One and a half days old. Won't feed this morning.

[belindarose]

Baby DS born Tuesday afternoon. Some successful breastfeeding once I found someone who would help in hospital. (breastfed DD for 20 months).

Home yesterday and he fed twice in the late afternoon, once around 9pm ish, then continually for about 3 hours, finishing at about 1.30am. Since then I haven't been able to get him to feed. He fell asleep about 2am and we can't get him interested at all.

Midwife will be coming later. Do I need to do anything urgently in the meantime. Skin to skin at the moment, but he's asleep.

Please dont worry too much. All my 3 babies slept for days on end after they were born... And skipped feeds. He had a great cluster feed yesterday. He will tell you when he is hungry. Midwife might say wake him and feed him. But, sounds just like my experience. You are doing everything right. No need to worry babes, congrats! X

Great he's doing skin to skin.

I think it's sensible to gently hand express some colostrum and give it to him on a tiny spoon, or drops from your finger.

This will perk him up, avoid dehydration, and help get your milk supply going.

It's highly likely he will wake and feed very soon. It's not at all uncommon for new babies to have a sleepy period, and it does not mean panic stations...but it is a good idea to be proactive in getting feeding underway, especially as he was a little slow to get going :)

Congratulations on the birth of your DS. Am very jealous of skin to skin newborn snuggles.

My DD was like your son.....Permanently asleep. Would far sooner snooze than feed. We woke her every 3 hours, increasing to 4 during the night until we were confident she would 'demand' her feed. Even then I had to keep an eye on the clock and offer for months.

We used to strip her off and use a wet piece of kitchen towel as a cold compress to keep her awake along with gentle ear tugging and feet tickling.

Thanks. I was worried by another thread saying he should be woken up every three hours. I can wake him up, but not make him feed! I have been expressing, thanks Tiktok, as he can't latch onto left breast yet at all (DD never did). I'm pleased you think I'm doing the right thing as I've been so happy with how he's managed so far. DD couldn't latch on for the first five weeks so I had to do a lot of expressing with her.

No he shouldn't be woken up that often, I believe this is normally only done if there is a problem, and your midwife will tell you if you need to. All sounds lovely she says through her rose tinted glasses

Thanks. He did wake up and have a long feed eventually. New problem, and this happened in the night too, is that he seems to finish on the right breast and still want more, at which point I would want to offer the other breast. But he can't latch on to that one so gets very upset. Any ideas other than just persevere with the latch?

When I was having problems getting DS to latch at around 3 weeks, MW suggested getting him to suck my finger first (near the nipple) then try to latch on, but my situation was different as he had been latching fine before. Do you have any idea why latch on left is a prob? Have you tried different positions? (I expect you have as you say you fed DD !).

belindarose, great he has had a lovely feed :)

This sounds like 'new baby getting used to different things' - and patience and love will resolve it. Don't 'persevere' in the sense of persisting even when he is upset. Try smk84's idea. You could also switch him to the other breast without actually turning his body - moving him across but not round, if you know what I mean. Keep him snuggled in and try again without distressing him.

Just offer the same breast again if he really does not want the other one for the moment.

Check with midwife, too.

Thanks both of you. The left nipple is much more inverted than the right. Nicely asleep snuggled with me now after only wanting a few more sucks anyway!

Hi belinda, not much to add to the great advice and hope all is going well.

Just wanted to share that dc3 is almost 3 weeks old and compared to my first 2 he is RUBBISH at latching on. He really is. No idea why but being my 3rd I had the confidence to just keep on working at it with him. I also have iron nipples which helps. Things have improved loads but he still doesn't want to open his mouth