Baby choking on milk not wanting to nurse

[whywhywhat]

My 7 week old has gone off feeding the last couple of days. I admittedly have a very over active letdown which I am managing by block feeding and expressing a little before he feeds as well as nursing lying down. He still chokes, splutteres and takes in a lot of air despite my efforts and it seems to unsettle him so much that he gives up and doesn't want to nurse anymore. Even when there is no more string letdown he still coughs and splutters. He's clearly hungry but because it obviously causes him pain he doesn't want to feed. It's really stressing me out. What more can I do to help him?

Pump off some more is what I did. You have to judge it a bit though so as not to overstimulate even more mad amounts of milk. I found that Righty was Fighty and Lefty was Lovely so if I was out without the pump I would feed on the left (or obv hand express in the loo). I also found that DS started to cope a lot better when he was not much older than your DC is now.
What are the nappies like? We had some problems with oversupply and lactose/ foremilk overload but that's another story.

My 9 week old stopped feeding last week. Turns out he has a sore throat. Some Calpol and diflam spray sorted it.

How did you know he had a sore throat?

(Genuine question)

My DS is 5 weeks and I'm nowhere near knowing him well enough to figure that out. What were the signs?

So he's a preeemie. A 26 weeker. So he's actually 9 weeks 'corrected'. And as such we can call our local A&E's paediatric unit any time. (They know him well- he was in their SCBU). So I called and they said bring him in and that's how we discovered his sore throat!
Take yours to the GP if you are worried. Throat/chest and ears are the first thing they check.

Also this is not my first child. And DS1 was v prone to tonsillitis. Signs: not feeding. Fussing. Crying for no reason. Looks like it hurts to gulp. Irritable.

Ah, I see. I thought you had some magical telepathic connection!
Hope he's doing ok now, that must have been a really stressful time. DS was 36+2 so spent a few days in NNU, so saw some babies similar to yours. All very tiny.

Mine is exactly the same. I feed lying back with her on top of boob so she's not overwhelmed with milk. If she's too upset then I get her to sleep in the sling then feed her when she's sleepy as is calmer and sucks more slowly. I don't express as that'll just increase supply more. It's a nightmare though.

He's doing well, thanks. We had a fairly smooth NICU/SCBU ride. Rare at his gestation. I am still waiting for something to go horribly wrong. Yep, maternal paranoia!
But I had no clue about DS1 at 5 weeks as well. I was in survival mode.