Jaundice/sleepy baby/breastfeeding - please help!

[mwro]

Hi! i really hope someone can help or give me some answers.

My DS is one week old. He has jaundice (but not so bad that he has to go under the lamp). He is feeding roughly every 3 hours (and sleeping well inbetween) and there is no doubt that I have a lot of milk.

The thing is he is taking over an hour to do each feed and I am constantly prodding him etc to keep him awake so he will eat. A lot of the time he seems to be sucking as opposed to eating. I don't have nipple pain and I am fairly sure he is latched on correctly.

He hasn't recovered his birth weight yet (was told he should do that within a week or 10 days of birth) and I don't think he has at least 5 dirty nappies a day ( more like 3). My breasts are always hard and full before i start feeding him and although they feel softer afterwards, they don't feel empty or nearly empty. I am doing one breast per feed to ensure he gets hind milk.

Because of his weight, lack of dirty nappies and my breasts not feeling empty as well as te fact he takes ages to feed, I am fairly sure he is not taking the milk from me.

Can anyone help and perhaps give me some answers?? Did you have a similar experience and it all worked out fine?

Thank you so much - I'm getting a bit desperate.

Hi

I had a DD who was similar - bit jaundiced, very very sleepy for the first week and had to be tickled and coaxed into feeding.
By dirty nappies, it depends if you mean poo or wee. If the wet nappies are nice and heavy (feeling full of wee), then you can be fairly confident that he is drinking enough of your milk. Don't recall ever being given a target number of pooey nappies per day.
One tip I was given to try and check that they are drinking rather than sucking is if you can see the swallowing action around (or hear it ).
I just persevered for the first few weeks with tickling her etc through each feed to really try and make sure that she had a decent amount each time.
It is great that you have your latch sorted out.
If you are worried though then well worth contacting a breast feeding councillor via La Leche League or NTC helplines. I don't have the numbers to hand, but I am sure that someone more organised than me will be along with the contact numbers and more advice.
Oh yes, I still feeding DD (she is 2.5 years now), and she was a very bonny breastfed baby after a bit of a wobbly start. I never needed to top up and was lucky to have a very supported midwife/health visitor team who never suggested it in the first few weeks.

meant NCT of course

me too mandy! Ds exactly the same with jaundice but he use to get on and feed in ten mins. It use to really worry that he was not getting enough and became nappy checking mad! Like mandy says check his swallowing (you can also see their ears move!) its only the first week. I went to see my hv. Turns out ds just got what he needed quickly! He is now two still

bf and a strong robust boy. You are doing fine. Congratulations btw.

Hi

I'm no breastfeeding but I had a similar experience. My DS was jaundiced for the first 4 months of his life (breastmilk jaundice) and was a really sleepy feeder. It sounds like you're doing the right things.

I know how worrying it can be,Is he not producing ANY dirty nappies? I think Mandymac is right they're different and will produce different amounts of pooey nappies but wet ones is a good sign!

Keep putting him to your breasts and trying to tickle his feet/chin and blow on his face, he'll get annoyed but feed eventually!

My DS is a HUGE baby now and I'm sure he did most of that growing while sleeping in the first few weeks! ENJOY these sleepy moments to do something for you..they soon dissapear!!!

Good luck

sorry ..

I'm no breastfeeding EXPERT!! I didn't re read post!

the only think I can think of is to offer the second breast at every feed - with babies where weight gain is a concern this is really important.
You may find that the fast flow of the 'new' breast stimulates him to eat a bit more.

three dirty nappies a day sounds okay to me.

Don't worry if it seems like he's constantly at the breast, just commandeer the remote and get dh to bring you snacks.

thanks everyone. I meant pooey nappies when I said 5 a day (he has 2 or 3 i think). He does have wet nappies too but I wouldn't say they were full of wee.

I'm panicking as I had a similar experience with my DD and was recommended to give a top up at every feed - I did this and expressed my own milk all the time so she became bottle fed and it was a complete nightmare and so stressful and i can't face the same thing again.

