Does it get less frustrating?

[espresso14]

I'd appreciate some encouragement. My LO is ebf and is 3 months old, and I'm committed to continuing ( she's a bottle refuser anyway). But, she has a shallow, but unpainful latch. This contributes to VERY long and frequent feedings, made even worse by a lot of spit up (entire feeds, throughout the day, endless washing) and it's rare that she ever gets fully satisfied, and will sometimes fall asleep because the flow has slowed. Most morning feeds also have problems with fast let down, so lots of coughing, bobbing off, and me sitting in puddles of spit up often for an hour or more, but after the first feed the flow slows right down and feeds often don't get finished, despite sitting there for hours trying to activate more let downs..

It feels so inefficient and we're doing everything, laid back feeding, night feeding, breast compressions, feeding in sling. She won't change her latch, so I think I'm just stuck with the situation. I'd love some words of encouragement from those who have been here before, or are in a similar situation.

Have you had her checked for tongue tie by a trained lactation consultant? This sounds a lot like DD who had posterior tongue tie, diagnosed at 16 weeks. Got a lot better after it was cut.

Seen that my local hospital does TT division, appointment made with GP to discuss a referral to at least get it looked at. Thanks, I assumed as I'm not in pain that I had to put up with it.

Usually TT gets picked up as a result of pain and/or weight loss but I am pretty sure they will still check and treat even without those things. I didn't have pain except during growth spurts, and DD gained weight ok. Suspect this was due to a lot of hard work on my part and on hers, to overcome the TT. Your situation sounds similar. Is your DD windy/won't nap long? Mine had awful wind which woke her up a lot.

By the way if they tell you it's only a "minor" tie, ask to get it cut anyway - the effect of a tie depends on lots of factors not just the size of the tie. Also an uncut tt can have effects later on (eg on speech).

Of course it might not be tt... but definitely no harm in getting checked out. Good luck.

This sounds a lot like the experience I'm having at the moment with 6 week old, more or less constant feeding, wind and sicking up. He's putting on weight but not as much as they would like, so I don't know whether we'll be allowed to carry on breastfeeding. Am planning to hibernate and feed him as much as possible over the weekend before the next weigh-in on Tuesday and hope that he's put on some more.

GP confirmed tongue tie today, and referral to hospital done. Hopeful that an end to sitting in puddles of spat up milk, could be in sight! And, perhaps even 2 hours between feedings.

Previously, my HV had said I should just wean early. It is worrying that a first time Mum with no medical experience can better identify the issue (via the internet) than a trained HV.

Unfortunately there seems to be very little training for identifying TT these days. Two different midwives in the hospital told me DD was fine but a lactation consultant told me she has a posterior TT She gave me a referral write up to give to my GP who then refused to refer it to the hospital as it "wasn't bad enough". We're now having to get it fixed privately.