Breastfeeding 3 week old

[JenL7]

My daughter is 3 weeks old today. I've been breastfeeding since she was born. The first 2 weeks I found it perfectly fine, she was latching on well and gained weight normally, we had no problems.

The past week, I think I may have an oversupply, from what I've read. Sometimes the milk is literally splurting out, it seems such a fast flow. When she feeds she starts to cough and choke and seems to struggle. She goes off and on, and gets very windy.

I've tried cradle position and laid back position.

I've been feeding her from both sides each feed. I read that it is better to do one side each feed. But I'm struggling to do this. She feeds on one side until she is done. Then she cries until I put her on the other side and then shes happy/full.
Also the other side ends up being massively painful if I only feed from one.

My breasts are very achy and painful a lot of the time. I've been told that expressing will make it worse.

Does anyone have any advice? I've got nipple cream and have been putting hot flannel on which helps but doesn't solve problem.

I will almost definitely get slated for this on here, but similar happened to us, my baby was projectile vomiting at around 3 weeks. Before that we’d had zero feeding problems, latched first time and my supply was plentiful. I was happily feeding on demand.

We ended up in A&E (via the gp) and the paediatric doctor told us that because we were feeding on demand our baby was also using me for comfort and given how regularly I was feeding, with no issues, he thought baby was over feeding. Again because we weren’t having supply issues and because baby was feeding for at least 30 mins a time etc he said to only feed every 3 hours, and other than that to use a dummy. We hadn’t introduced a dummy until then but we took his advice and happily breastfed until he was 6 months.

I know they say to feed on demand and introducing a dummy will harm the supply etc and I need to stress that other than him super vomiting straight after feeding everything else was fine, so maybe it might be worth a try, or going to see your gp to see what they suggest.

Trust your momma instincts 💜

I had this, it does get better as your supply settles down and baby gets bigger so can handle the faster flow. In the meantime, try hand expressing a little bit just before you feed. If you express a lot, then it will course you to produce more, as you've been told. But just a small amount to reduce pressure should be alright, and get past the initial 'gush' before baby latches.

Hi, I had similar problems with my little one at 3 weeks, I spoke to my midwife and she said to stop changing sides or at least stay on one side for 20 mins if she was still hungry. Basically her logic behind this was that there is fore milk and hind milk, the fore milk is the watery stuff that leaks and the hind milk is the creamier stuff which helps babies to feel fuller and sleep for longer. Baby needs to go back on the same side when they pull off to get the hind milk. I noticed a massive difference in my little one, she now sleeps 5 hours straight during the night and her poop is more seedy, then just watery 😂. When my breast are hurting or engorged I express using an electric pump just on the one side then dh can give her a feed in the evening. It's a nice little break for me too, it does get easier, my dd is nearly 8weeks and things have steadily improved x