baby thrashing and screaming while feeding

[scottygirl5]

My LO is nearly 7weeks old and EBF. From about week 2 she has been feeding every 1-1 & 1/2 hours when awake (day or night). Over the last few weeks she has become increasingly unsettled while feeding,she often thrashes and screams during the feed,sometimes at the start and sometimes later on. She keeps her mouth clamped on and throws her head around so i now have bruised sore nipples. If i take her off she immediately starts rooting again,same if she comes off herself. She then gets upset if i don't put her back on but if i do still struggles to feed. Sometimes it takes multiple goes to get her back on,sometimes its not possible and i have to give up and try again later. Initially this only happened a couple of times a day but in the last 2 or 3 days its happened at most feeds. Its extremely distressing and I've gone from enjoying BF to dreading it.

We thought she might have silent reflux and the GP prescribed gaviscon but this only helps sometimes,most of the time it makes no difference.

Has anyone experienced this behaviour? My DH and i really want to make sense of what's causing it to try to get BF back on track - at the moment I'm close to giving up BF as its so sore and distressing. Any advice would be great.

That sounds very distressing. Have found a BF counselling helpline :08444 122 949 - hope they. or someone can help you soon.

Thank you. Have some support from local breast feeding support counselling service and they said they thought what i was trying was right (offering second breast if it happens at the end of feeding,feeding with her face down on my breast if at the start in case the problem is my milk flowong too quickly) but these only help sometimes. Will try that number. Would also be good to know ifothers have experienced this.

My LO did this from birth and every feed was a nightmare but she eventually just got it.

Defiantly get HCP's to check there is not a medical issue though, trust your instincts if you feel there is one.

Good luck

This sounds very familiar to me, and my dd had severe reflux (though not silent - more of the projectile kind!)

Gaviscon doesn't do that much ime so it may be worth going back to your GP, they can prescribe ranitidine which may help more.

I had this with both DDs (DD2 now 4 weeks old and doing it). I eventually worked out with DD1 (and eventually remembered with DD2!) that it is wind that causes it, both mine need a lot of burping for breastfed babies and whenever there's screaming and squirming during a feed it means there's trapped wind. It can take ages to get the wind out but, eventually, she will burp and then feed normally. If I don't get a burp and try to latch her on she will feed for a few seconds then pull of screaming. I find a baby carrier useful for holding her upright for long enough to get a burp while leaving hands free and calming her.

Agree with wind thing, DS2 did exactly same, neither of the other children did. It did get better. Keep reflux in mind- gaviscon really not much use esp in breastfed babies x