Breastfeeding struggles

[Daisysimply]

Hi, any advice would be appreciated!

my little girl is 16 weeks old and I have struggled with breastfeeding from the start. She has very short feeds (less than 5 mins) during the day and is constantly coming on and off the breast during this time. She will often cry after a feed and wriggles around the whole time I’m feeding her and appears to be uncomfortable. Sometimes she’ll be feeding and come off crying but keep latching back on like she wants more but pulls away again. We strangely don’t seem to have the same issues at night most the time tho which I can’t understand. Anyone else experienced something similar and have any advice?

Also somewhat unrelated but she is now refusing a dummy and bottle which she took to fine up until a few weeks ago, won’t let either of them go in her mouth for some reason if anyone has any idea why that might be?

Reflux and/or strong letdown? She is overwhelmed by the volume of milk in her mouth so pulls off, and/or she has reflux and it’s uncomfortable to have the milk rising in her throat while also drinking.

does she hiccup a lot, is she sick after feeds? Does she ever choke/cough when feeding?

my baby has reflux (older now, but has always had reflux) and I have a strong letdown. It got to the point of feed refusal unless I was lying down (reduces the effect of gravity on the milk/letdown, her body is more relaxed and supported by the bed so she gets less reflux). Worth a try? I also block fed (just one breast per feed) to slow the flow of milk but recommend using a lactation consultant to support if you consider that as it can reduce your milk production.

Really improved when we started solids. She still has reflux but no longer has feed refusal. She has dairy allergy though, that makes the reflux worse and we saw some improvement when I eliminated dairy from my diet.

I wouldn’t worry about the short feeds per se, she may be very efficient. By 6 weeks my son’s feeds were max 3 minutes, only taking one side, and he was a chunky thing.

She does hiccup and cough a lot especially when she’s laying down so I thought reflux. went to a lactation consultant who said that most likely wasn’t the case and was a tongue tie which had reattached and sensitive palate so I didn’t try any reflux medications, thinking I probably should now. She does spit up milk sometimes as well.
thank you for the advice! Will try feeding lying down

It’s really hard when you have a refluxy baby, for them and you! Hiccups and coughing are classic reflux symptoms, your instincts were spot on! You’re probably almost through the hardest time for reflux and over the next few months as she starts solids and learns to hold herself in a sitting position it will improve. They say most babies outgrow it by 1 🙂

Firstly, well done for breastfeeding for 16 weeks, that's such an amazing accomplishment and you should be very proud of yourself. I found this explanation (and this woman/page) in general really helpful when I was going through the same thing with my little girl.

www.instagram.com/p/CfLZKUyD50-/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

It's so frustrating when you just want a nice calm feed and a few minutes of quiet with a nice cuddle and baby's just going nuts! Annoying as the phrase is, it is just a phase and I found DD grew out of it within 3-4 weeks and I'm still feeding her now at almost 7 months.

Hi, I’m in almost exactly the same boat with my 16 week old and unfortunately it’s not my first experience of this!

This is my 3rd baby and the second time I’ve experienced this! My first baby would just feed off one breast for a few let downs, feed a bit off the other breast and then finish. 2-3 hours later the same. My next two would feed for one let down on each breast every hour to hour and a half during the day. Feeds ant night we’re aall ways more settled. Both struggled with weight gain so I always ended up giving a EBM or FF top up every day.

No medical conditions like reflux but all had tongue tie. In all three cases getting it snipped made barely any difference.

I guess what I’m getting at is some babies are tricky feeders without good reason! Is your baby gaining weight and have enough wet/dirty nappies? If so you can be assured that they are getting enough milk……but it’s just a bit frustrating for you!

The fussy day time feeding and relaxed night time feeding is really common. They’re just tired and comfy at night and so just have a nice relaxed feed. During the day they are alert and stop, look around, pull off ect. Particularly common at 4 months (google Katherine Stagg and the 4 month baby).

my first baby, the good feeder, also started refusing a bottle and dummy around this time.

My sympathies! It’s not easy!

Might be worth just looking at your diet and seeing if there is anything triggering them (through your breast milk)
We had a similar experience and eventually found my baby had cow's milk protein allergy and he was reacting through my breast milk (he would scream and pull off after a couple of sucks when feeding etc, sicky, unsettled, wouldn't be put down easily and constipation or weird nappies sometimes) so might be worth being mindful of and doing a bit of reading on just incase.
Due to his cow's milk protein allergy (cmpa) it is also really common to also react to soy, and legumes like lentils etc too (as the protein molecules are a similar shape when being digested or something like that anyway!) So I've had to cut those all from my diet and he is a different- much happier baby!