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Original poster

Breastfeeding advice please, at my wits end

33 replies

Bumblebee412 · 01/01/2023 13:14

DC is 11 weeks now and we have still been unable to establish breastfeeding.

For background we tried straight away at the hospital every feed and he would mostly just scream at my nipple and not latch at all. I was told to syringe feed colostrum which I did and not to pump yet. I cup fed him in between each feed and tried to breastfeed each time. The support in the hospital was hit and miss, sometimes I would get someone who got him to latch but he wouldn't stay on, other times I was left hours after asking for help with a screaming baby. I was desperate to leave due to lack of support so we went home only to Be readmitted a day later. Met a couple of ladies who told me to get on the pump and we were getting milk to feed aswell as topping up with the infant hospital bottles.
Everyone kept telling me baby was just lazy but it turns out they had a posterior tongue tie. We managed to get referred to the infant feeding team and she could tell baby was struggling to feed with bottle and breast feeding. Poor thing has had so much nipple confusion.
We got a tongue tie appointment for mid December and continued to try latching which we got better at but it was agony because of the tie.

Baby has never not needed topping up with formula from a bottle and now has a milk allergy and I've given up dairy to try and be able to pump.
Pumping is so hit and miss and in all honesty I'm exhausted from it. I have an older child and I feel I just can't pump the amount I need to with doing everything else. My partner is very supportive but has to work so limited to how much help I get in the day. I was giving one bottle of breast milk a day but as baby has got older it takes me 3 or 4 pumps to get enough for one bottle.

The tongue tie has been done and we have gone from feeding for a and being painful to struggling to latch just like at the beginning

I have tried domperidone which has helped but again its back round to struggling to fit in pumping and I end up with lumpy painful breasts.

I don't really know what I'm asking, maybe just a hand hold. This is the one thing about parenting that has me in tears and makes me feel like a failure. I am so close to giving up because I know it's not worth sacrificing my mental health over. First born was not breastfed as due to the traumatic birth (pph with blood transfusion) I got no milk at all and I was in no state to try and breastfeed. I've always felt guilty over this so hoped this time would be different but its just shit for other reasons.

I honestly don't know whether to give it one last try and reach out one last last time to the breastfeeding group I'm in or to give up. The last one makes me sad but the trying and failing makes me equally sad 😭

Sorry its so long and thankyou for reading

OP posts:

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Original poster

Bumblebee412 · 02/01/2023 08:12

RememberFlimsy · 02/01/2023 07:46

It's ok to stop.

Thankyou, I appreciate this, just not sure I'm ready to yet xx

OP posts:

London77 · 02/01/2023 12:09

Apologies if I have read this wrong but it seems you are having to top up with formula because of baby's bad latch not because of supply issues?

If this is the case I would highly recommend nipple shields.

I had a lot of trouble breastfeeding in the first 2 weeks and baby was combi fed although mostly formula because she would just not latch properly and would scream (I believe due to lack of support on hospital but don't get me started on that).

Anyway I was so close to giving up and my aunt told me how she had fed with nipple shields. So I got the MAM ones as it was the MAM bottles baby was using. And since the first time trying them I have not had to give formula since. Baby is now 6 months old and thriving off my breastmilk alone all thanks to the nipple shields.

If you read online about them they get quite a bit of hate and are stressed as a temporary option but I've spoken to my doctor and she said I should continue using them as I've had no issues with my supply using them, baby is gaining fine and we are both happy using them. It's now such a joy to fed her.

Interestingly, now she is 6 months she has a couple of times just flicked off the nipple shields and fed from me alone with nothing. She seems to perhaps be weaning from them herself.

Give them a go. For me absolutely saved my breastfeeding journey! I told myself when I was pregnant I would breastfed to 6 months but now I don't want to stop and will continue.

