What do you do with breastfeeding biter? May have to give up....

[LiliAnjelika]

My seven month old ds has started chewing my boob. I have endured mastitis and cracked nips but this is something else. He bites down really hard at the beginning of feeds (not always but enough) and I am really starting to think about quitting. My dd never did it. I have tried shouting, patting his nose, pulling away etc but he just grins. Help!

My ds self weaned at 8-9 months. He started to blow raspberries on my boobs and if I didn't get out of the way in time he then bit me. I took the hint. Tried being stern and removing him when he bit or pretending not to notice and just putting him down but I think he just felt there were better things to do than feed.

My feeling is that he's just not interested. Problem is he wont take bottle most of time so I'm stuck!

Yep. DD did it a few times (luckily not too much as she had 4 teeth at 24 weeks!).
I used to immediately put her down, and leave her for a little bit. She screamed her head off and stopped biting.

Mean but necessary!

Have you tried pushing him onto your breast? I'd read that this can be quite effective, but never tried it myself as my reaction was always to pull her off.

Is he teething? My DD used to bite me badly, then the first teeth popped out and it stopped again until the next ones. I used to take her off and put her on the floor facing away from me. she used to cry as she knew she had done something wrong, but it seemed to help. I got quite paranoid about it and spent a lot of feeds with my finger hooked and poised to take her off, but she started pulling my finger away as if to say "i'm not gonna", and she didn't after her two top and bottom teeth were through.

If he is losing interest after the initial feeding, then watch for cues as to whether he is nearly finished as well, and take him off before he gets to the bored and gonna bite stage.

There is some good advice on kellymom

I tried all the advice with no long-term success. Different things seem to work for different babies and I found that Starlight's putting down firmly (ie ending the feed right then) was the best for me. But in the end, I had to give up (before she got her top teeth too and I had no nipples left ).

It's definitley a teething thing. I'll try putting him on the floor and see if it works. Thanks. Hope it subsides soon or will need nipple reconstructive surgery. Thanks all.

I used to take DS off, say firmly "No biting! Biting hurts!", then put him down completely for 30 seconds. That worked for us (didn't stop him biting other bits of me, but he seemed to get the idea that biting mid-feed was a no-no.

Also they can't bite you properly, with bottom teeth at least, when properly latched on, because the tongue gets in the way. So keep watching the latch. I found with DS that the danger point would come towards the end of a feed when he was getting a bit bored, and after that it was quite easy to notice when he shifted his latch in preparation for a good bite and take him off then.