Should I give up bfeeding?

[sofierat]

Hello again! I posted a while back about my little boy rapidly dropping centiles down to 0.4 when we were EBF all day long with nipple shields because no amount of LLLs or lactation consultants or midwives could seen to get him to latch without it (despite tongue tie treated . Well we admitted ourselves to a&e and they kept us in for a couple of days to monitor our feeding. They gave him formula top ups and he gained a bunch of weight. Two weeks later he has gone up to 12lbs from 9 and a half. Ive been expressing all of his milk and using formula so i can monitor his intake as we believe his FTT was caused by poor latch/transfer and increased sleepiness - but i always offer hin boob first and he usually has a good suckle first. Now however im so pleased he is gaining weight, but he is beginning to refuse the boob entirely and only take bottle express or formula. He howls and howls if I try and put him on my boob, occasionally he latches on but then he pulls away or slips off and cries. It's breaking my heart because i was so desperate to EBF and have tried so hard despite our shakey start and now I feel like he hates my boobs :( i now cant calm him down when he is upset with boob which previously was a fail safe.
Im trying to pump as much as possible when he is napping but he takes so long to settle so i am just not getting sleep. He has reflux too so often sicks up my expressed milk anyway (he has aptamil anti reflux which stays down.) I spend so much time crying because i feel like he hates me and even skin to skin doesnt work to calm him, only his bottle :(
I feel awful that he mustve been so hungry for so long and cant really resent him not feeding at boob as bottle must be so easy and such a relief to him after struggling for so long.
I dont really know what im asking here, i guess i just wanted a whinge! Should i stop beating myself up about bfeeding or keep trying? Him howling at my boob is making me so miserable and i feel so low already. I feel like my husband is disappointed in me because we always said we would EBF and i feel so ashamed that i cant seem to get him to do it properly.
The other option is i think he has upper lip tie as the bit of skin there goes all the way down to his gum line and he always curls his top lip in when feeding even if i flick it out. There is a dentist in finchley called malcolm levinkind who fixes lip ties but its 300 pounds... is it crazy to see if that is the problem? I really dont have much money.
Anyway..this is longwinded and mad and ranty..guess who is an underslept ftm?!?!

Bless you. You really don't have to ask permission to stop breastfeeding you know.

I really understand that you desperately wanted to breastfeed him, but the type of milk your baby receives is such a small part of their life and your mothering, you know?

Do you feel like you would enjoy your baby more if you weren't suffering during every feed, and feeling like he hates you? Do you feel like you might be getting depressed?

I'm not reeling out the "happy mum = happy baby" cliche, but I am saying it's OK to stop breastfeeding when you've really, really tried and come up against a lot of obstacles and there's a lot of evidence pointing towards your baby doing better on formula

Look, there are probably things you can do..I'm sure someone will post ideas.

but for heavens sake you were hospitalized, no one can say you didn't try and if formula is what works for you and baby then for the love of god use it and don't give it a second d thought.

A few weeks time when he's licking shoes and eating dog food you will wonder why milk was such a big deal.

do what works. and enjoy your baby

sofierat, there is no law, or dictat, or guideline, or anything, that says you have to breastfeed in order to be a loving mother to your son :(

You can be a loving mother while formula feeding - and you can offer your son the closeness and physical connection that's so important to you, with a bottle - check out 'paced bottle feeding' for ideas on making bottle feeding just as responsive and 'connected' as breastfeeding.

It's important for both of you that you are comfortable and relaxed and that you feel good about yourself. There is no shame at all in what you are doing and if you ask your DP I bet he would be mortified if you thought he was disappointed in you. If he is, then he deserves a Big Kick Up The Bum....he may be sad with you, that things are not sorted, but he's not going to judge you unless he really is a grade A twat :(

I know not much at all about lip ties, so can't say whether this is a necessary or good value operation, sorry.

How about finding someone you trust to talk to in real life? Not someone who says you are making a fuss, and that it doesn't matter blah blah blah...'cos it clearly does, to you...but someone who will listen and support and let you be sad without telling you what you should feel or should do.

I hope things work out, and you and little ds go on to enjoy all your feeding times together, however the milk is delivered to him :)

I totally sympathise with you, with my dd1 we had a bunch of issues and at 4 weeks I started expressing and never had the courage to go back to trying to feed directly as I was quite upset by it all. I was sending myself crazy and also my husband! It was him in the end who said stop, it's ridiculous and babies do perfectly well on formula. I compromised and pumped but when I saw my nct friends bfing I got so upset.

I now have 3 children, dd2 latched on like a pro and we had a lovely time feeding until she weaned but I can wholeheartedly say I did not bond better with her because I fed her compared to bottle feeding dd1. Dd3 is a bit harder and if she was my first I would struggle more, so every baby is different and there is nothing you can do but try........

