Please help me with some BFing advice for my sister

[2pt4kids]

My sister is having a really tough time of being a new Mum.
Her baby boy is 4 days old now. She had a very bad labour and was in hospital for 2 days afterwards as she was in so much pain.
She was home one night and then got taken back to hospital again because she was losing too much blood.
She's home again now but very weak and still in heaps of pain.

Despite all that she is feeding the baby herself. He's a BIG boy and is very hungry but she is doing so well.

Baby is feeding from one side for about 10 mins or so at a time then he falls asleep, so she stops feeding him and lets him sleep then he tends to wake up and cry to be fed again after about half an hour each time.
This is all day and all night, she's not getting a longer gap than half an hour at all.

My Mum and other family members, seeing her so tired and suffering are suggesting that her dp gives the baby a bottle to give her a break etc. They are trying to help, but its making her even more determined to feed him herself (she is stubborn )

I want to offer any advice I can, that may help her get more rest or settle the baby for a bit longer, but not outside of her determination to BF.
I think she is doing so well and I'm so proud of her and want to help her carry on. (I only lasted a week bf'ing myself so cant really offer any advice from my own experience).

Her MW has told her that as baby is weeing and pooing lots (and he's even put on MORE weight in the first 4 days!) that she's doing grand and just keep it up. Which is all well and good, but she's not getting any sleep at all.

Basically what I'm asking is - is there any different way of feeding that may be better than what she's doing now? maybe wake him up when he falls asleep and swap sides or something to try and get more in him each feed?
Should I recommend she call a bf'ing support line for advice or something?
Or is it best to let him do what he's doing seeing as he's thriving and perhaps it will settle down on its own in the next few days if she sticks it out [hopeful]

What do all you experts think?

Hi i am by no means an expert but have bf 3 babies so know how she feeling.
He is just establishing his milk supply at the minute so this is very normal although not easy.
It is definately worth doing the things you have suggested.
Just by moving him to the other side should e enough to rouse him to maybe take more.

Could she go to bed for a few days to rest and feed baby there ?

Just keep encouraging her too. Through the fog of tiredness and pain she will get there.

hello wow your sister is doing well, ok my advice would be support your sister, make lots of cups of tea and help her out in as many practical ways as poss.
Your sister may benefit from finding a local breast feeding support group, most childrens centers have one and the moral support is really important. Also if birth was very traumatic baby may be crying a lot due to the effects of this - traumatic births are very stressful for baby as well as mum! So crainiopathy may help as well as things like baby massage. If he appears to be feeding well (a 10min feed at this age is pretty good going if he is latched on properly) and is gaining weight IMO he shouldn't need feeding every half hour and may well be crying for other reasons, for new mums these can be hard to recognise. Swaddling may help to settle during the night. Wish your sister good luck, I hope it works out.

At 4 days he's really just working out that the milk comes out and fills him up. I'm sure that it will settle down of it's own accord in the next few days.

But, if she feeds him lying down she can get maximum sleep as he can latch on and off as he likes, and all she has to do is roll over with him every so often to swap sides - and sleep all the time in between. Most helpful things for everyone else to do is to keep bringing her drinks and food in bed, change the baby, and basically just let her stay snoozing in bed with the baby all the time

Thank you for your advice!
I wish I was closer to her to offer more practical help. I am 3 hrs away but my Mum is close by to her and seeing her every day. I can only speak on the phone at the moment.
I've told my Mum to stop mentioning bottles unless my sister mentions it first!

I will suggest she tries swapping sides when he drops off when I speak to her tomorrow.

At the moment she is mostly lying in bed or on the sofa a lot of the time. Her DP is doing everything else but feed the baby, so that is helping her lots.
She's also got the baby sleeping in bed with them so she can feed more easily in the night, which is making it a bit easier I think (although she is worrying about havinghim in her bed)

Hi

My dd was very sleepy for the first week or so, and the only way to get her to feed for more than 5 or 10 minutes was to try and keep her awake for a bit - tickling her feet or her cheek, blowing her face (gently). If I could get her to feed for a bit longer, ie: half hour, she would definately sleep longer. Also after calling the midwife in the middle of the night, beside myself with lack of sleep and sore boobs, she told me to feed DD and then give her to DH for a couple of hours (think 2 hours max) and he was to just deal with the crying the best he could, so I could get a bit of sleep (earplugs in). If I recall it was only really bad for a matter of a week or so, but having even a couple of hours sleep really helped. In fact DH and I had a little schedule going, so we both got a bit of sleep ie:
8pm - DH sleeps for 2hours
10pm - I wake DH after DD has fed and hand her over.
12pm DH wakes me and I have DD for 2 hours.
etc etc until the morning.
Sounds a bit mental, but saved my sanity, I managed to feed DD exclusively for 6 months with no formula top ups and went on to feed her till she was 3.

2pt4kids, congrats on being an auntie!

It sounds like she's doing really, really well.

I think those supporting her would benefit from reading the info here - by suggesting bottles they're really undermining her and there's every chance she feels shite about it.

Her baby's weeing, pooing, putting on weight, he's bfing well. She's tired - they can take the baby for a walk round the block while she has a bath or a nap, they can do the ironing, make her a cup of tea - her "job" is to feed her son at the moment, their job is to tell her she's wonderful and help her with everything else.

Definitely agree with finding other bfing mums in the area. Her midwife/HV might know if there are any support groups locally, otherwise she can get in touch with the BFN, LLL, ABM or NCT and see if there are any groups locally - or you could do this for her?

What a fab sister you are to be being so supportive

Agree with hunker.

Please don't go down the blowing on the face road - this baby is behaving normally and is breastfeeding well. Trying to make him feed differently from what his own 'urges' are is not kind or necessary....he may very well change anyway and have a different pattern tomorrow. He's four days old - give him a chance to get used to the world without trying to fit him into a mould which is more convenient!

Yes, it's exhausting, but there are plenty of ways to make it less exhausting

Thats very re-assuring
I'd much rather be able to say to her 'you're doing a fab job, keep at it' instead of 'try this differently, try that' etc as I'm sure she's sick of all the advice she's getting and it must be nicer for her to know that she's doing well and all this is perfectly normal for a newborn.
Thank you!

Have a look at this too (from my site again - sorry!) about newborn baby feeding patterns - and remember that's just one baby and others feed very differently. What's right for one isn't for another, as Tiktok so wisely says.

Oi Hunker, you're wanted Here!

You say she is stubborn. This will see her through

This bit is the worst, and it is exhausting, but it is normal and right and she needs, as everyone else has said, help to do nothing but feed the baby and rest when she can.

I am not an expert but she needs hot showers and nice food and someone to take care of the laundry and lots of cake. Her baby just needs her