What am I doing wrong? Baby just over two weeks old and got 2nd bout of mastitis!

[devotion]

My baby is just over two weeks old, last Tuesday I got mastitis and had all the horrible symptoms including feeling like i had flu. So i has to take an atibiotic, gp said I could stop after five days if my boob felt ok which it did so I stopped on Sunday then this afternoon that familiar pain is back.

Its not as red and I dont feel fluey so i called gp and he said to take the remaining two days and if no better i need another five days on top of that.

I am so annoyed that its happened again, why and what am i doing wrong?

This is my third baby that I have bf, 1st time i was always engorged and had mastitis 3 times, 2nd baby never had it and this time this will be the 2nd time and so early too. I did not think you could get it so early when your boobs are still adjusting to feeds.

I feed her 8 times roughly in 2 hours, she is a slow feeder and i always make sure i use one breast and empty it. she is a real snacker so i spend up to an hour putting her on and off to get to the hind milk so where have i gone wrong?

This is so frustrating.

For the last three nights she cries from 11pm to about 3/4am with rooting for milk so when I offer her the boob she sucks for about a minute then loses interest so she cant be hungry. just wondering if its the antibitoic bothering her, but she is fine in the day.

confused and fed up!

bump

My SIL has had about four bouts of mastitis in ten weeks or so and she is as frustrated as you. I directed her to 'la leche league' website where there is a page about repeat mastitis. I'll just try and insert the link here: www.llli.org/FAQ/repeatmastitis.html

Sorry can't be more helpful as I don't have direct experience of it myself, but hope someone else comes along soon.

Have you checked her latch? Make sure she has a good mouthful of breast and that she is pulled in tight to you. Try alternating breasts as much as you can during feeding so that each breast is getting a little emptier and reducing engorgement, don't worry too much about the hindmilk for now. Try pumping on the infected breast if it is engorged and your baby doesn't want a feed as that should help to clear the infection.

The fussyness at the breast is common at this age just keep doing what you are doing it sounds like you are doing a wonderful job as a mother, and such a horrible experience to have mastitis.

Have a look at the Kellymom website, it is great for anything to do with breasfeeding, very informative. I hope you feel better soon.

i wonder if perhaps the antibiotics hadn't had long enough to properly work after 5 days and the initial infection has just come back

thank you for all your replies.

thisisyesterday - this is what my gp thinks so i am finishing off the two days i have left and hopefully that will do it. i hate the idea of the antibiotics going into my little baby when she is so young. i am drinking yakults so hopefully they will help what is being removed from my gut.

i've had her latch checked by a few mw's and hv's as she is slightly tongue tied but she has a great tight grip and holds on nicely. she is putting weight on fine so they are not worried about it.

my boob feels a little better tonight, i have fed her for a very long time on the sore boob and she even took the other boob after so hopefully she has drained the blocked duct as it is not as uncomfortable as it was earlier and the deep pain that went to my arm has gone.

thanks for the link and i will have a look at kellymom. i'm just finding it so hard to find time to do anything on the computer and still getting use to three children

If you have a lump in your breast, it's worth feeding her with the chin pointing to the lump. That will clear a lump better than any of the other techniques (hand expressing, massaging lump during feed, expressing in shower).

If you tend to get mastitis, you are probably a mother who tends towards oversupply. You need to keep an eye out for lumps and sort them asap before they turn into mastitis.

This also means your latch can be less than perfect, but your baby will still get enough milk, because, hey, you have loads.

If you want to get your latch checked by a BF specialist, tell me what town you're in, and I can have a dig for drop ins for you.

If you want to reduce your supply a bit, then always only offering one breast (which it sounds like you're already doing) is the right way to go.

Good luck, you're doing a great job in difficult circumstances.

thank you, i live in surbiton surrey.

the lump was at the top of my breast so that would involve upside down feeding.

i dont feel like i have too much milk like with my first baby, my boobs felt like fake ones and was always engorged. Like the second time bf my milk came in so smoothly I only noticed as my breasts felt fuller ad bigger.

thats why i was so surprised i had mastitis this time.

Hi devotion

I had mastitis several times in Nov and Dec last year when dd was about 2-3 months old. It just kept coming back, sometimes in the same place, sometimes in different places. I took three courses of antibiotics (the third was in hospital where they made me stay overnight). Nothing seemed to work and I was getting really down about it.

I decided I needed to really deal with it aggressively, so as soon as I got the warning signs of painful boob and/or temperature and fever, I'd do the following

1. smother affected area with hot flannels, as hot as I could bear, for about 15 minutes, even if it was the middle of the night.
2. Then straightaway I'd feed dd from that boob, in the football hold position
3. Fed as often as possible from affected side, almost ignoring other side
4. I also began taking a multivitamin for nursing mothers as I felt I must have been a bit run down. I really feel this has helped me get my strength up - and I haven't had mastitis since before Christmas despite still exc bf dd

Good luck.

I was always under the impression that you needed a 10 day (at least) course of antibiotics for mastitis.