Pls can you tell me how to relieve the pain of cracked, bleeding nips!?

[Mimsy2000]

Have a lovely 4 day old ds who is killing my nipples! He had a little trouble latching on [my boobs are huge right now] but we've sorted that. My milk has come in and he feeds well. However the initial sores are still there and now bf is killing me. I can't seem to heal. I'm using Kamillosan, which helps a bit but not enough. What else can I do bearing in mind I've got such a young and constant feeder? I'd thought about using shields so I coul heal but now hear they may cause nipple confusion. Any other clever tricks? Any help appreciated.

i used nipple shields for a day when things got particularly bad -dd was fine, and they stopped me bursting into tears when she latched on but most people seem to think they are the devil's work for some reason...

other than that, keep 'em aired if you can, keep slapping on the cream (some people reckon rubbing in a bit of breast milk can help too I think)
it will get better!

lanishoh, i wouldnt use nipple sheilds if you canb avoid it as they can affect milk production.
rub some milk on at the end of a feed, and bear with it, they will heal very quickly.
as long as you have sorted out the latch they will get better now.

catissleepy - i've not ruled the nipple shields out yet by any means. i do feel like if i could have a day to recover all would be well....

incidentally, surely baby is ingesting kamillosan [sp!?] is that not a problem?

second the lanisoh - much better than kamillosan ime.

It will get better, and in a few weeks you won't feel a thing. Honest.

Baby will be ingesting the cream, oth lanishoh and kamillisan are perfectly safe.
I am a bf peer suporter and we give out samples of lanishoh as it is definatly the bst.

I tended to use the nipple shields for a couple of feeds out of the day just to give my nipples a rest.

I also used lanisoh but it does get better its just hard to see it at the moment x

will defo give the lanisoh a try - thanks for the info

thanks for the cream-eating info too, tsmofd

I recommend nipple shields, don't think my supply was affected. used them with dd, and now with ds 7 months. Although i stopped using them with him when he was 5 months, just stopped hurting. It did get so painful i contemplated stopping BF, but nipple shields kept me going! Goodluck

Another vote for Lansinoh.

I have no experience of nipple shields so can't offer any advice/opinion there, but have to say that dd was tongue tied which was agony on the nipples and lansinoh saved me

Lansinoh

Lansinoh and jelonet. You can ask your HV to get you a prescription for it or you can buy it in the Chemist. I cut it up into little squares and layered it on between feeds. It was the only thing that helped my nipples to heal.

Good for you for hanging in there - it is worth it!

Yet another vote for Lansinoh, it's streets ahead of anything else, partly it's 100% lanolin (or something like that) and it's very thick so it creates a shield in itself. I wouldn't have been able to breastfeed without it and had to apply before every feed. Good luck.

partly because

Get yourself a set of these breast shells

They really helped me - OK so they do make your boobs look a bit of a funny shape, but frankly I was past caring what I looked like and just relieved that the hurting stopped!

I used nipple shields. didn't affect my milk

I've had initial blisters/cracks and very sore nipples for first few weeks with both my dc. I've also suffered terribly from cracked/split/bleeding nipples due to having psoriosis (making my nipples v dry and flaky) AND both dc getting teeth at four months and biting so a whole load of problems that hopefully most BF-ers don't get.......LANISHOH is IMHO just simply a miracle cream.

Tip: lanishoh is quite thick and goes on much easier if you warm the tube up first. And I know it's quite pricey but just keep slavering it on - lots of it and often.

Grit your teeth and keep at it, even tho' it feels like you are not healing and the cracks might seem to keep opening up each time you feed, I found that it actually didn't take that long to heal....for me it would be within a week even for the worst splits going about 1/3 the way round the nipple. Sorry if this sounds like too much gross information but just trying to give you an idea of how well/quickly you can heal even when frequently feeding.

I also found that if you make sure your latch is absolutely right then the pain tended to be mostly with the intial latching on/letting down period, so quite brief, and once baby was feeding well it wasn't actually that painful.

Have you got a local BFing Peer Supporter's group ?? Ask your midwife/health visitor....I found mine really helpful.

Best of luck, hope you find it settles down soon

I didn't find Lansinoh especially helpful for my poor cracked nipples, what saved me was a homeopathic remedy called Phytolacca in 30C strength. You can take three pilules every hour until the pain gets better, and then decrease to three times a day. I kept some on hand for the first few months, because every once in a while my baby's latched a bit lazily and he rubbed me a bit raw. He's now 8 months old and I suppose my nipples have toughened up sufficiently but I still keep the Phytolacca around.

Lansinoh helped with the healing, but only after a while. To be honest the first time round it took nearly 3 months for my nipples to heal.

Raw white cabbage leaves inside the bra can comfort.

Another vote here for lansinoh.

I used Lanisoh and / or Kamillosan. I liked both but actually found I preferred the Kamillosan. So do try Lanisoh too, but don't expect it will suddenly heal up the cracks necessarily any better than what you are using already. I had exactly the same problem with both my DDs. My milk came in with an absolute vengeance making it a bit hard for them to latch on initially leaving my nipples cracked and bleeding. Both times as my milk supply settled and with copious applications of Kamillosan the cracks and bleeding had healed up by about 10 days / 2 weeks, so I'm afraid you may need to grit your teeth for a bit.

With DD1 one side was SO bad it was horrible and one thing that really helped me was to stop feeding from that side for a day or two and express instead and give in a bottle. For some reason expressing didn't hurt or make me bleed at all and after 2 days that side was completely healed. Whether you want to try this depends on whether you have a pump bottles etc though.

I used nipples shields with DS and my milk level never really recovered. used Lanisoh and girtted teeth this time and it has been much better. Also i used different positions as often as poss as this seemed to speed up healing. Good luck