Breastfeeding fail

[Sorrento79]

Not sure what i am looking for. But i feel bad, like i have let my baby and partner down. Baby is now approaching 4 weeks, having been born by c section 2 weeks early
in hospital the first day i was quite spaced out from the drugs and was making no milk and only drops of colostrum with difficulty. He had to be fed from cups by the mudwives/my partner.
we had some help/advice when i was a bit more awake but the baby was very sleepy and exhausted by trying to feed. He did latch on a few times briefly but we still had to give him cups etc
we got home and i was trying to BF but ut was very hit and miss, mostly miss, position difficult, baby tired/falling asleep or just not able to do it, everyone a bit frustrated. We were topping up with formula in cups and then by day 3-4 I'd cracked and given him a bottle of formula, which he guzzled.
anyway long story short i wanted to BF, would have been happy with combining, was/am trying to express and have whittled down to trying to get him to bf for a few minutes everyday and am squeezing out tiny amounts of milk (20mls) whilst he is busy enjoying huge amounts of formula and growing well and looking very bonnie
i just feel i gave him a bottle too early, lost the chance to build my supply and now he basically just wants milk poured into him and won't breatfeed unless under sufferance and that's a shame
stupid sets of feelings about it all really

Firstly congratulations on your baby, secondly FED IS BEST! I combination fed as I had a low supply however some tips to increase supply that worked for me were - make sure you are hydrated, I expressed one breast while baby fed from the other as it seemed to spur my body into producing milk, make sure the flange size is correct and tbh I bought a cheap electric pump online and it worked wonders produced more than ever in a couple of minutes. Keep trying but also don't worry if you can't or if your baby won't take it as long as they are having milk, formula or breast 😊 you can always reach out to lactation experts in the area (quick online search should show your closest), or if you can contact your midwife and they should be able to pint you in the direction of someone who can help locally. Best of luck!

Hi there, just to advise that my baby is 3 weeks old and I sound like I’ve had the exact same journey as you…. Couldn’t breastfeed and now can’t express very much at all. I had days of shame, guilt and tears but once you recognise that the only important thing is that your baby is developing nicely and goes to bed with a full belly, that is the most important thing.

You’re absolutely smashing parenting out of the park and you should be proud of the mum you have become…. Keep smiling and enjoying your growing baby, reach out to support networks if you feel it would help and take care xx

I had a similar experience - my milk never came in and after 7 days baby had lost too much weight so we had to give her formula. I still feel really bad about it (she's 15 weeks now). I try to keep reminding myself that in a year's time she won't know or care how she was fed for the first 6 months of her life and what's best for baby is a happy and healthy mum too!

Doesn't always work though; yesterday I had a little cry because we went to a baby group and I was very envious of the women who could just lift their top up and feed!

Oh love, you haven't let anyone down. Taking care of a new baby is so incredibly tough especially with c section recovery thrown in. The fact your baby is healthy and happy means you're doing a wonderful job. Go easy on yourself

Oh love it's so hard isn't it. My attempts at getting baby to latch sound similar to your experience.
Formula is absolutely fine to feed your baby with BUT if you're actually asking for advice about what to do, then have you considered exclusively pumping? That means not putting baby to breast at all, just pumping and feeding what you produce by bottle plus formula whilst your supply builds up.
I had no idea this was a thing before I accidentally fell into into with my son, that's why I'm mentioning it. Once I stopped faffing about with the fruitless latching on attempts and got myself a hospital grade pump, and a few other things that helped with supply, I started producing good amounts of milk and by 2 months had actually built it up enough to only give ready made formula very occasionally if I hadn't brought enough expressed milk out with me.
If you want more tips on good pumps, how to build supply etc let me know, happy to share.
But equally it's completely ok to decide enough is enough for you, and forget breast milk at all.

I just wanted to say your feelings are valid and not at all stupid. There is research that women who want to breastfeed and can't for whatever reason feel a deep sense of loss.

Maybe look into paced bottle feeding (plenty of YouTube videos) which is trying to mimic breastfeeding and if you wanted to try and latch him again there might be some local support out there to help you do this.

But if you don't want to please don't feel bad that it didn't work out. The lack of support for new mums in the UK is very poor.

Right, imagine your baby is in a crib like at Sleeping Beauty's christening. A line of godmothers are queuing up to give her blessings.

Shower of golden glitter - giving him what he needed to grow during pregnancy
Shower of green glitter - birthing him safely
Shower of red glitter - a loving home
Shower of yellow glitter - breastmilk that gave him beneficial bacteria
Shower of orange glitter - all the nutrients he needs, wherever they come from

I realise this is a bit facetious. But everything you have done for that baby is done out of love and kindness, and is a blessing. Whether you keep on breastfeeding or not.

