Help - need to stop breastfeeding quickly

[spicymum]

My dd has been ebf for 24 weeks, but I've just found out she's lactose intolerant and I need to put her on lactose free formula.

I realise I have no idea how to go about stopping my milk. The advice I've seen is about dropping feeds slowly (e.g. one every 10 days, but I don't really want to pump and dump for 2 months!), or alternatively just stopping completely and taking ibruprofen for the pain (doesn't seem sensible to me??).

Any advice from anyone who's been through the same thing, or can point me in the direction of some reading? How much/how often to pump, if at all? Should I be asking my doctor for medication? How long could/should it take to dry up?

Apologies if this is covered on other threads - I have had a look on MN and elsewhere but can't seem to find anything that quite fits. I'm already a bit emotional and teary at having to give up and don't want to add mastitis to the mix!

Can I ask who has told you to give up bf?

If you phone one of the helplines they can give oyu info in how to stop BF.m How to lessen the emotional and physical impacts on you and DD.

this blog has all the numbers down the right hand side.

HTH

What a distressing place to find yourself in

How are they sure she is lactose intolerant and not just cows milk protein intolerant (far more common). Have you tried cutting all dairy out of your own diet?

I don't know about giving up - all my research has been on establishing/upping supply not the other way round! Have you checked KellyMom?

How has your baby been diagnosed? What are your DD's symptoms?

Interesting Kellymom article on lactise intolerance in bf babies

Or even lactose

Why do you need to give up BF? My understanding is that you can continue if you are willing to cut dairy out of your own diet.

Please don't feel you have to answer this if there are other reasons you'd rather not share. It just sounded from your OP that you might not have all the information and I'd rather give it and risk offending than not give it and risk you stopping if you didn't have to, because you didn't know you could carry on.

As for stopping quickly - express, as much as you can sticking to your DS' current feeding schedule (guess if you have been feeding on demand) then drop this down by one feed per day, a week at a time. So if starting out doing 8 feeds, drop one the first week, then another the next week etc. Try and spread them out as you drop them, so if doing one every 2 hours then spread to one every 2.5 hours, then one every 3 hours etc etc until finally none. And be on the lookout for signs of mastitis - and be kind to yourself :) It's an emotional time and that's hormonal as well as circumstantial.

spicymum... what are your daughters symptoms?

if she is genuinely lactose intolerant she would have been very, very poorly a long time before now. failure to thrive etc etc because breastmilk is full of lactose

is it possible that she actually has a milk protein intolerance? in which case cutting dairy out of your diet would be all you needed to do?

who told you this? did they not give you any advice on stopping?

Good article from the ABA about lactose intolerance is here.

Defintely would recommend that you speak to a bfing helpline too.

Thanks everyone!

It is definitely lactose intolerance - she had the reducing sugars test and she has 4x the amount of sugars in her poo than the maximum you should if you're digesting it properly. Her symptoms were green frothy poos, up to 8 times a day, and generally being unhappy every time she needed to go.

It's the doctors (gp and paed) that have advised me to stop but in this case my instinct is with them. My understanding is me giving up dairy won't help because that won't affect the amount of lactose in my milk. She's had diarrhoea for so long (3 weeks) that I'm worried about dehydration and her absorbing enough nutrients from the milk. Also I don't really want to start weaning until her tum is settled.

Believe me I haven't taken the decision lightly - I carried on bf despite 2 bouts of mastitis, 1 of thrush, 2 periods of reduced supply where I had to bf 24/7. And I just cried all the way through her last feed! But I have bf all this time because I believed it was the best thing for her... now I no longer think that's the case. I did look on kellymom - it's the same as the ABA advice. If she was younger I might carry on through it, or at least express for a month, but she is so close to 6 months that I do feel this is best for both of us.

Docs haven't given me advice on stopping, but partly because I was so shaken by the test result I forgot to ask!

Sorry for waffly post... hope I've answered everyone. I'll give the bf helplines a go.

Poor you SpicyMum- things have obviously been hard.

Of course you haven't taken this decision lightly. Nobody was doubting you, it's just that often women are told to stop breastfeeding when it is not really necessary. The tests seem to be pretty conclusive though.

Hope your LO gets better soon. You've done so well to get this far.

Thanks crikey. I needed to hear that I think :)

yes absolutely, I see so many threads on here where peiople have been told to give up unnecessarily. Thankfully a lot of them come here and find out they can carry on, but it's worrying to think about how many don't get a second opinion and give up just because of bad advice!

I would definitely ring one of the hotlines and get some good advice on gradually reducing supply.
if there's a chance this may resolve itself would you consider expressing and then going back to breastfeeding?
I only ask because I know from experience how hard it can be giving up breastfeeding when it's a forced situation rather than being your choice!

I'm probably going to do a compromise - not express fully for the whole time, but maybe only cut down gradually, as it looks like that's the best way to go anyway. Then the likelihood is I will still have milk for at least a couple of feeds a day by the time she is better. But I do want her to have been symptom free for at least a couple of weeks before I introduce lactose again, and even then will only introduce slowly. But I will feel better even if I can give her a bf or 2 a day...