Stopping breastfeeding & boob is really painful

[Lelly0503]

Hello,
I have a nearly six mo who was ebf until roughly 3 weeks ago when I decided to stop. I reduced feeds gradually and it’s been nearly a week since his last bf. I only fed off one side so my milk is only in one boob. The problem I’ve got is nearly a week on from completely stopping (and 3 weeks of gradually stopping) my boob is still really painful and hard. It doesn’t feel massively engorged or full, just round the side it’s hard and really tender. Any ideas as to when this will stop? It’s a different pain to engorgement as I had this when I first started to stop. Any help is much appreciated.

Is it hot to touch and red?do you have a fever?

You need to express a little (not too much as you don’t want to encourage more milk).

@GlitterSparkle85 no, no redness, I’ve been keeping an eye on any mastitis signs and none there.
@ninkaninus I’ve just gently massaged it and I could feel a lumpy mass under the skin, I pressed down and massaged it and shit loads of milk came out. I rekon I had a blocked duct or something

Yes, you need to empty out a little milk once in a while. Maybe once a day or something? It’s been years and years since I was doing this myself so I can’t quite remember what I did...sorry about the pain!

When i stopped bf my dd my breasts took around 2 weeks to go back to normal & were very painful, GP told me nott to express by hand as it will stimulate more milk. If you can have a really hot bath & it was release milk naturally to ease the pain!

You need to hand express just enough to relieve the blocked duct/ discomfort. It does not stimulate anything like as much milk as baby suckling. Hot bath alone is not going to encourage milk out of the ducts sorry!

Good luck OP did anything relieve it for you?x