I am pro feeding, but there's a limit and I think you have surpassed that, i applaud you for the effort you have put in but surely it's time to give yourself a break? I have never heard anyone try so hard and I feel so bad for you that it hasn't worked but you have to stop beating yourself up, as everyone said, in a few months you will wonder why you worried so much.

Gosh what a roller coaster. Only you can decide but I must say when I gave up feeding ds2 after 3 months I felt huge relief. I mixed fed from the start. I feel cross as I now know he had reflux and a tongue tie which wasn't picked up on and do perhaps it could have been different. But in the end he thrived on formula and we bonded and it was ok in the end.

Hiya, firstly well done for getting this far! I have encountered a similarish situation- my ds was prem but happily fed from day 2 despite jaundice and billi lights etc. I had a few days of work meetings where I had to leave him with our nanny and provided expressed milk- he loved it... A little too much. Added to this he then decided on a nursing strike around my period and my supply plummeted. I wasn't ready to give up and spent tearful hours trying to get him to feed. My last ditch attempt was the medela sns. Basically it is a way of supplementing at the breast- a little silicon tube attached to a bottle around my neck (or once practised tucked into my bra strap) which you latch baby onto with your nipple- baby gets the instant gratification as with a bottle and you are stimulated to make more milk. With the sns, fenugreek and fennel tea he's back on the boob happily and we're doing 70% of feeds without the sns now. I express and used freezer stashed ebm in the sns but you can use formula

• I'm hoping to wean him off totally within a month. It's a bit clunky and takes some practice but a suggestion!

I won't go into my bf experience in any detail, but it wasn't too dissimilar from yours OP. It took quite a while before I stopped feeling guilty that I couldn't get DS to bf, and even longer before I accepted it wasn't to be and stopped expressing. I still feel sad about it sometimes, ie. sad that we had a rough time and that we missed out on the experience, but definitely do not regret stopping.

Every time I went to a bf support group or asked for help online, lots of suggestions were given and I felt like I had to try EVERYTHING or I was a bad mum. (Among the suggestions were things like baby massage, and rock the baby before bf to relax them...) Please don't feel like you have to try everything, a lot of this advice is easier said than done, and you know your baby best anyway. If it's not working it's absolutely fine to stop. If I were to experience the same thing with another baby, then I would definitely stop sooner.

Ps. having had my DS's lip tie revised, and having done a bit of research into it, I would be surprised if it would miraculously cure all your problems. Some babies with TT have a tough time relearning to use their tongue after revision, so that is more likely IMO.

I can really relate to your post. DD is 6 weeks tomorrow and BF her has been such a rollercoaster. A couple of weeks ago I was in a total chaos of breastfeeding, expressing and topping up with formula and on the brink of what I felt was "giving up". We managed to make a few small changes though and now have been EBF for over a week.

Only you can decide what is right for you and your baby. Like the others have said, you have given it such a good go already that you should be proud of yourself for getting this far. It is more than ok to switch to formula if you feel that is the right decision for the two of you, please don't think of it as giving up, it really isn't. Then again you need to decide when you have reached your limit so that you can be at ease with the decision.

I am clearly not an expert as I'm going through the same thing, but I have a few suggestions that my midwife gave to me which you might want to consider. perhaps you could offer a bottle first and then offer the breast once DS has gotten over the initial hunger? Also maybe there are certain times of the day where he is more relaxed and maybe more likely to latch on? You could also try different teats for your bottles so that he is having to work harder for the milk?

Also try googling biological nurturing - Never tried it myself but the idea is that you basically spend lots of time skin to skin with your baby so that they automatically go for the nipple.

I wish you all the best whatever you decide and please be proud of yourself for getting this far after everything you've been through.

Thankyou so much for all your wonderful advice and comments, really helped when I was feeling very low. Still trundling along pumping and attempting to breastfeed and using formula. Little man still quite unsettled but he is growing rapidly :)

I struggled with bf to start with although in the end my issues resolved, but I understand the guilt you are feeling. While u mix fed I didn't want to go out invade people thought I was a bad mother and it really hurt to see others bf.

It is all consuming whilst you are in the thick of it- nothing else seems important. Now 18mo later I can see I have more to offer my dd than just milk- that is one insignificant part of being a parebt. I refused to let anyone except me and DH feed her by bottle as I still wanted feeding to be a quiet bonding time not a novelty for others and I think that helped too. I wasn't losing quiet cuddle time with her.

Ultimately I promise that it will all seem less significant later on and in the short term try to enjoy some of the perks of ff- longer sleep and help from others. Your child is thriving and that is what matters.