BF - if you didn't do it first time round, have you tried with DC2 or 3?

[maxpower]

Evening ladies. Can I bore you with a bf issue? I had intended to try bfing DD. However, in the end, I had her by emcs and she slept for the first 24 hours. After that she wouldn't latch on and despite trying to manually express and trying a breast pump, I couldn't produce any colostrum. DD ended up being put on a feeding chart until we went home and had to be cup fed. Needless to say, by the time I got home, I was so worried about her not getting anything to eat, coupled with the trauma and no sleep for 5 days (no, I'm not exaggerating) I immediately resorted to bottles which we all got on with fine.

I'm expecting DC2 in December and wondered if anyone who had struggled with bf first time round had a) tried again and b) been successful in a subsequent pregnancy.

Similar story here, em cs, ds did not want to latch on. Expressed and he finally latched on after 3 hellish weeks. I had had enough by 6 weeks so mixed fed and finally stopped bf at 3 months.

But dd was a planned cs and latched on with no problems, no soreness, gained loads of weight and I ended up moaning that she was too good as she wouldn't take a bottle of expressed milk until she was 4 months old.

Give it a go, you will be more experienced and be able to prepare for it this time.

My first BF experience was a nightmare, DS1 took hours to latch, my nipples were a mess from day 1, we were forced to give formula top ups in hospital and continued when we got home and by a week he was on bottles. With hindsight I think that he was tongue tied but that was never suggested to me for a moment.

DD latched on like a pro and we had no issues but I had an extremely demanding 3 year old and really didn't feel that I could give her the time she needed to BF so mixed fed for 3 months

DS2 was not a natural feeder but I was well prepared and when I was being bitten to shreds despite being sure his latch was fine I saw a number of BF counsellors who diagnosed him with Tongue Tie. He was only 3oz above his birthweight at 3 weeks, he was born at 6lb 7 so only a tiddler anyway but I had his tongue tie snipped at 3.5 weeks and from then on it has been plain sailing. He is now 13 weeks and about 12.5lb, gaining about 8oz a week, sleeping well, feeding well and also taking bottles well once a day which is important to me.

Thanks - can I ask, did either of you seem to have problems with your milk supply first time round? I genuinely coldn't get anything out of mine - I never even leaked until my milk came in on day 8 (which I understand should happen on day 3/4). I notice meglet that you were able to express - I couldn't.

DD's delivery was very traumatic, and as it involved a failed induction, I always felt that a big part of the problem was that my body hadn't been ready to have her and the milk supply issue was part of that.

First time round I don't think that my milk came in for the best part of a week but I wasn't feeding enough, it was too painful

With DD I think that supply was fine initially, she was born on the wed and my milk was fully in by the saturday but it didn't stay good because I wasn't really feeding her enough.

This time round my supply is very good. DS only feeds from the left breast and I can still manage to get a 4oz bottle out of it before I go to bed. I have been taking a supplement called More Milk Plus since he was born which may or may not help but I'm too scared to stop taking it. I have never leaked, never used a breastpad but am sure supply is good.

I gave up in agony and misery with dds 1 and 2 after a week, and am still BFing dd3 at 6 months!

mp I was able to express colostrum when I had ds, but after 48 hours he was crying non-stop so I was only to happy to let him have formula.

Once my milk came in a couple of days later (leaking everywhere and bowling ball boobs) I had loads of it and he was on mainly expressed milk with just the odd bit of formula. I could never be bothered to express at night either which meant I was a couple of feeds short.

DS1 was born 3 months premature and expressed for several weeks. He never successfully latched on and so after week 9 my milk dried up and i ff. I was determined to bf my next and have been successfully BF DD for nearly 8 months. Its been tough and we had teething problems but i'm so glad i perservered. What an amazing experience it has been and i am so proud of myself

Thanks. I think if I had been able to express something I'd have persevered, but I was just left feeling I had nothing to give her even if she did latch on.

