Was this normal?

[Squitten]

So, I'm pregnant with my second child. Very early days at the moment but I've been pondering BF and how I'm going to handle things this time around. The main thing I want to know is whether what happened last time is normal or not?

We never really got established with my DS. I had an emergency section (breech) and he was born early Sat morning. Things were fine on Sat, he latched on fine and slept a lot. Sat night he woke up and screamed constantly if he wasn't on the boob. I had no sleep at all that night (2nd night without any at all!)

He continued to scream when not on boob all throughout Sunday and the midwives just kept saying to let him get on with it. After a day of constant feeding, my nipples were in agony and red raw. I insisted that the midwife come and see me and when we tried to express, we got two drops of colostrum - literally. Midwife put him on FF by cup which caused projectile vomiting from swallowing the air and was so awful that he eventually went onto bottles and stayed there. My milk finally came in on Tuesday but I didn't want to carry on trying at that point.

So, was this handled correctly? If your milk is taking forever to come in, are you just supposed to wait and endure or is it ok to supplement at that point?

I really want to make BF work this time around (sick to death of flippin' bottles!) and, whilst my DH and his family are very pro-BF, I have zero support from my family. They all FF and are very anti-BF so if I start to struggle, the pressure will be on to FF again.

Thanks for reading this essay!

It doesn't sound as though your milk was slow to come in - day 3 or 4 is normal I think. I'm sorry you had such a hard time, it's hard to tell what went wrong, although it seems the main issue was the sore nipples- I think the MWs should have helped you more with latch rather than expressing etc. A bfc might be more help next time, if you do need problems, here's hoping you don't!
Congratulations on the pregnancy!

It's normal for milk to take a few days to come in - a few drops of colostrum on day 2 is totally normal and plenty for a newborn baby. I think milk usually comes in 3-4 days after the birth. I too had a section and it was day 4 for me.

I remember it being really painful at first, and I just completely covered my nipples in Lansinoh after every feed. I found that if i could grit my teeth, stamp my feet and curse for the first 8 seconds or so it did ease off.

I think you would be wise to seek advice from a BF counsellor rather than a midwife this time around - and making that contact before the birth would be a good idea, so you can debrief about what happened last time and know where to turn for help this time around. It might have been that the latch wasn't quite right - and with both you and the baby having to learn what to do, you should probably have had some more support than you did.

Good luck - and congratulations!

No, it wasn't handled corectly. Milk takes 3-4 days to come in and all the baby gets (and needs) is colostrum.

Normal length of time for the milk to come in, Squitten...not normal for a baby to make your nipples red raw by day 2

Not normal to get 2 drops only of colostrum - that's technique at fault, there, is my guess.

Agree with SPB.

Pretty poor help from the midwives, from the sound of it.

Sorry, I stand corrected

Tiktok, when I was in hospital after having DS, the midwives all commented on how much colostrum I had. And yet it was literally a tiny dribble at best.

The mysteries of what MWs tell you (will I ever learn?!) ...

Colostrum is in small quantities for sure - but good technique will get a teaspoon or more out at a time, which is not a huge amount but it is more than 2 drops

Sorry - not a teaspoon out all at once, but in drips, IYSWIM

Wow - that was quick! Thank you for your advice

Interesting to note that the lack of milk over that time is normal - the way that the midwife quickly whipped DS onto FF made me think it was a problem. I don't mind it being difficult, I just want to be psyched up for it beforehand if it's going to happen again.

My son was breech due to his mega head so I may be in the same situation again this time around, hence the question. I'll be at a different hospital though and the midwife I met from there when I was struggling before was brilliant so fingers crossed. I'm also talking to the correct baby doctor at my local GP surgery so I think I'll talk to him about BF support too.

My family are all telling me that because I didn't feed this time, I won't be able to next time but I know that's not true.

Mine screamed a lot for about 4/5 days after my em section

Once my milk came in properly he was like a different wee baby.

Best advice I got from one of the visiting midwives was just to feed him as often as possible. This will be fun when you already have one to look after though!

Hopefully you won't get sore this time. I got a cracked nipple, but this was probably because DS had a tongue tie and couldn't stay on very well till it was snipped.

