Upset about breastfeeding

[feelingdown7]

My baby was born on Friday and despite every effort, will not latch on. When she does latch on, it's only for a few seconds and then she comes off again. I have been expressing breast milk using a pump and have been giving this to her and using formula as a top up. This has really upset me as I really wanted to exclusively breastfeed and feel that I am depriving my child of all the benefits of breastfeeding. My mum and husband keep telling me not to put pressure on myself and that it's not the end of the world if she has to be formula fed but I can't help but feel down about it.

Can someone convince me I'm not entirely ruining my child's life by not being able to breastfeed?! 😩

I felt the same way as you. Beat myself up about it. Tried for 2 weeks. Now that child is 6. You cannot tell she was formula fed. You can't tell with any of them. This is a brief period, one of the first of parenting and in the long run all that matters is your child is fed by whatever method.

I was where you are a few weeks ago. It is so hard and often those who manage to breastfeed but talk about it being hard work in the beginning don't seem to understand what you mean when you say the baby won't latch AT ALL. It's not just a case of it being hard, it's a case of it not working in any way shape or form. I had to give up but the support I received was shocking and had I sought more support e.g. private lactation support etc. it likely would have been possible. As it was, this baby is my second and after the awful support I had with my first leading to exclusively pumping etc I chose to switch to formula much quicker because I could feel myself slipping into bad mental health like the first time. My baby is fed and happy however the grief I feel is very very real at yet again not being able to feed my baby in the way I want. I also think some people don't fully appreciate that you don't care that fed is best when you have your heart set on breastfeeding. Seek private support if you are able to and if it doesn't work out, there is a book on breastfeeding grief by Amy Brown which is supposedly very good. I'm not ready to start reading it yet but lots of people online have said it really helped them. I really really hope it does work for you. Nipple shields are brilliant though and we managed latching with them although it was shallow and the support to correct it was non existent. My advice is seek the support basically if you're able to do so. Good luck!!

Firstly congratulations op on your little baby. I choose to ff my baby as it worked for me. There is no difference between my DD and any other child at her school...you have no idea who was ff who was bf who walked first, who talked first. Talk to the midwife re the latch but please dont best yourself up. The first weeks are hard. Your body made a human being.

Try some shields, keep pumping it up your supply, and do breast compressions when baby latches onto shield thinking it’s a bottle. In time you can try without the shields but no rush on that.

This, every single word of it. Very wise and humane (and correct!).

I’m on week 4 with baby no. 3 and despite having BF two already, this one is currently entirely on expressed due to what I think is a terrible latch.

i think it’s the shape of his mouth (too small) and am hoping that by 6 weeks we might start getting there, as happened with my first.

At 5 days you are still very very early OP. If you are desperate to BF there is still plenty of time. Can you try to relax into combi feeding, keep working on the latch for a short time every day, and see where the journey takes you?

And if it takes you (or has already taken you) into fully formula feeding, then it won’t make any difference to your baby (except possibly giving you a happier baby if/when long term removing extra stress/pressure from yourself makes you a happier mum).

I had this but due to having a baby born in lockdown it was hard to get proper support. She had a tongue tie that wasn’t picked up until week 7, I had her assessed privately. I had been expressing my milk until then but we never made it work sadly. I pumped for another month and then switched to formula. Baby is thriving and you really can’t tell now she’s at nursery who was formul fed and who was breastfed.

Your hormones are all over the place at the moment too so please be kind. X

Has she been checked for tongue tie xx

Definitely get referred ASAP, help is there! You are doing amazing, every bit of milk you have given is great. Formula is great too, it keeps these little ones fed and healthy.

I took six weeks to get baby fully breastfed and that was using nipple shields. In another two, baby was on the bare breast.
It is hard. Only you can say if/when you think it's time to stop.

My DH was very supportive along the 'it's OK not to bf' lines (in a nice way, he could see how difficult and upsetting it was). Us other mums are there to say it's OK to go through the struggle to try to make it happen too if that's what you need to do.

DS never latched. He never showed any interest, never opened his mouth, used to nod off the second I got a boob out. All the "experts" were bloody useless and the constant trying was just making me more upset. Gave up and just FF instead, but felt guilty for a long time after though. Long run, no one can tell - like me and DH (both FF), he's really healthy, active, rarely ill and he's really well bonded with both of us.

It's not all or nothing and you (and your baby) don't need to get it immediately.

Different things work for different people but the worst piece of advice I was given was to just persevere, eventually baby will get it and FF will affect your supply if you let so much as a drop pass your precious baby's lips. Truly awful advice in my case and my baby almost ended up back in hospital due to excessive weight loss. I had a very hungry, unhappy baby for the first few weeks. By comparison, your baby is getting enough milk and you are doing exactly the right thing.

If you want to FF, your baby will be absolutely fine and no issues. You are not letting them down in the slightest.

If you want to persevere with BF, also fine. Many babies start off mixed fed for a variety of reasons and then as their mother's supply increases and they become better at feeding, eventually go on to be almost exclusively bf. This is what happened with my baby. After a truly awful start and lots of pressure put on me by various people not to give formula (which in the end I ignored and slipped baby a few bottles of formula to stop the hunger screaming), both my baby and I eventually got the hang of breast-feeding and I ended up breastfeeding until 18 months.

What I would say is that if you choose to continue, breastfeeding can be a lot easier than formula feeding in terms of not having to sterilise bottles/prepare feeds etc. I was glad in the end not to have that hassle. On the other hand, your partner/other people can help a lot more if you're giving bottles.

Currently pregnant again and this time I will ignore everyone else's opinions and do exactly what feels right for me and the baby, which will probably involve a combination of breastfeeding, expressing and formula to start with.