I was going to offer second breast at every feed as Mrs Badger suggests but when the first breast is not empty and the milk comes easily when i squeeze breast with fingers, I thought it would be more important to ensure he gets hindmilk from first breast rather than more foremilk from second breast?

there will always be milk, even in a just-drained breast - they're never empty.

if he's really not gaining weight it's more important to get volume of milk into him rather than worrying re hindmilk.

agree with badger. Try feeding with second breast. Search around for tiktok she is always a great source of knowledge

mwro - I think you're right to be slightly concerned, but maybe not to panic

One breast a feed? No - this is not a good idea at first. Please don't worry about 'the hindmilk' - it's far more important to ensure he gets a good volume of milk and that both breasts are stimulated at each feed. Babies sort out the 'constituents' of the feed themselves - they don't need 'engineering'! Babies grow with good volumes of milk, and they get that with both breasts. Did anyone tell you 'one side only'?? I worry about this - it seems to be a common misunderstanding. Some mothers and babies will be fine with one side from the start, but you can't tell if you are going to be one of the 'some'

A baby who seems a little slow to gain should definitely have both breasts, and 3 hrly feeding is not very often at a week - no need to do the tickling and prodding thing, just allow him to set his own pace and have shorter, more frequent feeds. The tickling and prodding can be exhausting for babies (imagine how it would feel for us!), and they can 'shut down' rather than have this unwanted stimulation - so it rarely does any good.

More effective is breast compression (search archives) which encourages the baby to keep feeding without irritating him

Nappies - not sure from your description about them, but it's good he is pooing and weeing,

Do call one of the bf helplines!

No real answers as such.. but don't panic.. when the community MW came to see us after we left hospital DS2 had lost more than 10%of his birth weight and I was worried somewhat because his bro had severe jaundice and didn't help (one of the reasons) in getting bf to go anywhere.

I know an hr seems very time consuming with them coming off the breast, falling asleep etc but keep at it.. at that age I was stripping clothes off him and gently wiggling his ear to keep him awake too. I also found lying down to feed him made for a very successful feed too and those feeds were much shorter. (I got the impression he had less work to do as it poured out

It took my ds2 over 10 days to get his weight back on, but now he is doing ok and I am sure yours will be too...

Thank you all. I realy appreciate all the advice. think he'll wake for a feed soon so will definitely try the second breast once i feel he is getting really sleepy.

My DD still hadn't recovered her birth weight after 3 weeks so that's why I'm worrying now. Not sure why my babies do this when i don't seem to have latching on problems and have lots of milk!

and presumably if he is asleep between feeds, unless it's been longer than 3 hours I shouldn't bother wkaing him up?

mwro - were you doing 'one side' only with your first baby? This would explain her slow weight gain, if so.

If you keep your baby close, in a sling or in your arms, it's unlikely he will go as long as three hours between feeds.

If he is asleep in a crib, three hours is the max to leave him, yes....fine to let big bruiser babies sleep on if they want to, but not a baby of a week who's weight gain may be a little slow and who has jaundice.

Hope this helps - you can check it out with the midwife, too.

Congrats and hope you're well. It does take babies a while to wake up sometimes especially if they're a bit jaundice. Ds2 is 4 wks old and he still only feeds for about 15mins at a time but this seems enough. I think it's important to try and offer both sides each time early on to get your milk flow stimulated etc. Also, daylight is good for jaundice so if poss when he's sleeping, try and get him by a window where he can get the light and get him out when the weather allows. Have you got a breastfeeding drop in clinic near you? They can be a really good resouce as not only are there those that can help with the bf side of things but there will be other mums which can be quite supporting.

On the waking thing, if he's sleeping ildly beyond the 3 hrs I would wake him up. I had to do this with ds2 as he was quite sleepy at the beginning.

Hope things start to improve. Meanwhile, not sure if you want to but we've got a thread for those of us that have had feb babies (or jan in my case!!) - you're more than welcome to join us. I'll post a link.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/2290/470643?ts=1204193743252

No pressure, I like talking to everyone cause we're all in the same boat.

