Non stop bf at 6 weeks

[user1489931797]

Guys

I'm getting desperate I've turned into an all day buffet and has been this way for the whole 6weeks of his life so far.

there's no clear stops/gaps as people mention the every 1.5/2hrs of feeding for 20mins at a time I'm more like from 3am until 1am for 1 to 2hrs at a time with the occasional 5 min nap the only time you would call sleep happening is for an hour or 2 late afternoon sometimes again at 1am and then again at 8am but certainly not for 16 hours a day more like 5hrs a day broken up.

He won't be put down in his Moses basket I've tried elevating it and warming with a hot water bottle the longest he's lasted in it is about an hour and this has decreased to about 2mins before crying and wanting the boob and we start all over again.

He only falls asleep in our arms he put up with the travel seat sometimes and when take him out in carry cot he cries the whole time.

He doesn't have reflux or colic but when he's awake and not on the boob he gets fussy and cries apart from the occasional 5mins on the changing mat where he's momentarily happy to kick his legs and wave his arms.

There's plenty of wet and dirty nappies and have even tried giving a bottle of formula once a day as a top up to try and keep him fuller for longer he finishes 2/3oz in minutes and straight away wants the boob again.

I didn't want to use a dummy but felt it was needed to be introduced to help him comfiest sleep rather than fall asleep on the boob but he doesn't even care for that tried for 2weeks with it with a couple of different ones and longest he sucks on it has been 5mins and the. Just repeatedly spits it out.

I'm exhausted and aside from weekends can't keep up these crazy sleeping shifts with husband when he's at work meaning I'm lucky to get 1hr 2hr max per day of sleep.

I know everyone says it doesn't last but 6weeks in I'm worried he will never sleep nowhere other than arms!

Help!

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, you need proper advice from someone qualified. Your HV and GP are not, sadly. You need a lactation consultant or breastfeeding counsellor.

Failure to gain enough weight is another sign of possible tongue tie. If baby has tongue tie they can’t drain your breasts effectively which can affect your supply (because it works by supply and demand). Mothers are often blamed for having low supply and told they must combination feed when their baby actually have tongue tie. I read it on threads here a lot. Of course it might not be tongue tie but you won’t know until you’ve had a proper assessment by someone trained to do it. Not by reading the NHS website on it (which has a lot less info than the link I shared, btw).

Whether it’s tongue tie or something else, get proper support.

The weight does throw a different light on the situation, and should have been flagged before now. Your care has not been the best, OP. What exactly has his weight record been?

BF can still work out though. You do need some expert help soon, however.

@tiktok his weight had been steady holding his own but this time it has not gone up following the curve for his age

hence why if wasn't issue before but I think his last weigh in she was cagey tbh as he'd gone from putting on 9oz in a week to 6oz then just 4.5oz

@NameChange30 will still look into TT at BF drop in next week with the pro there.

DS1 did this at 6 weeks, he was on my boob for 24 hours at one point. It's a well known growth spurt. I promise it gets better!

Www.kellymom.com isa great website for info on breastfeeding.

Ah sorry, missed last few messages. Good luck with the lactation consultant OP, hope things get sorted.

Thanks so much @DuruttiColumnist

What exactly has his weight record been, OP?

It's not really possible to comment without knowing birthweight, and dates and weights since then....can you share?

I would pursue the tongue tie again; this was exactly my experience. My baby had good weight gain until just after 6 weeks. When. I had my TT appt with the lactation consultant, she said this was a very common pattern. Apparently babies have to start working harder to get the milk from the breast at around 6 weeks, and this is exhausting for TT babies as they are having to work extra hard anyway. She said tongue tie is often not picked up in the first few weeks because weight gain tends to be good to begin with, then suddenly tails off at around 6 weeks.

Hi @tiktok

Born as 61b9 then after week 1 only lost 5% of that then week 2 put it back on

He then put on 9oz then 6oz then before xmas he was at 7lb10.5 then today's HV app was 10 days post that weigh in and now he's 7lb15 so hasnt list but it now not where he should be

Op please see a proper lactation consultant.
My dd is now 3 but I could have written your post 3 years ago. I saw an NHS breastfeeding leader/lactation consultant who helped me but missed posterior TT. Only after not sleeping and feeding constantly whilst fighting against HV advice to formula top up did I spot my dd had upper lip tie which often goes alongside mild TT. We were doing ok by this point so after speaking to my gp I didn’t take it further but one thing I really regret is not seeing a private lactation consultant/TT specialist with DD1, I didn’t know they existed back then.
DD2 has just been born with a really bad TT which I had cut privately very early on and honestly feeding is amazing. I didn’t know that this is what feeding should have been like first time around. It really upsets me thinking that DD1 had to work so hard just to get enough milk to survive and how those first months could have been so much better for us both had we have had proper advice and support which unfortunately in my area I now know needs to be paid for privately. If you can afford it then just a session with a real specialist could make a huge difference.