Part of this problem is that at my booking appt, the midwives asked about feeding and I (honestly) told them that I didn't know what I intended to do this time round. They then said that if I choose to ff, the hospital doesn't provide any formula. So now I'm anxious that if I do try to bf and have the same experience as last time is DC going to go hungry because I can't feed him/her and there's no alternative available? It's just adding to a lot of (very premature) stress I'm having about what will happen this time.

Hi - I had similar problems when my DS was born last year - got to hospital at 3cm at midnight and at 6am was at 9cm when it was decided that he had to come out right now as his heartbeat was very high. I had had pethedine and an epidural and when he came out he was very lethargic.

I also was carrying Group B Strep so because of the speed of the labour and birth my poor boy had to be taken off to have an iv canula put in his tiny hand - 3 days of iv antibiotics . He was away having this done for over an hour and when he came back was very sleepy from the pethedine.

I tried for nearly two days to get him to latch on but he just screamed and screamed and was obviously hungry, but kept yanking his head away as soon as he got my nipple in his mouth.

Anyway, the reason I'm telling you this is because of you worrying that they won't provide formula in hospital - I'm down in Crawley and had my baby at East Surrey Hospital in Redhill, and when my baby wouldn't latch on they insisted by the next day that he be given a bottle of formula, which they provided.

They have tiny bottles of ready made up formula on a cart with newborn size teats which you can just go and take as and when you need them. I think what the MW was saying is that if you went in to have your baby with the intention of not BFing they wouldn't supply the formula. But if you went in with the intention of trying to BF but ended up not being able to for whatever reason you will be provided with these little bottles. So don't worry about that ok?

In the end I tried to exclusively BF for the first week, when I had virtually no sleep because it was taking me sometimes 2 - 3 hours to try to feed him because of the whole head jerking away thing and because he just wasnt feeding at all really and would most of the time fall asleep on the breast - he just didn't seem to have the strength to suck properly. He dropped from 7lb 10oz at birth to 6lb 13oz in 5 days, at which point the HV insisted I go on to bottles - which I did and he started gaining again.

I carried on try8ing to BF til he was about 4 mths as well as FFing but in the end he completely lost interest in my breasts, even as a source of comfort! I have the same worry as you that if/when I have another child I won't be able to BF them either. I guess you won't know til it happens, but I know that after a lot of research into the problems I had I will definitely use a supplemental nursing systenm to help! I just wish I'd known about it the first time around!

Similar story to some other posters here,DD wouldn't latch on and I didn't really get much help or support in hospital.They wouldn't let me go home until she was feeding well so I gave her a bottle just to get out of there!
Once home I tried to get her to bf before giving in and giving her a bottle.I also tried to express and got nothing and never really felt my milk come in apart from one tiny wet patch on my top when she was about a week old.
When pregnant with ds I was determined to bf this time and put in my birthplan that I wanted to bf and would be grateful for any help in doing it.
Ds latched straight on and I fed him for 11 months. So it just goes to show that if it doesn't work the first time,all is not lost.
I also think you are more confident 2nd time round and people don't tend to butt in with advice as much,so you can do it your own way.

Whether you can express, or whether you are leaking, is not a good indicator of supply. I have never leaked - I had I think one drop of breastmilk on my top one morning when I was pregnant, and that was it, ever - but I am still breastfeeding DS who is 21 months, and there is definitely milk there, I can hear it when he swallows!

If you have breastfed for a short time before and then want to breastfeed in the future it can be helpful to explore why it went wrong the first time, to avoid coming to the same problems again. Interesting stats - women who breastfed a previous baby for less than 6 weeks are much more likely to stop BF their second baby before 6 weeks. I am sure this must be because if you come up against the same problems it's easier just to go onto bottles - and that's not a criticism at all, in fact it makes perfect sense - I just think you have more chance of succeeding if you can find out what might have gone wrong before. Reading a book on theory of breastfeeding (anything but NOT Clare Byam Cook! I particularly recommend The Food Of Love by Kate Evans, if it's your sort of thing.) or just hanging around in this section of mumsnet and reading the different threads is another good way of getting information as you will hear different problems people have and (hopefully!) see that they are easily fixed with support etc. It also helps you get a good idea of what's normal - e.g. if someone is posting "Oh help, my newborn is feeding every hour, is that okay?"

