Day 3-ish, still only colostrum and baby going yellow... :o/

[LadyOfTheFlowers]

I can't even see colostrum anymore and she has not weed today yet - that's not good is it?

She was born on Thurs afternoon.

Ha! She has just weed all over me!! Its quite dark and MW did say she is jaundiced, but she thinks she looks better , I think she looks yellower.

What do I do? Will the elusive colostrum keep the jaundice at bay till milk comes in?

Difficult one - I would ring either La Leche League on 0115 974 6658 or 0845 456 1844 or NCT breastfeeding support line on 0870 444 8708 for their advice. Well done for BF efforts so far!

I have the NCT number in the phone ready. She is on now and appears to be drinking something but is getting more and more lazy with it. I have stripped her off abit to try and keep her awake.

DS got like this, infact I think both did. I expressed for a while (was in hospital and they suggested formula ), just so I could know exactly what was going in. Once more was going in, they woke up abit to feed abit better themselves. Even if you have no bottles I think at day 3 I may have still been using a spoon.

Have you a pump? If not, you can still hand express

Sod. None of the numbers are answering.

Part of my pump is missing and I have had a hand express and can't see anything.

I have bottles and formula just in case already.

Can anyone pop to the shops and get you a pump? Are you expressing from your nipple? I found it best to 'massage and squeeze' from the edge of my (large) nipples, not the 'nipply' bit. I also found squeezing the breast a little itself helped - just fondle and grope them a alittle - there is a method which I will try and google for you. Try and draw the milk out rather than squeeze and squirt like a water shooter toy duck type thing.

are you even getting anything that looks clearish?

www.realbabymilk.org/breastfeeding-information/31-hand-expressing

www.askdrsears.com/html/2/t024900.asp

I sort of pinch the whole areola area pushing back into my boob aswell iyswim? To mimick the baby feeding. I did get one pearl of clear stuff that time.

will check those links - just got some more out. there is stuff there, dont know why she is not weeing much tho.

That's great. Have you a plastic spoon, or a weaning spoon - or even a teaspoon? Pour some boiling water over it (beware a metal spoon getting hot), or throw in a bowl of milton water (however you do that milton stuff), let it cool a little on a clean dish, then scrape up those little beads. Plastic picnic spoons are good because they tend to be abit deeper. just get 4-5 drops on, then 'feed' baby.

TO me (no expert at all) she seems a little dehyradted. It then starts a circle - doesn't feed, then becomes too tired to feed well - if you can get it in any way you can it should perk her back up to feed again properly. How dark is the wee? If it's really quite dark I'd ring MW

well, the wee is golden-ish.but there was a fair amount for one wee. but saying that it was the only wee so far today.

i know the mw will say give her some formula and as ds1 was jaundiced and ended up spending first 10 days in hosp i will be scared and give her the formula.

when i said she looked a bit yellow on day 2 mw said 'top her up with formula then' straight away.

keep going with the feeding, it can be hard to express, esp in the early days and what you can express is really not a good indicator of how much your dd is getting.

hopefully tik tok or someone will be along soon, but another thought is that getting babies out in the sun is meant to help jaundice? or even putting them by a window with sun coming in? or at least i am sure that is what i was told when ds1 had jaundice?

yeah they said that to me too for ds1 but how do i let her get some sun and not burnt? can i just put sun block on her? she will still burn wont she?

If you are getting milk IMO there is no need for formula - there is nothing magical in it that makes it better than breastmilk. Spoon feed for the very short term, try and get hold of a pump (where abouts are you?), and express (of course if you want to ) I expressed and fed two or three times, then once I knew DS was getting something and getting abit perkier, I fed at the breast first, if he still wasn't doing much I'd give him the bottle of expressed milk, then try breast again - eventually (within 24 hours) the bottle was phased out.

The sun isn't overly strong, about 10 mins laying out in a bodysuit in the garden if you can - I put my moses basket infront of the window (take care it doesnt get too hot - move back and forth) but not much gets in through a window.

We had to hand express with ds1, and found quite a good method (which I've just tried and no longer needed as dc now 6 & 3 but a quiet afternoon ).

So, with right boob take left thumb and place on top of boob, 2 finger widths above the nipple and place all other fingers underneath. Now sort of massage ( for a few seconds) the boob and milk / colostrum should spurt out in very fine fountain (keep going is quite slow progress but you do get a decent amount). It always really helped when boobs got sore and not enough milk was taken.

Hope you get some milk in soon.

And when I say 'we' had to hand express, I meant I!!

I will put her basket by the patio door then - sun is blasting in - and soldier on. She is feeding on the other side now.
Her eyes are actually open atm and the whites are not yellow yet so that's good?

Breastmilk will do much, much more for getting rid of jaundice than formula. No idea why the midwife would think formula is a good idea unless there's serious dehydration issues.

Get her out in the sun and keep trying to breastfeed. Your milk will probably come in quite suddenly. It should be in within three days of the birth so you've still got 24 hours.

Don't rely on pump or hand expressing as a measure of colostrum. Chances are she's getting out more than either method.

If she's weed on you and she's not being fussy or listless, that's a good sign. She ought to have 4 wet and/or dirty nappies in 24 hours.