No engorgement or letdown 1st time round.....

[Boohoobaby]

...with DS. Will I be able to breastfeed this time round? (baby due in May)

So wanted to breastfeed last time and produced colustrum in one breast and nothing in the other (breasts only went up one size in pregnancy). Five or so days later, no engorgement (ever) and hardly any milk, despite DS latching on perfectly and exclusively being fed by me.

This time, breasts gone up one size again, are more painful than last time, but does this 'guarantee' that I will produce milk?

Mears or anyone who could answer this or give me a clue would make me very happy. MW says that not all women produce milk, but then you read all women can, irrespective of breast size etc.

Shall stop rambling now

I'm not sure that you should assume that no engorgement etc means you have no milk. I didn't have any either, and it took a long time for my milk to come in too - yes, around five days - and I think there was no engorgement etc because my baby fed all the time (like yours) so when milk appeared it was hoovered up! But when the milk started to flow it really did come. Did you carry on after five days or so or give up? Or did you try mixed feeding?
Mears always recommends an over the counter medication called Domperidone (brand name Motilum) which can increase milk production in the early days. You can buy it at any chemist. However, though the vast majority of women can breastfeed I don't think there are any 'signs' or guarantees.

Thanks aloha.
I switched to mixed feeding after that on MW's advice and then a week later, exclusively bottle feeding, again on MW's advice.

Hmm, shall look into this Domperidone and see if this helps. Should this be taken post birth or in the last few weeks of pregnancy?

i too had no milk or engorgement with dd and felt very dissapointed when i tried to feed her myself.after complete agony from mw trying to get her to feed on nothing i gave up and bottlefed.
when i was pregnant with ds i said i wasnt going to bother so bought bottles ,milk etc.
then on day 3 after having him wham !! my bust swelled and milk came flooding in lol.
sadly after the agony id had trying to get dd to breastfeed i didnt bother and carried on bottlefeeding.
as for breast size thats rubbish my bosom is of over adequate size

aloha's right - engorgement is deffo not an essential. It's not at all uncommon for women not to experience it at all. Not producing any milk at all is very, very rare indeed. There would be no way of knowing if you had colostrum on one side and not the other, boohoo.....not being able to get any out is not an indication that there is nothing there, if you understand me. It just means you can't get it out. I am assuming you have had no breast surgery in the past, BTW.

Letdown, too, is an elusive beast Some women feel it, some don't. Some do all the time, some do some of the time.

Nothing in your post makes me think you won't be able to breastfeed this time, though it will prob help if you get good info, a supportive friend, selective listening to other friends ;)

I'm with aloha on this one - you may well have had plenty of milk.

Just to reiterate, I had a very slow start, came under HUGE pressure to bottlefeed (which I personally found very upsetting indeed) from midwives who I presume meant well but I think were pretty ignorant, but when I went home and persevered feeding a LOT - ds was very, very sucky - after about a week after I got home from hospital (in for five days) I had more milk than I knew what to do with. Yes, ds had a few bottles of formula and certainly seems none the worse for it, but I was very glad to have breastfed him too.

You take motilum in the early days of breastfeeding - if you seem to be having trouble. You may well not need it at all though.

My boobs never changed size during either pregnancy, I have never felt a let-down, and have only occasionally had a bit of partial engorgement - certainly never the rock-hard baskteball type that you always seem to be warned about. Yet I breastfed both my children. With ds I had bad advice and ended up mix-feeding, but I managed much better with dd, and exclusively fed her until solids (ok, the occasional bottle of formula for convenience, not need), and continued feeding her until 22m.

Having good support is crucial - midwives may be wonderful when it comes to pregnancy and childbirth, but they're not so hot on breastfeeding. I too went over to bottles on my midwife's advice, and it was only because I can be rather bloodyminded that I didn't end up completely bottlefeeding. That and the wonderful NCT Breastfeeding Counsellors.

I also tried fenugreek (this site is very helpful) and am convinced that it helped a lot. You don't need a prescription for it - so no need to try to convince a stuffy doctor - I got it in capsules from a health food shop, and took about 6 capsules every day.