I had assistance the day after my section to express a wee bit of colostrum and give it to DS by syringe, it really wasn't very much. I do believe in my hazy state I let someone express it for me (a MW or something). I can hardly remember this though.

He was also quite chilled out for about 24 hours then 'woke up' my 2nd night in hospital and screamed all night...

(someone else hand expressed it I meant)

Your experience sounds very similar to mine. First time round I never managed to BF my DS. After an intervention heavy birth (epidural, drip, forceps in theatre etc etc) he came out screaming and didn't stop for 4 days! Actually, I still can't believe the midwives let me out of the hosp the next day when he had been screaming all night (pleased to see the back of us no doubt).

He had managed to latch on ok that morning and did another couple of times when we were back at home but the rest of the time he screamed and wouldn't come near me. We ended up being checked back into the hospital on day 4 when the gp agreed he didn't seem right.

Anyway, long and short of it he ended up on bottles and a diagnosis of silent reflux. I also had no support from family as my mother never even contemplated BF and clearly has some major hang-ups - she was desperate to give him the bottle!

But....this story ends happily! DD was born 6 weeks ago and is EBF and all going swimmingly. My top tips are thus:

1. If your hospital postnatal wards are bearable stay in a bit longer than you might. With a toddler at home it's very easy to try to do too much. I really believe one of the main reasons things have worked out this time round was our 3 day stay in hosp.

1. When you do get home, 'bed-in' - I have a v supportive DH and he looked after toddler, made me meals etc and me and DD lay in bed snuggling for the next few days while I coped with my milk coming in. I definitely had a few wobbles around this time and it really helped to just focus exclusively on getting things right.

1. Get help - in hospital, as soon as she arrived I started harping on to anyone who would listen about the problems I'd had first time round and demanding help. I saw 2 different BF counsellors and made a general nuisance of myself with the midwives - made them watch me feed etc. One of them even collected colostrum directly from my nipple with a syringe while I hand expressed !!

1. Expect it to hurt at first. It took 2 weeks for my nipples to recover from those early days. I covered them in lansinoh after every feed and eventually things got better and now I don't even really get the pain at the start of a feed that many seem to get.

1. Don't stress about nipple confusion. I'm wary of recommending a book here but I found the What to expect when you're BF very calming on this issue. If your latch is good then there shouldn't be any problems if for whatever reason you have to give a bottle. In fact my DH has been giving DD a bottle of my EBM once a day since she was 2 weeks. (has helped them to bond too, he was so involved in DS he was feeling a bit useless). oh, and she had a dummy from day 1 too - she's not that interested in it anyway and I just use it to wind her.

1. Don't beat yourself up! While I was really keen to BF this time, it also helped that I went into it knowing that FF wasn't the end of the world. I bonded with DS for the first time when I gave him a bottle and all was calm....

Good luck!

I think a normal feed for a newborn is 10ml of colostrum, as this is what my midwife told me when I managed to express a pathetic 1ml after over 20 mins of me (and her!) trying. I was then advised to just try DD at breast but after 20 mins (I always persevered for 40 mins with screaming baby) to formula feed with a syringe. Was also told to try to express in between times. Milk finally properly came in on day 6, so just flipped straight away to solely BF (she had also been very sleepy for the 1st week and basically suddenly woke up on day 6).

To be fair though, I had an extremely 'easy' birth, and there's no way I could have 'persevered' if I'd had a c-section.

Just to add: you may also be surprised at how painful the afterpains are with a second baby. But that is completely normal with a subsequent baby, adn together with your previous problems (and a toddler!) might make it all seem too daunting. But if you get the right help, it will work.

My dc1 was also breech, but the VBAC worked well with dc2 - would have been even better if I'd been encouraged to get off my back and into a better position for giving birth! Have you got any NCT refresher classes near where you live?

Thanks again

So, I basically need to be prepared for it to possibly be a bit hellish for the first few days and demand lots of help if I need it!

It's very helpful to get my previous experience in perspective. I'm really hoping that I'll have a better grip on things this time (she says...)