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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

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Original poster

6 week old not great at breastfeefing.

12 replies

Loulou757 · 26/03/2011 17:38

Hello, am just after a bit of advice really if anyone has or had the same problem. Ive had trouble breastfeefing from day one really. My baby is quite lazy and won't open her mouth well to latch on, and once she's on she makes this clicky\sucky sound which makes me quite sore. Especially at night. I have carried on with it because midwives/chiropractors/Breastfeeding specialists have said that some babies just do that and it will get better and of course I want to try and do the best for my baby. Well 6 weeks have passed since I gave birth and instead of her getting better she has got worse :( I'm so sore. I've considered giving up and expressing milk and giving it in a bottle but then feel really down because as much as Breastfeeding hurts, I would really miss the closeness of it. Has anyone else had this problem or any suggestions would be great :)

OP posts:

StealthPolarBear · 26/03/2011 17:44

Congratulations on your DD :o
Has she been checked for tongue tie?

Original poster

Loulou757 · 26/03/2011 17:56

Thankyou :) yeah she has been checked and she hasn't got tongue tie. I just don't know what it is :( surely it would be getting better by now, not worse.

OP posts:

japhrimel · 26/03/2011 18:44

High/bubble palate perhaps?

Can you never get her latched on well? Have you seen a BFC, Bfing clinic or infant feeding specialist? I don't get why no-one you've seen is helping you work on your poor latch.

Babies aren't lazy - bfing is a skill both of you have to learn.

Original poster

Loulou757 · 26/03/2011 18:59

Sometimes she will open her mouth big and sometimes she won't. I have gone back into hospital for 3 nights for help, had Breastfeeding nurses come round, been to groups. No one can seem to help anymore as I've been told she will grow out of it. It's nothing either of us are doing wrong and I know she can't help it but it's really making me sore now.

OP posts:

TittyBojangles · 26/03/2011 20:57

Have you tried any of the helplines? NCT/LLL/BFN etc? It might be worth having a different pair of eyes on things... you never know.

mercibucket · 26/03/2011 21:04

do you know the qualifications of the people you've seen so far? breastfeeding nurse can mean almost anything really - from a few hours training to an indepth degree level course. you need to be seeing the latter not the former imo. I'm no expert but it does sound like tongue tie - can sometimes be hard to spot or very small but make a big difference to feeding. Do you have cracked nipples as well? What does the nipple/breast look like after a feed? What's her weight gain like?

with dd it did take 6 weeks or even longer for bf to start to 'click' and stop being excruciatingly painful. she was also a clicky feeder but I don't know if that was my oversupply, mispositioning or what. It did resolve itself with time and I always knew I would feed long term so it was worth hanging on in there but I do sympathise - those weeks seemed very very long

Original poster

Loulou757 · 27/03/2011 10:48

Well I've had the breast feeding specialist come round several times. She checked baby for tongue tie. I was advised to go to the chiropractor to see if they could help. They checked her pallet and said it was uneven and that by 6 weeks it would be sorted. I do have cracked nipples and after a feed they look a little bit white on the ends. It's not thrush. They can sometimes be bruised. I also developed mastitis on the breast that she had the worse latch on. I have been trying to avoid bottles but had to give her one when the mastitis was so bad and she makes the same clicky noise when she sucks the bottle.

Mercibucket- it's good to hear that other mums and babies have had the same problem. Did it hurt your nipple when she made the clicky noise? Or just all the time? I'm going to try and carry on for a couple more weeks and see what happens :)

OP posts:

Original poster

Loulou757 · 27/03/2011 10:50

Oh andsheerr weight gain is perfect. It's not effecting her, just me. I just want to be able to enjoy Breastfeeding and not dread it :(

OP posts:

ElsPels · 27/03/2011 13:49

Loulou, stop beating yourself up about it...you have done 6 weeks and that's amazing! Concentrate on that and all the goodness that you have passed on to your little one instead of giving yourself a hard time.
If you want to carry on because you miss it and you're determined to make it work then that's great! But remember to give yourself some credit for lasting this long and so if you decide to stop - that's OK too.
Lots of luck :)

FoxtrotMikiLima · 27/03/2011 14:14

Your situation sounds so similar to mine nearly 2 years ago. Ds was diagnosed with a bubble palate at 6 weeks (clicking sounds, pain...) but by that time he was losing so much weight and crying from hunger so much that I had started to supplement with formula and express - I then had so many problems getting him to continue to latch on, I eventually gave up. I continued to express for another 6 weeks until I had pretty much dried up but tbh I'm not sure I would do that again - I was so depressed about feeling a failure that I stubbornly expressed every three hours but I'm not sure it did either of us much good.

With hindsight, I was a mess and, although I tried my best, it was to the detriment of my emotional health - and to my son's - as I didn't really feel like I bonded with him. He was also very unhappy through hunger and losing weight so even my lactation consultant eventually conceded that formula was the way to go.

I'm pg with dc2 and will definitely try to bf again but if it doesn't work out, I'm not going to go through all that anxiety again.

Bert2e · 27/03/2011 14:29

What qualification did your bf specialist have? Is she just a HV with a special interest? Is she a trained bf counsellor (ABM / BfN / NCT / LLLI) or lactation consultant (IBCLC)?

The clicking is a lack of suction - normally due to a tongue tie and a tongue tie is also normally the cause of a high or bubble palate. TT babies can also have trouble with bottles too - they often dribble as well as click. If it is a TT you may see a gradual decline in weight gain as your supply evens out.

Is there someone near you who is trained to snip TT? I'd try and find someone who is and get them to have a look as many HV etc just don't know what they are looking for.

narmada · 27/03/2011 15:57

Definitely get her rechecked for a tongue tie - my son's posterior tie was missed by a veritable army of breastfeeding advisers and it's only thanks to these boards I got a second opinion. If it is TT, you may well find that all is so much better when she's been done. Do you ever see your baby stick her tongue out so that it's clear of her bottom lip/ gum? My DS never could until he was snipped.

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