This happened to me as well- and we survived and we managed exclusive breastfeeding to 6 months DD was so sleepy at the start and like you I thought that feeding from one side only at a time was what I was meant to do. And I was too loopy after labour to realise I was letting her go more like 4 hours between feeds. She ended up under lights . Finally I got better advice- offering both sides during a feed- I would change her nappy mid way through a feed to wake her up again and then offer the other side. I also fed every 3 hours at least during the day.
It is really hard when you have a sleepy baby as feeds do feel like they last forever, but stick with it- you have got some great advice- I wish I had found mumsnet earlier!

Hi everyone. It's been a difficult couple of days. My paediatrician came and said that DS was so jaundice (his bilirubin level was 17) that I had to express my milk and give it to him in a bottle (at least every 2 1/2 hours) so we would ensure he got enough fluids and was eating. So I've been expressing about 6 times a day (although not at night after midnight as been so exhausted). Once DS started drinking from a bottle, I realised he was actually taking food as he had lots of wet and dirty nappies (and that when he was on my breast, he had barely been taking anything from me).

DS is doing a lot better now - has recovered his birth weight and is now about 3.6kg (not sure what that is in lbs and ozs) so my paediatrician said i can start to feed him from my breast again. The problem I have is that my milk supply has gone very low (doctor said baby is much better at stimulating breast than the pump is) so i think i'll have to supplement every feed too - did this happen to anyone else?

As to advice, I don't live in England. There is La Leche League here but I asked them questions when I had problems feeding DD and they were kind of useless - they all breastfeed so well and don't think they understand the true problems you can have.

and i forgot to add that I can't really sit for hours with DS at my breast as I have DD to look after too (she's only 15 months) and my DH is at work!

Sorry for the third post but keep forgetting things! DS is now waking on his own every 3 hours for food - not sure if i should wake him more frequently or not. I also read about breast compression so will try that too.

Thanks everyone - you've been so helpful

mwro, caring for a toddler of 15 mths and a baby whose weight is causing concern is a really tall order - can you get help of any sort at all, or maybe dh can take some holiday from work? I feel strongly about this - it is too much to expect you to do all this on your own.

Expressing 6 times in 24 hours is bound to have a lowering effect on your supply - for most women, it's not often enough to build up and maintain a good milk supply. But the good news is that this is reversible, and frequent feeding - a mininum of 8 times in 24 hours and preferably more - will restore it, as long as the feeding is effective. Try using more than 2 breasts at each sitting - go backwards and forwards, and use breast compression, too. If your baby is waking every three hours, then that's good, but if there are other opps to feed then take 'em Keep your baby close so you can respond at the first feeding cues ie mouthing, waving arms a bit, squeaking

LLL are well-trained everywhere and should understand the probs of people who are not finding it all easy - maybe you were unlucky with the ones you spoke to. Try again, maybe?

Thanks Tiktok. I put DS on my breast before and it took him a while to get used to it after the bottles and even once he was sucking, I didn't know if he was just sucking or actually eating (seem to have lost all my confidence in breastfeeding). I did go back and forwards with the two breasts and tried breast compression and once I thought he had stopped sucking, I gave him some top-up formula and then pumped my breasts to ensure they were empty - but to be honest, I can't go through this 3-stage process at every feed

Of course you can't go through all that - what a faff!!!

Are you sure you need to express still? There will always be milk in your breasts after feeding - the breasts are never completely empty. The only reason for expressing in your situation would be to make up for a baby not yet being able to remove milk very well - maybe a good thing to do when things were very difficult, but prob not necessary now...but check this with someone in RealLife who knows you and your baby's situation and who knows about bf.

Thanks Tiktok. Will try to get someone to help here. I just tried him again at my breast and i really don't think he's taking the milk properly - he still seems to stop and start all the time (with a lot more stopping than sucking) - that's why I've been expressing.

Am v tempted just to bottle feed now....