Nipple Pain / Breastfeeding

[cheeseplease3]

Hi!

I have a week old 2nd baby who is doing great with breastfeeding but my nipples are now in the agony stage. I know it gets better (I managed to feed my 1st until 14 months).

Does anyone have any tips for the grit and bear it stage? Distraction techniques? Pain killers? Somewhere that sells gas and air for breastfeeding at home? I used nipple shields with my first but they don't seem to be easing the pain at all with my second and feeding is now making me very sad.

All tips welcome!

Mam compresses. Excellent.
And create a big C with your fingers to pop out the entire Areola for a wider latch.
Only move baby’s head to boob when they have a wide open mouth.

Has baby been checked for tongue tie?

Yes to tongue tie but not by a specialist. I've organised an appointment tomorrow but tomorrow currently feels a long way away and many feeds to get through before then.

I'm trying Lanisoh, silver cups, milk in the cups, paracetamol.

My saving grace is that he's a quick feeder at the moment so it's 15 minutes of being stabbed repeatedly but 15 minutes isn't too long.

The cold lanisoh compresses that you put in the fridge are pretty good. As above, definitely check the latch and if that's good think about a private tongue tie check (the NHS largely isn't great at spotting or doing anything about them). If it's a stabbing pain it's also possible that it's thrush.

Do you have any Bepanthen nappy cream? I found that worked a lot better than Lansinoh. I started off wiping it off before a feed as I don't think strictly you're supposed to leave it on. But after a while I stopped/forgot and it didn't seem to so the baby any harm

I second the MAM compresses. They are expensive so I used to half them so I got twice as many, and just leave them on indefinitely rather than taking them off.

I found my nipples cleared up when I let them air out as much as possible and with Lansinoh nipple cream. For leaks I just carried a muslin cloth around. Obviously you can only do this at home when it was chilly I just wore my dressing gown but open.

Is the specialist tomorrow an IBCLC or other BF specialist? You need baby's tongue and your latch checked asap. Make sure your fingers are off baby's head when he latches, narrow your breast during the feed (compress it gently with your thumb parallel to his mouth), make sure he covers lots with his bottom lip/jaw and just over nipple with top lip.

Update for anyone who finds this thread in the future. I saw a Breastfeeding specialist who was super highly recommended. She confirmed no tongue tie but was helpful in terms of flagging a shallow latch on occasions (that I hadn't fully noticed). She showed me a couple of different positions that have helped.

I've also been militant with taking ibuprofen/Paracetamol to manage pain. Using Lanisoh and Silver Cups in between feeds (never letting my nipples get stuck to Fabric) and reverted to nipple shields. I definitely still have some discomfort particularly on latching (my daughter does an excellent impression of me when "feeding" her doll) but it's bearable and I feel like I can see the light.

Thank you for all the help!