Soother at night?

[tjtheminx]

I am EBF DS2 and it has been going reasonably well

He's been pretty good at night since birth, take him up to bed at 10pm. Feeding at about 10pm, 12mn, 2.30 and 5.30am.( Great I think!) Middle of last week had what I think was 3 week growth spurt and fed every hour/ every hour and a half round the clock for a couple of days.

This cluster feeding slowed down over the weekend and he has been feeding for about 30 minutes every 2 1/2 -3 hours during the daytime.

However for the past 3 nights I have not had a wink of sleep. I have not been able to settle him at all. He takes a big milk feed at about 10pm and again at 11pm. From then on he will only settle if attached to the breast. He doesn't seem to be hungry, just sucking for comfort.
eg, I pick him up, put him to the breast and within 2 minutes he's fast asleep. But when I put him down in his cot he's awake and crying again within minutes. Last night this went on and on until both nipples were bleeding. So so sore. And neither of us got any sleep.

So I am wondering if he needs the sucking reflex so much should I try a soother -- at night only?
Any other suggestions?
[ I never gave DS1 a soother so have no experience with them and DH is acting like I have suggested giving DS2 crack cocaine!!]

Please help, I am in that sleep deprived state when everything feels just too hard and I want to cry.

Really want my lovely DS to sleep better!
Thanks

No experience myself, but if it's what you need to do, then do it is my opinion. You're not going to be able to cary on breastfeeding without sleep and if he's making your nipples bleed every night without even feeding. I'd ignore your DH - he's not the one with bleeding nipples!

How old is he?

The bleeding implies to me, that his latch isn't quite right. What sort of BF support do you have?

Thanks,
NQC - he's nearly 4 weeks. I am in the USA and TBH I don't have any BF support.
I saw a lactation consultant in the hospital and told her I had had a tough time BF DS1- her sage advice was "formulas are really good these days" and handed me a box of ready made formula!!!

I think his latch is OK when he's actually feeding though... this is the first day I've had any problems with pain/bleeding etc.
When he was sucking all night last night he was just sucking on the nipple not the bit around it IYKWIM.

BF in the last half hour and not so painful.
Still, I'd like to hope I'll get some sleep tonight.......

Ok, the Jack Newman website has good information about latch, including lots of videos. Kellymom is a good source of information, too.

I'm sorry to hear your lactation consultant is so rubbish.

It's ok to take him off if he's just sucking on the nipple. Break the seal first, though!

The thing is, though, if they're comfort sucking, it tends to be really gently sucks, so unlikely to do any harm. If he's sucking hard on the nipple, he's trying to get milk, just incompetantly. (sucking on just the nipple doesn't make milk come out.)

Oh, is bed sharing an option for you? I know some mothers aren't comfortable with the idea, but if you could fall asleep while he sucked (particularly if he's not sucking on just the nipple) then that might work?