keep trying).
I don't know what to do. I've been trying lots of skin-to-skin today but that makes her more settled and less bothered about feeding. I also try waking her up by changing her nappy to prompt her to feed more but she isn't wanting to feed unless she instigates it.
I'm really worried about her being weighed again on Monday. I feel under a lot of pressure to 'perform well' with BFing DD3 but don't seem to be producing the tight results
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Infant feeding
Baby not recovered birth weight
RoomForALittleOne · 19/07/2013 19:51
Who knows if it was medication or simply nature that grew DD3 so big. I would have happily settled for a good 2lbs less (and she still would have been bigger than her siblings 
)
Don't worry 
(easy for me to say I know!)
It sounds as if you're doing really well, and she's so close I really wouldn't panic. She sounds very similar to dd2, who hadn't quite got to bw at 13 days, the HV (not my usual
calm and collected one) got in a bit of a tizz about it. She was producing wet and dirty nappies and was alert before and after feeds. She too had a painful latch that was checked and ok, but she was small (6lbs 9) and once she had grown a bit it got much better. Anyway, the day after the HV visited my mw sent us for bloods as she was still jaundiced and she was weighed at the hospital and she'd gained over 100g in a day . Her weight gain has been fine ever since .
Wait and see what Monday brings, but for now it sounds like you're doing really well. It might be worth going along to a bf group if you are concerned about your latch, did your mw give you a list?
I've had a list but (and forgive me for sounding arrogant) they are only run by peer supporters and the HV has just asked me to be a peer supporter so it feels a bit like I might as well carry on by myself! It's at times like this that I wish we still lived in Southampton where there was free access to a lactation consultant from 10-1 mon-fri 
This reply has been deleted
Message withdrawn at poster's request.
Thanks everyone for the support.
I was checked for GD as I kept on peeing large amounts of glucose but both GTTs were normal. I don't think I'll be having DC5 to see if it happens again though 
My youngest was 9 weeks by the time he regained his birth weight. He was the biggest at birth of my 5 (9lb 9 1/2 oz), slowest to gain weight afterwards though. The HV was going nuts about it, she managed to get him admitted to hospital at 4 weeks when his weight remained static, right after sending a breastfeeding advisor around (who got the gp to prescribe me domperidone to see if that helped). He was an active little baby- rolling at 4 weeks- and I suppose stuff like that used more energy at that age. I ended up giving him a bottle of EBM then formula as I could never pump more than 10mls at a time, but suddenly at 4 months he shot off the 2nd centile and hated the bottle and never looked back.
Had a doctor tell me in the hospital when he was 4 wks that I was feeding him too much by feeding on demand, I should leave 3 hours between feeds because feeding too much means the baby gets air from your breasts not milk 
My 12 yr old dd now sees this dr and I can't take him seriously...
I suspect a posterior tongue tie but (I think) we are managing a good latch. DS had a tongue tie but it caused ongoing problems for him so he had it snipped. I'm not convinced that DD3 needs to have the op. I also can't get anyone to check for a TT because of this ridiculous idea that BFing is going to go perfectly because of my BFing experience
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