Fast letdown - overactive supply?

[clairemow]

DS2 is 5 weeks old, and seems to be having trouble feeding off my left breast in particular. I have big letdown on both sides, and if he pulls off, he gets a shower and I sometimes even have to change all his clothes as they get soaking. If I express, on the first letdown, I get at least 3-4 oz within about a minute off both sides.

Tonight he was really fussy with his latest feed - his head was bobbling about, he kept crying and arching his back, and going very red in the face. Then he'd fall asleep, but immediately wake up and start chewing his hands if I put him down in his cot. I don't know if it was overactive letdown, or if he just didn't want any milk and wanted to go to sleep instead... He is asleep now, and has been for 29 minutes!

I've been reading about one sided feeding on archived threads, but am worried about mastitis. I spent all of last week fighting redness and inflammation in my (sore) left breast (the overactive one...), and it only feels totally better today - will one sided feeding make that breast likely to get inflamed again?

i was like this. he is probably gulping loads of air with the fast let down and getting really windy and unhappy. Expressing off before feeds will help with that.

my understanding is that 1 sided feeding is for when the baby is getting too much foremilk and developing colic.

my left breast became so engorged one day he couldn't feed from it - when ds was 5 weeks if i recall. it was due to blocked milk ducts and i ended up having to express it off inthe middle of the night. really important to keep the breasts emptied properly. how long does your lo feed for?

hi and thanks, he feeds for varying times - sometimes 10 mins, sometimes on and off for 1 1/2 hours. At the early evening feed, it's usually about half an hour to 45 mins. Tonight, much quicker, but I did feed him at about 5.30, and he stayed on for a while, so maybe he just wasn't hungry and got a good top up v. quickly. I think he gets a lot in the first burst with let down. He isn't developing colic as he does settle easily and is really calm and watchful the rest of the time. So I think I might just carry on as I am for a bit - am really scared of the blocked ducts again as it was so painful and nasty.

oh, I have been expressing extra carefully on the left, so maybe it's just producing more at the moment because I've stimulated it so much to get the duct unblocked.

I've got an over active left breast as well !! I found that what helped it is to use the Avent breastshells. I feed DD2 on the right side just very briefly...say a min or so, with the shell in my left bra. This collects all the spraying (sometimes I would get DD to start on the left to get the milk coming out, then whip her off to the other side to feed)

I try to avoid expressing on the left side as well as even a small amount makes the left boob swell up like a melon ! I woke up the other night at 5:30am, having tossed & turned because she usually feeds about 2:30 - 3:30am & the delay had caused it to balloon.

HTH

BTW if you use a sterlised shell you can collect the milk & save in a sterlised bottle. Unfortunately I can't get DD2 to take a bottle at the mo,so it ends up going down the sink

claire- maybe you could ship me your excess milk for ds?!
my supply is getting less and less each day.

thanks everyone.

2B0B, bet your supply isn't really going down, it just feels that way. I've read loads to say that a breast that feels empty never is... and the creamier milk is at the end anyway - while DS2 here drowns in foremilk, yours is wallowing in lovely hindmilk!