Lumpy breast- help!

[jubblicious]

I've been breastfeeding DS who is now nearly 5 months with no real problem till now. This morning I've woken up and my breast is hard and lumpy on places. I've tried expressing but that doesn't help and DS won't feed from the lumpy breast either. Any ideas on what to do?

Assume it's a blocked duct?

Hot bath/shower, massage breast (gently! I bruised my boob really badly once) towards nipple, as if you're going to hand express. If you can relieve pressure a bit DS might feed. Also try feeding in other positions- rugby ball, kneeling over DS (yes, really). Suspect there is more info on www.kellymom.com, but no time to look just now, sorry!

If you feel remotely unwell, have red patch on your boob or have a temp, please phone out of hours doc in case it's mastitis - you can end up really properly unwell if you have it and don't get timely treatment. And also end up with what looks like an interesting pus/breastmilk combo coming out of boobs

Thanks hopefully. My breast feels like a brick and it's so uncomfortable. I'll give those a try and hopefully it gets better soon! Ouch @ pus

agree with hopefully, feed feed feed - your baby is the best person to clear a blocked duct which this sounds like. I have knelt over my son whilst feeding to enable gravity to help drain ducts evenly.

If a blocked duct I found ibuprofen helped with the inflammation a bit too. That and feed feed feeding.