What you need to bestow now is a shower of pink glitter - mother who is relaxed and not stressed off her head about breastfeeding

All the things you are giving are positive. Be proud of yourself, not beating yourself up for not achieving 100% perfection all the time. Our kids need us to be good enough, not perfect. What you're doing is definitely good enough. Deep breath!

You are all so kind. He BF for about 15 minutes today without going into a rage so i assume was getting something, and i've managed to express about 30mls. yes he is doing well in himself which i agree is very much the main thing
i would like to hear about increasing my own milk to give that a good go over the weekend with my partner at home (it's quite hard to express and hold a baby at the same time!) so if you have any info that would be great!

@Sorrento79
A few tips I learnt- feel free to ignore what doesn't seem relevant/useful!

• hospital grade pump is essential, that means it has stronger sucking ability. Medela Symphony pump can be rented from Medela website. I used this for a month then bought a Spectra S1 which is a very popular pump for exclusive pumpers as it's rechargeable rather than needing to be plugged in. Often for sale second hand on exclusive pumping FB group or on Spectra website, Amazon.
• coconut oil to lubricate the flange helped me massively, everything just slid more smoothly!
• correct size flange. Medela website has a measuring guide or the FB groups will recommend a size. Many ladies are not the standard size nipple that come with the pumps and find it helpful to buy inserts or alternative flanges.
• drink more water and oat milk, eat more protein and fat in snacks and meals. So houmous, cheese, eggs, not just crisps and cereal bars.
• pump every 2-3 hours day and night for 30 minutes. Especially important to pump between 1-4am as that's when the milk making hormone prolactin is highest (called middle of the night MOTN pump). Don't drop this until baby 12 weeks old, that's the average point at which milk supply regulates ie is reasonably fixed and won't plummet. This is very exhausting, if your partner is able to do the night feeds it will be easier (I used to actually quite enjoy the peace of watching Netflix in the spare room during MOTN pump!) As baby gets older you can drop pumps, there are guides on the FB groups for how to this.
• totally hear you on the difficulty of feeding and pumping at the same time. Once I cracked this everything became much much easier. My advice would be to sit on sofa with baby propped up next to you facing you/back of sofa in a curved breastfeeding cushion, with other cushions behind to get the right angle and rolled muslins to sides of baby's head for support, whilst head still super floppy. Get all your kit and feeding station ready whilst baby naps, once awake feed and pump, if baby is done first then this is a nice time to chat, sing songs, dangle toys etc.
• power pumping in the evening mimics newborn cluster feeding. Pump little and often for 3 hours or so, eg 20 mins on, 10 off, 20 on, 10 off, mix it up a bit shorter or longer on and off. This tells breasts your baby is trying to increase supply like cluster feeding does. I did this 3-4 times a week in the early weeks watching TV, whilst partner sorted baby.
• as mentioned above FB groups are very helpful. Exclusive pumping UK mums and exclusively pumping mamas education and support group (US based, where EP is more common as they go back to work so quickly).

Good luck! Happy to answer any questions.
I'm just about to have my second baby and will be EP again if nursing doesn't work out like last time. I did 9.5 months for my eldest.

Oh also if you haven't already, get yourself a decent pumping bra so you are hands free. I like Bravado pumping and nursing bra and wore it all day as I was pumping so often instead of taking the bustier kind on and off.

Wearable pumps are very popular now, generally these aren't recommended to be used too often until 12 weeks as they aren't as strong. Some exceptions now eg Elvie Stride is apparently hospital grade, I haven't got one of these though.

Massaging breasts whilst pumping can help supply. So pumping bra is essential so you can use one hand to do this alternately and another to hold baby's bottle. Have a look at med.stanford.edu/newborns/professional-education/breastfeeding/maximizing-milk-production.html

I had a terrible time with my first, and I was desperate to breastfeed him. He couldn't latch at all though, and had cmpa and severe reflux. I quit pumping after a month as on top of the c section recovery, it was killing my mental health utterly. I now have a dd who is 2 next week and still ebf.

If you do want to continue, I'd suggest of course keeping baby topped up with formula for weight atm, but then spending as much time as you can with topless skin to skin to encourage latching, snacking, milk supply, all the things. I was really anxious about breastfeeding dd, I so wanted it to work, that I was basically in bed naked for the first month, so we could both learn to do it.

If it becomes too much, there's nothing wrong with formula, nothing at all. Ds would not be here without amino acid formula.

Dearest OP, you are doing a great job!
If you want to breastfeed, keep giving formula for now and start pumping to build up your milk supply. You might want to get a hospital grade pump to achieve this - you can hire a Medela one for approx £50 per month. You won’t need it long. In the meantime get help from your midwife by checking baby’s latch etc.

If you want to resume breastfeeding, you can. But do not ever feel you have failed! Its not an easy thing to do. All the best, OP x