Also op remember to pump/hand express if you’re doing formula top up to keep your supply

Thanks @slowsloth I definitely will look to get it ruled out for sure!

bookending a formula feed with bfing to help keep up supply then will also express too.

It's heartbreaking to think how his constant feeding and upset had been hunger and not just greediness

It's easier to calculate growth in metric and with actual ages, so it can be plotted on the chart - it's just occurred to me maybe you are not in the Uk or you would be doing this yourself on the chart in the red book. I have translated your imperial weights into metric and charted them using what I think are your dates, and I would say this issue should have been picked up at four weeks, when it looks like your baby was on the second centile having started at the ninth. Dropping through one centile space is not necessarily a problem - but when it's near the lower end of the chart it is something to flag and to check out (you can read current guidance on faltering growth on the web - search on NICE guidance faltering growth).

However, it has been picked up now and that's good. This is in good time to enable you to continue BF and to address his growth - you need to express and give the expressed milk as a supplement (instead of the formula if there is enough, or in addition to it if not) and to seek some expert real life help from someone who can observe a feed and check again for anything that might be a problem.

He is still healthy, and he has not gone 'hungry' as you fed him in response to his 'requests' .....hopefully now the holidays are over you'll be able to access some effective help :)

What on earth made you think a newborn could be “greedy” Of course they’re hungry, they’re tiny and have a lot of growing to do. They do also feed for comfort but they need comfort as well as calories especially when newborn and other times too, when ill or in pain for example.

How are you topping up? I would strongly recommend using a supplemental nursing system (Google it and there's loads of YouTube videos explaining). I had to top up for 4 weeks and I would not be breastfeeding now at 15 weeks if it was not for this! Baby gets rewarded with milk at the breast so no "nipple confusion" and nipples get stimulated so keep producing milk, literally turned my breastfeeding experience around and made it a happy experience for both of us! Cannot recommend this and a meeting with a lactation consultant enough to address breastfeeding problems, definitely worth the money!

Another vote for getting a specialist to check for posterior TT.

I ended up exclusively expressing my milk which worked for us. I only had to supplement with formula for a short while till I built up my supply.

With DD2 I haven't had any problems (touch wood) because she hasn't got tongue tie. But for when she does genuinely cluster feed have you thought about co-sleeping and feeding in bed so you can get some rest?

But I agree, feeding non stop all the time isn't normal and isn't cluster feeding- and you should get checked out. Good luck!

OP I really feel your struggles and have been where you are with both of my children. In my own experience health visitors have a broad knowledge of a lot of things (much like GPs) but are not experts in everything. You need a specialist to help you as others have said. Please take this on board. During all of my troubles and between both children I met one person who worked with the HVs who was more of an assistant, but who had deeper training and experience of sleep and eating in babies. She really saved my sanity with my second. She diagnosed (where SIX other midwives and health visitors had said there was no problem) mild posterior tt and a high palette. She helped with many other things and recommended a book called "baby bliss", which really helped. It talks about the 5s which (once you have feeding sorted) helps to comfort them and explains about the fourth trimester.

I never managed to exclusively breastfeed either of my children because I didn't seek sufficient expert support. I was too worn down from the constant feeding (just as you describe) which started on day 2 with both babies and carried on until I started supplementing with formula. If I didn't have baby sleeping on me I was expressing. For 10 weeks with each child I had so little sleep I was hallucinating. In the end I moved to formula. I look back with such regret and can see very clearly now how let down I was by the system. Even after my second was diagnosed with mild posterior tt I was told that doing anything about it wouldn't change the feeding as it was not that bad. When you're in the fog you just trust what you're being told.

Given my time again I wouldn't even talk to the HV, I would go straight to a lactation consultant. In fact I'm already planning that if we have a third then I will have one in place ready in case I need to seek help!

I really hope you get the help you both need. In the meantime may I recommend a sling so that you can move about while feeding and while baby sleeps. It is a game changer.

HV coming again on Friday to see how topping up with formula has been going

Baby has been bringing a lot back up still of both my milk and then formula and we start again some obviously staying down with nappy output but still hungry too.

Will definitely push to be advised a consultant as this just does not seem right at all whether it's reflux, TT or lactose intolerance or something I don't know of I know deep down that something isn't right as it's definitely more than just the crying and spit up that babies do.

Sounds like it could be tongue tie and reflux but obviously you need qualified face to face on that. Lactose intolerance is unlikely as it’s very rare in babies. More likely to be CMPA if there is a milk intolerance issue, so that would be worse with formula (as it’s made from cow’s milk) than with breast milk (as it will have some CMP if you’ve had dairy, but nowhere near as much as formula obviously).

qualified face to face advice on that

Thanks for the advice @NameChange30 will mention all this to be discussed and not dismissed with HV and push for a proper consultant on this!