Fretful Feeding please, please help!

[pixiepoo]

I am really hoping that somone will be able to shed some light on a new problem that has developed when I try to breastfeed.

I have a 12 week old baby boy who has always been a good feeder and has steadily put on weight. He is big in fact and was 14lb and 2oz at 9 weeks. However for the last 4 weeks or so he has started to thrash about and kick his legs and go bright red at some of his feeds. I have always had one side that releases too fast, where he coughs and splutters and thought that this was the problem, but he now seems to do this kicking about on both sides.

Sometimes, he will feed for about 1 or 2 minutes and then start to get aggitated, kick his leg hard and arch his back and start to cry. It is not due to lack of milk beacuse there is always a lot coming out. I sit him up and sometimes he does have wind, but not always.

Once sat up he quite often then seems ok and will only start crying again if I start to try and get him to feed again. In fact as I start to lower him and get him near the nipple he will cry.

Therefore I started to think he may just be full on a quick feed or not be hungry (even if it is the first feed of the day) and not want anymore and be what they call 'an efficient' feeder now he is older. However, his average feed used to be 20 mins one side and then 10mins on the next.

Do baby's really get that much quicker at taking what they need and if so would they kick about as a signal that they have had enough?

To make matters even more hard to work out, this does not happen at every feed of the day. He has five feeds a day and I would say this thrashing about usually happens at about 2 of them. Sometimes he will happily do a marathon feed and take 20/30 min from each side with no thrashing or kicking about at all (this is usually the last feed of the day)

I am getting so upset because it is almost as if I am hurting him, but I am so confused as to why this is only happening sometimes.

If anyone has a similar experience or any suggestions at all it would be such a help. Also if any one knows how to stop a very fast let down at least I could try and sort that out that problem as he nearly chocks!

Hi Pixiepoo
I am no expert on breatfeeding and maybe someone else will come along who can give you more help, but my son also did this and I tried lots of different things (expressing a bit before I fed him, hot clothes etc) but the best advice I can give is it will probably sort itself and it is definately not your fault it is nothing you are doing. Do you go to a breastfeeding support group? They are really helpful and they will be able to support you. Please don't worry.

My 6 week old little boy does this too, it started off during the evenings and now occasionally does it during the day too. We have been using infacol and also I sit upstairs in a dark room to do the evening feed before putting him down and it has improved dramatically. Good luck

Hi, Pixie,
My dd is a relly quick feeder.(she's now 12 months) Right from really early on she would only feed for 3ish minutes (before she would only feed for 11)and then go 2.5- 3 hours between feeds. She would get really cross if I tried to put her back on as you say your dd does. I couldn't believe that she was getting enough in that time but she obviously was. (My hv confirmed that some babies can feed this quick.)I also had a fast flow of milk. She would also feed for longer at the bedtime feed but I think she was just used to stocking up for bedtime. And she was tired then so not desperate to get down and play.

If its not due to your ds having fed enough maybe it is trapped wind , maybe try infacol, or that he's just getting to the age where they get distracted really easily when feeding. They start to realise that there are other things going on.

It may be worth taking him to see a Cranial Osteopath. I did this with my ds and dd who both screamed at different stages while feeding. It worked for ds but not really dd. Her prob was more to do with tiredness/ fast flow etc.
I think if you had a difficult birth or forceps/ventouse this sometimes can affect the feeding. This was the case with my ds. We went twice and he was loads better.

Hope some of this helps, x

Thank you so much for the help, I am going to try and find a breast feeding support group in my area. Also, its stange but I really can notice that he is starting to look around alot during feeds and looking up at me and giggling which he never did previously.

My milk supply does seem to have gone mad at the moment and I seem to be producing way too much combined with the fact he does really eat frantically. He is also going longer between feeds and I think there is build up becuase I get quite engorged??

Hopefully it will settle down a bit soon

xx

Hi, A support group is a good idea. There is one near me but I never actually got round to going!

Make sure your boobs don't get too engorged. Cabbage leaves are good if they are painfull x

pixie - I have just seen this.

You are describing the classic signs of over-generous supply, and if you check the archives on one-sided feeding you'll find some good info on this. Basically you need to feed on one side only every time the baby comes to the breast in several hours and then switch to the other one for the next several hours. You reduce the volume of milk, reduce the 'fire hose' effect, and yet do not reduce the amount of calories available to the baby. You need to try this for a couple of days to see if it works. You may need to express (very lightly, just to comfort levels) on the unused side at first.

Hope it helps.