6 day old baby and bleeding nipples - help please

[Gonnabamumma]

I am feeling pretty wretched and hope you lovely ladies might be able to help. My DD arriving 6 days ago and I breast fed her straight after birth and carried on when I got home. From the moment she got on my breast at the hospital, it hurt, but the midwife said the latch was fine. I persevered and was still struggling and asked the NCT breast feeding counselor to come round on day 3, which she did and it did help, but my nipples were really sore still from the first couple of days and pretty scabby. After a couple of marathon feeds yesterday, both my nipples cracked open and bled really badly today when I was feeding DD. It was terrible, all the blood dripped on her little face and it upset me really badly . The pain in my nipples is terrible and I had to send DH out to buy a breast pump, to see if I can keep my milk going. She was screaming with hunger and I had to give in and give her a formula bottle, which she promptly threw up. I managed to express around 3oz, so far, but I have no idea if that is even one feed?
Is it possible to express enough to keep my milk going to try again when my nipples have healed?
How much milk constitutes a feed?
Has anyone else had a similar experience?
Thanks in advance

No miracle cure here, just offering my support. I got blisters on my nipples on day 2 and was panicking I'd have to stop. I persevered and they'd healed up by day 5. Bfing was fine after that - they never blistered again.

I rubbed breast milk into the nipples - it is good for that sort of thing.

I was amazed by how quickly they healed. Good luck and hope it gets better soon. Congrats as well.

Just wanted to say, gave it a go again today and have managed to get through a couple of feeds, relatively pain free. Am going to stick at it and am feeling really happy. Thanks ladies for all your support!

How fantastic! x

Gonnab brilliant news, glad things have improved for you.

You are doing a fantastic job, never doubt that!!!

Also meant to say:

Try to have lots of skin-to-skin contact between feeds, too. Undo your shirt and get your baby nice and close for lots of lovely bonding and cuddles, this will encourage getting back to ex BF too.

Sorry you have been having problems gonnabamumma. I am having similar problems and know that it is latch. I am expressing and trying nipple shields cause I am determined to get this sorted! Was chided by madwife cause dd 5 days old has lost 1lb in weight. Milk only came in last night and she cluster fed all night but she's not managing to get enough suction to pull my inverted nips out and get them back to the soft pallet so it is rather painful. If any one can offer advice it would be great although I am going to tr to get to bf support at the hospital on monday!

GonnaBamumma- that's brilliant news, I'm so pleased it's getting easier. It will keep getting even easier and you'll never look back.

Mummyhill - it's normal for newborns to lose some weight in the first week. See how her weight is at the end of her second week. My sister had inverted nipples and was able to bf her 2 dc. There was some special technique she had for drawing out the nipple herself before a feed. I will ask her about it and get back to you soon

mummyhill I asked my sister what she did with inverted nipples: her answer was "I deinverted them by squeezing the skin around them" This had to be done before every feed. Hope that helps. If you start a new thread on this board asking about your specific problem you might get more response / in depth advice. Good luck!

Ineedchocolatenow, that's great! they were the place that sent me the email saying they couldn't do them anymore, so obviously, they've sorted something out.

Gonnabamumma, they are well worth investing in IMO as if you get the slightest crack or soreness externally, they heal you within hours. I wore them overnight when I had cracked nipples and by morning they were healed.

Very best wishes to you for bfing in the future!

Me again! Thanks for the update on the silverettes, am def going to get them. We are doing really well now and nips are as good as new. Little minx is a total guzzler and have been feeding her with no dramas. Lansinoh is a miracle and I now have a tube in my pocket constantly. Once again, thank you ladies for your help, am so glad I didn't give up and I am v. grateful to you all!

Mummyhill, in my massive trawl through all things breast related, saw this and wondered if it would be any good: www.consumer.philips.com/c/avent-baby-breastfeeding/twin-scf152_02/prd/gb/

Thanks Gonnabamumma.

Have tried latch assist from lanishol. Have also tried expressing to pull the nipple out but non of it is working. Have made the decision to express to feed her and top up with formula if I need to. I then know that her weight won't got any lower and that she is definitely getting what she needs itms. It was a very difficult decision because I really wanted to breast feed this time round and in some way I feel I have failed again.

Congrats on your dd mummyhill. I went awol from the ante-natal threads and haven't updated (feel a bit embarrassed, and then whenever I'm about to post, ds2 wakes up or I fall asleep), but had ds2 on 1st September. Called Joe, born at home. Is lovely but has been a bit poorly in the last week but hopefully on the mend.

Sorry to barge in, but had wondered whether you'd had the baby yet - I remember being on the ante-natal threads for Sept 05 as well

Oh mummyhill, I know what you mean..breast feeding and all the emotions around it can make you feel wretched. You haven't failed, you have done the best you can with the equipment you have! That is all we can do and we are making the right decisions for our LO's. I hope your LO puts on weight now and don't give yourself a hard time hon