Thrush - sorry lots of questions

[ninja]

I'm pretty certain that dd and I have thrush. She has a white coated mouth and I've had very sore nipples that I put down to her top teeth but it all now seems to be coming into place.Plus sh'e been off her food

I'm off to the doctor tomorrow but could do with some advice:

1. What's the best thing to be prescribed? I guess I need to get all areas covered for her and me don't I?

2. Do I need to wash all toys that she could have chewed?

3. I think I can't freeze breastmilk, is that right? and do I have to throw all stored milk away as I don't how long we've had this?

4. Is she all right having fresh expressed milk for nursery?

5. did I read somewhere that I should be washing her nappies hotter?

6. anything else I should know.

Sorry for all the questions and thanks in advance

How old is your dd?

When ds & I had this he was so weeny that the only thing he was into chewing was my nips.

Certainly sounds like thrush. I managed to get my gp to prescribe for both of us in the same emergency appointment. For him a gel, for me he said canestan cream and a pessary (I'd only just given birth, imagine how easy that was!). It cleared up pretty well.

However, expressed milk was a nightmare. I was expressing nearly every feed because my nipples were such a joke. I had never seen breast milk in my life, and so I just assumed that all breast milk was pink and lumpy. I am told it usually isn't, and that this was because of the thrush. So take advice before feeding it to dd (mind you, didn't seem to have any lasting effect on ds!)

Hope you get it sorted soon, soooooo painful.

Hiya - the NCT breastfeeding helpline are brilliant and I would really recommend you call them.

I'm really sorry but you'll have to dump any stored breast milk until you've got rid of it. Horrible isn't it?! I found canestan helpful for me and nystatin for ds. Wash everything hot, but a hot wash will knacker your bras so soak them in milton (it will bleach out the dye though) In my experience it took about 3 days for the treatment to work and then the soreness disappeared almost immediately.

Good luck!

1. yes

2. yes (sterilized preferably!) 3. Yes 4. yes 5.yes - and your bras ! 6. read this - it's the best leaflet around.... all the BF counsellor I know use it!

Pupuce - BF counsellor

You can put your bras in oven or iron them if you don't want to "boil" them

I had nystatin for babe and cant remember for me ?canesten

dont worry!

thats all I did - didnt wash toys etc

Thanks - I've printed off the leaflet - hope I get a spare week to read it and sterilize everything in sight (shame my boobs don't fit in the sterilizer!)

I'm going now to have a very sad and ceremonial dumping of all my stocks of frozen EBM -

Come on it's not that long to read
Sorry about the milk.... I know that's like throwing away gold

No it isn't - it just seemed like it was printing out reams.

Pupuce if you're still there, should I specifically ask the doctor for this Fluconazole, if I take the leaflet with me are they likely to say yes? Do I have to have miconazole oral gel as well or is that an alternative?

I haven't had the heart to ditch the milk yet - I feel I have to work up to it!

I can't believe I've been back at work 3 weeks and we've both had coughs, lost our voices, I've had a stomach bug, she's had 2 new teeth and then this aaaaah

Very quick reading of this thread, so apologies if this is not on track ... I too had thrush when breastfeeding (dd was around 13 months) ... my doctor actually said I didn't need to throw away all my frozen EBM, although I know that most reputable advice says you should. So I decided to give the treatment a go without throwing away the milk .... and it worked fine. That was 4 months ago and no recurrance of the problem.

At one point I had almost 300oz frozen milk and frankly it would broken my heart to chuck all of that!

Pupuce - do put me straight if this is bad advice.

pupuce are you there?

yes......

... but I'll be gone in 5 mins! Back online tonight.

Pidge - the "only" thing is that you do take a risk of reinfecting as I believe (Tiktok may know this) you do not kill the fungus that is thrush by freezing.....

Sorry Ninja- I had not realised you had posted below....
Bring leaflet to GP as some are amazingly VERY ignorant of thrush (some won't treat mum or baby.... but you need to treat both) ! You only need 1 treatment for yourself and one for your baby. So pick the one you want/can find.
I'd go for : miconazole oral gel (or Daktarin gel) for baby and Fluconazole or Nystatin for you (I think F is more efficient but some GP won't prescribe it)

Thanks for that pupuce. The docyor prescribed me the Fluconazole - but he said the dose in the leaflet seemed very high, so I have 2 x 50mg for 7 days, and dd has miconazole oral gel. Does that sound right?

Just noticed that dd also has a spotty rash on her bottom, could this be thrush as well and if so presumably she would need that treating?

Sorry to be a pain, I just want to make sure that I get this right as I've made it to 7 months, and just want to carry on.

Thanks again,

Hi Ninja - did the doctor know all of this or was he/she interested in the info.
The Bf Network who published this info would not say a higher dosage if they felt that was not appropriate... see how it goes.... if it doesn't improve in 3 or 4 days then you'll know !

The spotty/sore bottom is definitely thrush. you can put the canestan on her bottom, if it gets really bad you get canestan with hydrocotisone in it. In the last 3 months I've become too much of an expert on this wretched thrush

Thanks Wills - I only thought about it when I got home and then realsied that it would be silly to treat some and not th other - HV told dp that she thought it wasn't thrush aaah. Looks like I've got to go and search for someone to give me a prescription tomorrow! or is it just the same stuff the adults use?

Pupuce I did try and answer you yesterday but the computer crashed. Basically doctor was happy to give me the medicine when he saw the leaflet - just queried the amount as it was higher than he'd given before. I'll go back and tackle him if it doesn't seem to be working.

Thanks