Help! What's going on?

[SnowlightMcKenzie]

My nipples are so sore. Baby Starlight will NOT open her mouth any wider. BFing is a fight.

She'll feed for a bit then pull of and scream, or she'll grab my breast and either 'milk' it or push away whilst still feeding resulting in a shallower latch and stretching my nipple.

As soon as she is off she is screaming and rooting, but it is hard for me to get my nipple very far in her mouth dodging her manic arms and flapping tongue. It is sooooo stressful and after 20mins or so I find myself being quite rough with her, and 15mins later putting her down screaming and leaving the room.

Has anyone got any clues or suggestions?

TIA

Hi Starlight - sorry you had another tough couple of feeds. At 6 months it got so I could anticipate when DS1 would be hungry (he was every 4 hours or so) so I'd calgel him around the 4 hour mark. Otherwise I'd wait for his hunger signs to start up and calgel him then try to distract him for 10 minutes before feeding him. I hope you have a better day and night today.

Hi Starlight - i think our LOs must be almost exactly the same age as I remember some of your threads from when we were both pregnant.

DS' feeds have become a bit of a nightmare too. I pretty much have to feed him lying down (this has the case for about 2 months) and sometimes (over the last week or so) I even have to use a dummy to calm him and get him into the idea that he needs to suck. I can tell that he is hungry but he's just thinking about other stuff, getting distracted etc.

It is interesting about the ovulation thing. I haven't had any periods yet but I felt like my fertility had returned last week (best way of putting it without TMI )

I was also interested reading Tiktoks post re biological nurturing positions - I think the lying down position we have ended up using allows the feeding reflexes to kick in.

Hope things improve...I'll be following this ppost for more ideas for myself!

Hi MiniMarmite

Grrrrr, PITA feeds this evening. What happened to my angel baby? I thought I could solve everything with a bf!

howdy!
my dd acted this way every time I was hormonal (got my first period after 5 weeks, and have had one every month since then ... thanks for that one mother nature )
It was dh that actually pointed out that she started being fussy around this time (he knew it was coming LOL!).
Probably is the teeth too. I use Ashton & Parsons and they really seem to work wonders. (you can just pour a sachet in lo's mouth before a feed, and hopefully it will calm her down)
hope it gets better for you

Starlight you've not got nipple thrush have you? Just you saying about the sore and then itchy other nipple made me wonder. If your DS has got it in her mouth it will make her a fussy feeder - the pulling off and screaming is a possible indicator?

I sympathise with the pushing away of the breast - DS does it and it's so bloody painful. I actually use a nursing necklace when he gets like this as it focuses him and gives him something other than me to grab.