Swapping TO breastfeeding - help!

[Aimeevictoria]

Hi all, any help would be v v much appreciated. Currently at home with 4 day old daughter who is my third baby. Breast fed the first two. I was prevented/ discouraged from breastfeeding in hospital due to transference of psychiatric meds (quetiapine) which I gave now discontinued and am advised should be gone from my system. I really really want to breastfeed my little one. She's had nothing but formula since birth and I'm quite upset about it. Now the meds are gone I am trying to establish breast feeding but unsurprisingly she's confused and fretful and I suppose I am too. Is it too late to swap? Is there a method I could try? Has anyone done it? There's plenty of advice in the other direction (breast to bottle) but nothing helpful to me.

If anyone can help I would be so very grateful to hear from you. I'm waiting to speak to a midwife but she promised to pop by early this morning and I've seen neither hide nor hair of her. Thank you all.

Aimee

You can do it. Get some face-to-face help ASAP from a specialist lactation consultant, the MW may or may not be much help. Talk to local La Leche League, NCT, or there may be BF support groups overseen by a LC at your local children's centre. The Breastfeeding Network has a great drugs in breastmilk helpline where a pharmacist who's also a LC can advise you.

PS it's absolutely not too late to swap - but you will need to get your baby to the breast often to stimulate your milk to come in, and the sooner this happens the easier it will be. But don't panic - it's possible to move from bottle to breast after days or even weeks (have a look at kellymom.com on relactation). Hope you can get some expert assistance. Another possible way to find a LC would be to contact the hospital and ask to speak to the infant feeding co-ordinator.
Meanwhile, you could try biological nurturing (google it) to get your baby to feel more at ease on the breast, maybe take a relaxing bath together?
Good luck to you.

I decided to mix feed my 9 week old baby when she was 2 1/2 weeks old as a comfort thing because I was going back to work part time (previously bottle only).

I started off by giving her a bottle then swapping to the breast part way through, when she was settled in feeding but still hungry. After a couple of feeds she started to prefer my breast milk and would turn away from the bottle, giving me a big-eyed, hopeful look. Now she only has bottles while I'm at work.

Hope this helps - I'd also advise you to express (by hand if necessary) as often as you can to ensure your milk supply doesn't dry up while you're trying to establish breast feeding.

Aimee - you certainly can do it....4 days is not too late at all :)

Get on the phone and ask a midwife to come to you as soon as possilble, today or tonight.

Keep your baby close and snuggled in; don't fight or struggle with her; it will happen, if you enable it.

Just wanted to echo what you've been told here; I managed to move from bottle feeding a mixture of ff and breast milk after a tongue tie was fixed at 4.5 weeks so 4 days is absolutely not too late. Do get support from your breast feeding clinics, Im not sure what I would have done without them!

Congrats on your new baby and good luck!

Thank you ever so much. Ive seen a midwife now at home and she was encouraging. She is a mental health specialist and going to speak to the perinatal psychiatrist first thing in the morning. She wants me to pump and dump for another 24 hours just to make absolutely sure and is coming back to see me on Wednesday to help get things started with her. I'll have a look at the kellymom website about relactation. I've got boobs like rocks at the moment so hopefully that's a good sign for things. Thanks ever so much for the suggestions and encouragement, I will follow up your suggestions and start looking to get her used to it.

Aimee - 4 days is absolutely not too late to start bfing, lots of expressing and skin to skin with baby will help.

Also, I wonder if you have seen this from LACTMed the US government's database on drugs in breast milk?

Good luck and keep us updated

All the best! Hopefully your experience with feeding your other children will give you confidence as things develop. I struggled to feed my DD1 at the hospital at first so ended up giving her expressed milk to start off with for a good number of days. They're amazing, adaptable little creatures when so young. I've every faith this will happen for you so long as you persist! X

You certainly can do this! I mixed fed for several weeks, then at about 8 weeks, decided to give up BF and LO had nothing but formula for 5 days. I then decided to give it one last go and now at 13 weeks he hasn't had a bottle since last Thursday!

Also, I did a lot of expressing, by hand. I expressed after feeds straight into a bottle, and would also express while standing in the shower, just to help supply.

Yes, as others have said, it can be done! I switched to breast feeding at 4 weeks and we're still going strong at 23 weeks. I found my HV and local nhs lactation consultant a huge help when I was wobbling.

OP, how are things going? Would love to hear how you're getting on. Congratulations on your baby, btw!

OP, wishing you the very best.

I do just want to check - your withdrawl from your meds is being medically supervised, right? From your posts it sounds like that's the case, but the consequences of not doing it in the right way could be so severe that I couldn't rest easy without raising the point. I hope you don't mind.

Congratulations on your new baby OP.