Good luck!

I have just re-read your OP and see that you had a section last time - this might be something you need to look up about for example. I'm not saying that having a section is a bad thing - just be aware that if you do have one (do you know yet?) your baby may be a bit more sleepy than usual and your milk may take longer to come in. Neither is a major problem, but it may take more management - e.g. with a sleepy baby you might have to wake them to feed more often. I am not sure about milk taking longer to come in - I would have to look it up, but I think that it's fine, because the colostrum is so rich and good for them, that it won't matter that they are having that for a few extra days.

I tried and failed to bf dd's 1,2 and 3 but none of them would latch on, however I was determined to try again with my 4th baby and refused to take formula to the hospital, dd4 took to it immediately and has only been weaned recently at 19 months.

I had a nightmare first time around and gave up at around 6 weeks with dd1 (but was mixing from 10 days). This time around whilst not without similar problems I got help much earlier and am still bf dd2 at 4 months. And this was with an 8 day stint in scbu from day 5. Good luck. Have you got a local baby cafeyou could visit whilst pg to have a chat about some of the issues you had?

I'm a very similar story to you op. My dd1 was emcs and I had a hell of a job trying to breastfeed her. I just don't think I could get the hang of it, she didn't seem to want to stay on, to be honest I hated it, and after three weeks of bf and ff when I was in tears trying to bf my dh and hv both told me to stop for my own sanity. I don't really know whether it was the latch or the supply or what. I never had any pain in my boobs, I had plenty of milk, I could express it well so I'm not really sure why we didn't manage it.

Dd2 was the complete opposite. Fast, natural birth, breast fed like a dream for seven months. The nipple thrush was a different story but I even persevered through it, I was so determined to get it right this time. I did find it a bit difficult to express though. Sometimes I could sit there for an hour and not quite fill a small bottle. No idea why.

All you can do is try again. I think the babies themselves are vastly different each time and perhaps what works with one doesn't seem the same with another. Good luck!

Thanks all, it's really interesting to hear your stories. I would imagine you are right about the formula arrangements hellopuppy as I can't imagine that the hospital doesn't have some duty of care to the baby. I'll definitely ask for some clarification but it's really played on my mind.

With DD, I did the whole trying to wake her up and keep her awake to feed, but she was just not doing it. The attempts didn't cause me any pain or discomfort, I was just so worried that other than the formula cup feeds, she wasn't getting anything. It was that that made me switch to bottles so quickly.

It's going to be quite a challenging time when DC2 arrives as he/she is due 7 days before DD starts school. I'm also facing the prosepct of dealing with a VBAC which I really want to achieve as I need to be able to support DD.

I really think the circumstances of the birth are such an influencing factor. I was so traumatised and physically drained (the emcs came about after a failed induction that had lasted for 3 days) I didn't have the reserves to deal with the bf situation and as I've said, my concern lay with making dure DD ate. I remember when she was about 12 weeks old thinking, if only I could start bf now, I think I'd be able to cope with it. Sadly, it doesn't work like that!

I failed spectacularly with DC1 (no latch, tongue tie, bleeding nipples, mastitis, abscess) and was dreading trying again with DC2. I needn't have worried and am currently absolutely loving bfing her.

If you are worried about having to decide in advance it wouldn't hurt to buy something like this to take into hospital with you. I think they cost about £13 from ASDA.

Good luck

Oh, and my milk took ages to come in with DC1 (day 7). It came in early on day 3 with DC2 so I think the delay with DC1 was just down to a bad latch and cheap breast pump.

You could try hand expressing a little colostrum in the shower in the month or two leading up to the birth to reassure yourself it's there and get used to expressing it should you need to (DC2 was a bit sleepy on day 1, so I gave her a few spoon feeds of colostrum to reassure myself she was getting enough). La Leche League has a good factsheet on expressing milk antenatally but I can't seem to find the link to it. I think some Mum's freeze it and take it into hospital with them in case they are unable to feed after the birth.