"Can someone convince me I'm not entirely ruining my child's life by not being able to breastfeed?! 😩"

Yes sure op. ...All kids that arent breastfed lives are ruined . 100% ruined. Theyll never get a job. They'll never be able to make friends and be happy. Poor kids....

Hi, after lurking for ages I have joined MN just to comment as I noticed no one else mentioned this.
did you have any difficulties during birth and /or have noticed a stiffness in one side of your baby (such as preference to turn head one way or hard to move arms and legs on one side)?

my boy (now 4 months) didn’t BF properly until 7 weeks old. At first I was bottle and expressing due to poor latch. I was told at birth he had slight tongue tie. The HV noticed I was very tired and getting depressed about feeding. I was feeling pressured by my family to BF and by partner’s family to formula bottle feed.

HV recommended nipple shields and they worked.
I then went to see a cranial osteopath (this is what no one has mentioned yet) as my baby was very stiff on one side due to doctor having to reach in and turn him face down as he was going to come out face up and was having trouble during labour to come out. I believe this is what caused the stiffness in my baby.

I then went to see lactation and tongue tie specialist as I wanted to get off the nipple shields as baby was starting to pull them off. TT was barely there so was not the issue. She also suggested it was the stiffness that had been causing issue and recommended a few more sessions with osteopath.

my boy saw osteopath 3 times and now BF like a pro. It is a lot easier for night feeds to BF but like others say, a fed baby is what is essential so don’t feel bad on yourself if you do switch to formula

good luck

It’s so early . You can still have a fantastic breastfeeding journey if you want . There is also no shame in formula .

With my first we struggled with latch for the first THREE MONTHS! His first week or two we topped up with formula every feed and again between 8-10 weeks old.

15 weeks later (and two tongue tie snips later ) we were finally exclusively breastfeeding We went on to breastfed until he was 14 months old .

this is something that seems huge at the time and irrelevant after. You've already pumped which requires super human effort. There comes a point where the stress and effort may not be worth it and that's totally fine. Have you ever heard anyone in your whole life say 'if only my mum had breastfed me a bit longer, then....'? Your baby will be fine.

This is absolutely true. I had a baby who wouldn't latch and was obsessed that he MUST breastfeed. We managed it but I look back and wonder why on earth I didn't just give him formula.

Nipple shields worked for us. I found Medela were by far the best.
I also took him to a chiropractor specialising in babies. Hard to say if it helped but he had a massive sleep after & seemed more settled.

You will get through this OP and one day it'll be your turn to advise a new mum that although it feels horrible right now, everything will be fine x

Ask for help from your midwife and la leche league, and have baby checked for tongue tie.
Please don't be hard on yourself. You're trying your best and stress will hinder your milk production.

There is a real hysteria around breastfeeding and pressure on mothers. I was made to feel absolutely dreadful for wanting to give formula even when my two week old baby had not slept for hours since they were so hungry.

Of course in the long run this is one of those decisions you simply should not stress over, but try telling that to a vulnerable new mum who has been given the spiel about how breastfeeding offers the best start (and anything else is by definition inferior) in the lead-up to the birth. The benefit of hindsight is a great thing, so please try to be sympathetic.

For me breast feeding was the most traumatic experience. Just couldn’t get DD1 to latch on despite loads of visits to breast feeding clinics etc. After 2 weeks ended up with mastitis and in so much pain. My lovely health visitor said ‘you can just stop trying now you know, bottle feeding isn’t like giving heroin’. I cried with relief and we bottle fed from then on.p and only really then started bonding properly. She is now a very healthy 19year old and has no allergies, rarely gets ill, very sporty.

i know this is my experience, but don’t beat yourself up please. Your baby will be fine if you bottle feed. Keep trying if you want to, stop if it’s adversely affecting your mental and /or physical health.

ps I next had twins and I chose straight away to express and didn’t even try to breastfeed, and that worked really well.

I agree. It was incredibly traumatic for me. I had very little support due to pandemic. The midwives and HV kept pushing it over the phone. I was isolated. Felt like a complete failure. Even the message on the formula box about breast feeding being best would send me close to the edge. I did have Postnatal depression but I swear the whole messaging surrounding breastfeeding was such a contributing factor to this.

I really feel for you, BF is so hard so try to be like to yourself, speak to yourself the way you would a friend if they had the same concerns.

Breastmilk is food, formula is food. They are very much equal. If you really do a deep dive into the evidence and the studies you will see for yourself that the difference is negligible, mainly concerning the gi tract and very much short term. Breastmilk is not the "liquid gold" that some make it out to be, its just food.
Breastfeeding is great, but it is not without its drawbacks, formula feeding is also great. If BF isn't working for either of you at any point then switch without guilt, you both need to be happy.

Yeah I'd try some shields.

I'd keep pumping on one side and keep giving her chance to latch on on other side. Having her in your arms while pumping should help re. what you get out.

I'd try to combi feed, you can keep trying with latching/breathing feeding while you do. It is possible to combi feee and reduce the formula as you get more from breast-feeding. You'd have to keep pumping though, if shes not latching/sucking. Have you tried the mobile in bra pumps like the (elvi, if ots still going).... they'd make it a lot easier. There's also a relatively mobile collection cup called a freebie, that works with various pumps.

Babies are rubbish at breastfeeding to start with! I really struggled to get DS to latch and called a private lactation consultant who just moved his head and my arm a tiny bit and suddenly it all worked. Hope you can get some practical support, I would have never managed alone.

I was adopted from birth so no option to have been breastfed and I can honestly say it has not impacted me, my life or my health. Your baby will be fine and will no doubt grow into a healthy adult. A fed baby is best, whether that’s breast or formula.