Newborn won't latch and feed

[DoNotDisturb]

Have breastfed my first two dc for a year each but both were a struggle in the early days. Dc3 is the worst of all. He's latched maybe twice in two days.

Midwife says I'm doing everything right and just to keep trying but has also suggested pumping and spoon feeding colostrum. I've done this this afternoon and he's taking the colostrum but now won't even try to latch.

Really don't know what's for the best..

How was the birth? Is he sleepy too? Keep trying to latch him on, and spoon feed colostrum every 2-3 hours if he doesn't. Try giving a little bit of colostrum to get him interested and then try to latch him on, it might perk him up a bit.
Neither of mine were particularly interested in latching on after the first feed, for maybe a couple of days, but they did eventually get the hang of it. They were both CS and I think that affected them.

The birth was fine. Water birth and he came out happy and healthy. He's sleeping a lot but when he's awake he's crying as if he's hungry. Never had a newborn cry so much!

Thanks for the advice. So your two eventually got the hang of it even after spoon feeding?

My first needed syringe feeding for a few feeds, then a particularly stern midwife got him to latch on and he was ok once my milk came in. His latch wasn't good so I had to be really careful to take him off when it wasn't right rather than just let him get on with it because he was on! My DD was very sleepy and just not interested in latching on at all, and if she did she fell straight off again. She had to be syringe fed lots of times in hospital, but even when we got home and my milk came in she wasn't fussed, and I had to express milk into a spoon and pour it into her mouth to remind her she should be feeding (even if she hadn't fed for hours) and she would then latch on. She needed that for a couple of weeks, starting with all feeds, then sporadically, and gradually she just got on with it.

Thanks Noble. It's really good to hear other people's experiences. It's so frustrating when they cry and you can't get them to latch on even though they're struggling!

ds1 wouldn't latch for 36hrs.

I found out many years later that he was tongue tied.

Can you find someone who specialises in tongue tie to check?

DD never latched-we tried for about ten days alongside hand expressing colostrum/syringe feeding. It was soul destroying and contributed to my PND. I had counselling about 18 months after her birth because I was still distressed by it and an independent midwife suggested that it was because the birth was particularly traumatic and DD was focusing on breathing rather than feeding. I hope it all works out for you OP, and I'm sure it will as I think it's pretty rare for it to not work at all, but if you continue to have problems do look at what support is available to you. If you really want to bf and can't for whatever reason it can be surprisingly devastating.

Thanks guys. He's managed a couple of latches on one side now so hoping he'll get there. Think I just panicked yesterday. Hopefully if I keep expressing he'll get the hang if it when my milk comes in..