BF & Suicidal - advice/cyber hugs needed!

[EveLaurensMummy]

My ebf 15 week old DD smiles, laughs, squeals and coos, has plenty of wet/dirty nappies and sleeps 5-6 hours at night BUT

She has been gaining just 1-2oz per week for some time and I'm being threatened with referral to a paediatrician. I have followed all the advice and I feed her 10+ times a day but to no avail. I am physically and emotionally spent.

She also fusses alot at some feeds, growling and stiffening as though she is in considerable discomfort and coming on and off the breast. This makes me think my milk is inadequate/flow too slow?

Last night I bought some formula as I was ready to give up, but she wouldn't take it anyway and was quite disgusted with it!
(she will gladly take bottles of expressed bm) Plus the thought of never looking down again to see her feeding from my breast has had me in tears for hours now.

I called the national bf helpline, but was fobbed off with dink more, take vitamins blah, blah.

I just don't know what to do

Just re read my posts and guess you may have the new charts as they were 'using them up' when DD was born

Thank you so much for these responses . Perhaps I should try to pay less attention to charts!!

DD was born at PA hospital...undiagnosed breech, ready to push for 3 hours (yeeeouch!) and then an emcs, so it would be lovely for the bf to at least go right!

If the PA are still the way they were when I gave birth to dd, they have a lot to offer in terms of breastfeeding support. They propped me up no end and I found them completely non-judgmental (the only person who was judging me was me).

I was in a similar situation, turned out eventually to be due to a mild disability (nothing scary) which made it harder for dd to suckle.

You take that referral; it may be something minor that can easily be sorted.

2nd centile means 2 in every hundred, i.e. 1 in every 50 babies. To put this into perspective, this means that for every 1 busy bus, there will be one person to meet this statistic i.e. its more common than HV's make you believe

oops....just re-read OP and realised you never actually mentioned a centile

Hello,

Im in Southampton too My baby is 17 weeks and I definately have a FF chart in my red book. HV said the new BF ones are being used from April this year.

Not sure where in Southampton you are but I went to a very nice BF'ing group in Fair Oak. Its an NCT one and they also have a local helpline - the lady on it, Nicole, is lovely and gave me some much needed help and moral support when I was struggling. It might be worth trying one of these groups (there are also a few others around) to get some support and also mix with some fellow breastfeeders. These problems seem to be pretty common and HV's obbsession with centiles doesn't seem to help.

As others have said the referral might turn out to be a good thing. If there is an issue they will find it and if not you will be reassured that nothing is wrong and can carry on as you are.

I bf one and ff the other they both didn't put on much weight it was only the fact that it was my second that was bf and I was able to show that she was doing the same as her sister that the hf didn't worry to much. You are doing a great job try not to worry. A few things that help you prob already doing offer the second side (I had been told only to offer one side a friend said I should be doing both). Eat more food (healthy and with plenty of calories) Drink more water.

Just a reflux quickie - they are more likely to lose weight, but not necessarily. The wriggling and coming off could be signs of reflux. Look for a preference for lying on their front, or being upright and a kind of bleurghing with their tongue - sticking their tongue out (make the bleugh noise and thats what they do with the tongue) and lots of saliva because these are all signs of trying to neutralise acid - ie reflux. Not all reflux babies are sick, often its the acid causing discomfort which is the real symptoms of reflux. If they diagnose reflux then message again for advice on that. Infant gaviscon is a waste of time, especially for BF babies.
DD had it quite severely. xx

Have they checked her for tongue tie? I know someone who had similar trouble and several months after giving up feeding the HV spotted it.

Will she take expressed milk from a bottle?

Hi there

Don't let this upset you (difficult not to tho!), baby is gaining not losing and breastfed babies have their own natural growth patterns which can be erratic but provided healthy in all other respects is not a cause for great concern - a good paediatrician would reassure you.
An infant fussing at the breast may do so for a variety of reasons, positioning & attachment, speed of milk flow etc - it could simply be a little bit of impatience if she has become accustomed to taking some EBM from a bottle as she would not have to work as hard to get the milk from a bottle as from the breast so make sure its a slow flow teat on the bottle - I had similar problem when back at work and using EBM, my son would appear to get angry & frustrated lol that the milk wasn't coming quick enough when back at the breast, my sister (who has fed 4)helped me to work out why he was getting so cross and even tho nearly 6 months old I changed the bottle teats to newborn flow which did the trick for us.
Also my sis is based in the middle east and has friends out there traditionally well informed on lactogenic herbs & foods (galactogogues)which can help to increase milk supply - on amazon.com there are a couple of interesting books on the subject if you want to find out more: Mother Food A Breastfeeding Diet Guide with Lactogenic Foods & Herbs by Hilary Jacobson and The Breastfeeding Mother's Guide to Making More Milk by Diana West & Lisa Marasco. The following site contains an article on the subject by Hilary Jacobson www.mobimotherhood.org/MM/article-diet.aspx If the breastfeeding helplines, HV or a local bf group can't provide the support you need then it may be useful for you to contact a lactation consultant via www.lcgb.org/index.html some are private, some free, the site can point you in the right direction.
Good luck, don't get too down hearted, no 2 babies are the same when it comes to feeding habits and remember becoming a mother seems to come with an inbuilt propensity to feel guilty, worried and responsible for like erm everything!

My DD is 20 weeks old and she's on the 2nd percentile line too.

She's my second though so I trust myself to look at her and know that she's fine. She's happy and alert, she feeds regularly, sleeps well and is growing fast - she's just little. My HV is happy for us to only have weigh in's once a month as DD is so obviously fine.

Trust your instincts. If your baby looks happy and healthy then she probably is. If the stiffening and growling worry you then ask for the Paed referral youself. Don't let the HV's make you feel threatened.

You sound like a lovely caring Mummy and I'm sure you're doing your absolute best for your daughter.

Great, thanks. Just sharing the problem has made me feel more relaxed....and that's bound to benefit BF!

I don't think DD has reflux, as she doesn't fuss at all when taking ebm from a bottle (slow flow teats all the way!), plus she only does it at some feeds.

Hmmm...

I have a fair stash of ebm. Would it be worth topping up a couple of evening feeds with, say, 2oz of ebm to encourage weight gain, or am I being a muppet?

You are not being a muppet, if you feel it's the right thing to do then go with it!

Just wanted toadd my support - BF is hard and you don't need unhelpful HV adding to your stress - if your DD seems happy then she IS happy - just go with your mothering instinct .

You are doing a fab job

You guys are just amazing...I can't imagine how many dispondant bf mums have been helped to carry on with all this great advice and support.

I will definitely re-read this thread when I'm next feeling overwhelmed by it all

Eve, you sound much calmer, stress won't affect BFing but it will affect your sleeping which will make everything 100 times worse and so much harder to understand!

Glad we have helped, now you have to sticka round and in a few weeks you can help the next undermined and overwhelmed BFing mum. Because there will be another, and another, and another....