Help me to boost my milk supply please

[HeartStrings]

DD will be two weeks old on Monday and she's feeding great, plenty of wet/poop nappies, good weight gain etc.

I have a cracked nipple on one side which because infected so using antibiotic cream (taking forever to heal though) I've been expressing that side due to the soreness and to relieve engorgement while keeping up my supply. DD does feel off that side but I use a nipple shield as it's the only way I can bare the pain. The other side is completely fine and feed off with no problems.

As I said I express the bad side a couple of times a day and I've noticed that every time I do the amount I mange to get out is decreasing each time.

DD feeds on demand. Also I've been quite unwell with being fluey and just generally run down. Not sure if that has anything to do with it either.

Can anyone give any advice please? I don't want to give up breastfeeding and I'm worried I'll just end up with no milk

Just picking up on your point about feeling fluey - that sounds like mastitis. Can you get to GP/out of hours? You can still feed with mastitis, but you'll need antibiotics.

@ACertainRatio I did go to the GP earlier in the week and I mentioned all my symptoms and she had a look and said there were no signs of infection in the breast itself but the problem is with my nipple

The best way to build supply is to feed. Once you are all healed on that side, you should be able to build supply through feeding. Does it hurt to express on that side? (By hand or pump?) you could express more often than a couple of times a day if you can manage it (expressing can feel a bit relentless).

Your baby is still only young, so your supply should be fairly responsive to changes in demand. It sounds like once you are healed, your baby is an effective feeder, so hopefully you will be able to rebuild supply fairly quickly - at least you have the other side that’s already doing well.

Have lots of rest, and I hope you’re feeling much better soon .

Lots of feeding, lots of skin to skin, drink a lot of water, eat well and eat some oats every day.

Please go back to the GP if you've got a sore boob and feeling fluey. Possible mastitis needs careful management.

I haven’t a lot of help, am quite new to this as well, however:

If you are feeling worse - worse pain, worse flu symptoms, go to ooh gp (I’m guessing you saw your gp in the earlier part of the week?) mastitis needs to be seen sooner rather than later.

You can effectively feed off just one breast (there was a whole thread a year or two ago about everyone having one good boob and one rubbish boob and which one & whether you were left or right handed iirc!).

Keep up the feeding with the shield & pumping & try not yo worry too much, it sounds as if she’s getting what she needs.

Congratulations on your new baby 😊

Thank you so much for the advice. Breastfeeding is really hard isn't it lol.
I'll see how I get on over the weekend, will try the oats too. Water I'm automatically drinking more of because breastfeeding is making me really thirsty anyway.

If still really sore on Monday I'll get in with the GP again then

Oats can help, I have found chocolate oat milk is quite nice and a change from porridge. I believe you can take a fenugreek supplement as well. Also the baby will be more effective than expressing but I know it is hard when you can't see how much they are getting. Agree with pp about checking potential mastitis sooner rather than later.

Fenugreek tablets made an enormous difference for me. Could have been a coincidence but I suddenly started leaking and squirting all over the place! I went from pumping dribbles to gallons as well.