Please help my sil, newborn won't latch on!

[MinkyBorage]

I posted the other day, but thought I'd start another thread.

My gorgeous little neice was born on Wednesday morning, after a fairly traumatic birth. Sil went in for surgery for 1 1/2 hours after the birth and as soon as she came out, the bf nurse basically made her express some colostrum and fed it to the baby with a syringe.

The baby hasn't latched on since, and unfortunately is very mucusy(sp) which is making it more difficult. Nappies fine, and the milk is starting to come in, so not worried that she's not getting enough, but Sil desperate to bf her.

They are still in hospital, but sil is desperate to come home so may be able to post on here tomorrow with the bits I've missed.

Any tips to get her off the syringe and on to the breast would be fantastic. Currently she won't even open her mouth.

bumping for you

She needs to keep her daughter against her breast as much as possible. Stripped to her nappy so she gets skin to skin contact, just spent as much time as possibly cuddling. Expressing a little bit of milk so the baby smells it will help stimulate the rooting reflex. If the baby is too sick to feed, she will need to express but there is no reason why breastfeeding can't be successful under such circumstances but she must demand help continually from the midwives/ bf counsellors.

Hi, poor lady, I struggled with my first. May sound a bit daft but what helped for me was rubbing a litte of my milk round nipples. Tell her not to give up! it will be worth it!

i didn't get ds latched on for five days after a cs. really good about the colostrum but she needs to speak to a properly trained bf counsellor asap.

i was released from hospital on day 3 with absolutely no idea of what to do.

there was a great deal of poking and prodding in hosp, maybe baby is refusing and i am sure she is desperate to go home, try to get something set up for her if she can't ring from there.

i have assumed that the bf nurse isn't properly trained, the ones i saw certainly weren't and one even called herself a bf counsellor.

Def would get a trained NCT counseller to her asap...

Thank you for replies, really helpful, thanks.

Minky, a trained breastfeeding counsellor would help, but what people forget is we are all volunteers, we may not live anywhere near you, and it may not be possible for someone to come to see her as quickly as she needs. It is worth asking, though.

The fact she is not opening her mouth suggests to me some excess handling and maybe too much insistence on getting her on...she may have switched off. She can switch on again, of course...plenty of skin to skin and gentle handling, and opportunities for her to self-attach.