Bf 6 day old and feels like someone is driving hot pokers onto my nipples

[zippyswife]

Is this normal??? (I've bf dc1&2 but can't recall the level of pain).

I felt determined to bf it was working but the pain is ruining the whole experience and making me dread feeding him.

Midwife said he has borderline tongue tie and suggested it could be that. But I managed to get a referral but we won't be seen for weeks! This can't go on for weeks!!

Any advice?

Have you a breastfeeding clinic nearby, often run within a childrens center?
DD2 was tongue tied and not getting a good latch, she was getting enough and putting on weight but causing me a lot of pain and I ended up with mastitis.
After a visit to the clinic and guidence on a couple of different positions we managed to resolve the issues and are still feeding at 6m, if I hadn't of got the help I would have stopped within a few weeks.

We didn't get the tonuge snipped as once over the feeding issues there were no other concerns (it was almost 50% tied but very stretchy and she could stick it out past her lips).

How is your baby's weight doing? My ds had a Tt and feeding him was agony. We got it snipped at 18 days because he was still losing weight at 11 days old (then we had to wait over a bank holiday weekend). I'd been in tears on the phone to the lactation consultant at our hospital (who could make the referral) about the pain but nothing was done until he lost the weight. When I was pregnant with dd I looked into having any potential tt snipped privately- could that be a possibility?

The pain was, as you say, like hot pins pushing into the actual nipple. i had thrush too (but later) and that was more like my boobs were refilling with boiling water. Is it localised to your nipple? Does your nipple come away from a feed mis-shapen at all (mine went lip stick shaped), or white?

It's not normal! My DS had tongue tie and I also couldn't wait and went private. It cost about £100. You can find one at the Association of tongue tie practitioners. They will do an assessment first and you would not need to proceed if it didn't appear to be the cause of your problems. But you have my sympathies re the claim - its horrible.

Not claim - pain!

Thanks all. I'm being seen by tongue tie midwife tomorrow. She will assess and do it there and then if it needs it.

The feeding hasn't been as painful as it was this morning but still painful for the entire feed which can be 45 minutes a pop. I'm sure that's not right.

I think the telling part is "for the entire feed". I think some pain for 10-20 seconds at the start of a feed is quite common but constant pain isn't. I had a couple of mums who had bf telling me that pain was normal at the start but I found feeding ds with a Tt something else altogether.

I had this, it felt like a very sharp pain for a few seconds when baby latched on. It passed after a couple of days and midwife said it was common

Just seen gp who says I have mastitis in one breast. I have antibiotics so hope it clears up soon. Thing is it's still sore in other Breast too. Not as bad though. When should things be less painful? I can't remember when the pain subsided when I've bf before?

Even with dd (who was much easier than ds to feed) I was very sore and days 5-8 were the hardest but any discomfort was completely gone by three weeks. Hopefully the mw will be able to help tomorrow and your anti biotics will kick in soon. It sounds like you're doing really well in tough circumstances op