Boopboopboo · 02/01/2023 12:26

Have you tried the NCT breastfeeding support line? May help to talk through your situation with someone trained who can see the whole picture. Hats of to you for pumping for all this time and still being willing to try, you're amazing x

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0-3 months old Antenatal & postnatal Babies & sleep Breast & bottle feeding

wedonttalkaboutyouno · 02/01/2023 20:42

I can’t really say there were any signs unfortunately, other than breastfeeding (and shockingly little weight gain) never really improved after the first cut. I had breastfed previous babies with no problem, and support was not forthcoming from the NHS. The NCT breastfeeding counsellor queried it as she didn’t think my baby was opening her mouth wide enough still, and we had it confirmed with the tongue tie practitioner who did the initial cut, as I had asked her for feeding support. I found her on The Association of Tongue Tie Practitioners website, if you are able to go private, even just for a check up. Costs vary, but we paid about £120 I think.
I was very stubborn as I had breastfed before, but it still upset me when people would tell me to just bottle feed. Not that I would ever judge anyone who chooses to bottle feed, but it wasn’t what I wanted to do, and I found it so dismissive of our problem.

wedonttalkaboutyouno · 02/01/2023 20:46

Sorry, just re-read that you said no one would touch the posterior tongue tie, so I don’t know if that website will be of use to you, but my daughter’s was posterior, and the practitioner had no issue with snipping it there and then.

PurpleCat88 · 02/01/2023 20:59

MySoCalledStrife · 02/01/2023 00:19

My heart goes out to you. I really struggled with feeding my daughter when she was born and went through such lows with it that it really has coloured my memories of her early months. I wanted to breastfeed her and was determined to do it, but I wish they’d tell you that it doesn’t necessarily happen instantly. I did not feel like it was working for me until she was about four months old. I’ve put my experience below - I don’t know if it will be helpful or not but please take what you want from it.

My baby was born via c-section. No one tells you that can really affect feeding initially. The night she was born she would not latch at all and was sleepy. A midwife in the hospital pretty much force fed her a bottle of formula. By the time we left hospital (and I was in for a week following my section) I couldn’t get her to latch for more than a couple of minutes.

When I came out I was told by the midwives to triple feed, so was expressing, trying and mostly failing at breastfeeding and giving formula top ups. Because there were concerns about DDs weight she was being weighed every other day and each time we’d see a different midwife at the clinic who would tell us a different amount of formula to top her up with as if they were plucking random numbers out of the air.

I found expressing really difficult. Neither breast yielded much, one more then the other.
The first few weeks when I wanted to be cosily nesting with my baby was just a hellish never ending cycle of futile expressing, washing up bottles and trying to breastfeed a very hungry baby. The cycle of triple feeding and recovering from a c-section just broke me. My husband and I were so miserable that we had a discussion about giving up on breastfeeding entirely and just giving DD formula. As a FTM I was just blithely following the advice of the midwives at the weighing clinic, and it just made me feel like I was a failure. One of them told me that if I wasnt able to breastfeed DD from each breast for half an hour by the time of her next weight check she would readmit her to hospital. At two weeks it was finally discovered that she also had a tongue tie!

Around the same time, a friend put me in touch with a lady who runs a breastfeeding group locally to me. I had a chat with her and she told me straight away to give up expressing milk. As she put it - “no machine will ever give what you can give your baby.” She told me just to go bed and stay there, put the baby in my nightie, concentrate on skin to skin and just let her feed as much as I could manage whilst carrying on with the top ups. I think she understood that I’d never really got a chance just to “be” with my baby.

Having the tongue tie cut and stopping expressing milk made massive difference to everything. From that point on I relaxed a bit and gave formula top ups and I breastfed. I really thought I’d cracked it. However DD’s weight was still not tracking along the percentile line. At this point our HV referred us to the breastfeeding service. The breastfeeding coach that came out to us told me to stop topping up after every breastfed but instead to give the top ups as two or three larger feeds during the day. That helped massively as it freed me up to focus on breastfeeding the rest of the time. She also showed me how to do breast compressions which helped DD take more. By this stage I’d become fixated on getting DD off formula as I was determined to EBF. She reframed my thinking entirely by telling me that my baby was EBF, she just got a couple of extra drinks every day. DD was about three months old by this point and realised that her tongue tie had reattached. This was cut again.

I also saw a private lactation consultant during this time who honestly gave me nothing useful, and I really wish I’d not spent the £100 I did on her.

By the time DD was four months we’d finally got into a rhythm and now she feeds really well. She has just turned a year and I am still breastfeeding her.

Another thing that massively helped was seeing a chiropractor who specialises in paediatrics. I think it’s called cranial osteopathy. He worked wonders on my daughter. He told me that when babies are tongue tied it affects the biomechanics of their jaws. He basically got her jaw working and her digestion working properly and that helped the feeding exponentially.

Other suggestions are making sure you eat lots and well. Oats are good as is fenugreek.

Whatever you decide to do, will be the right thing. It’s ok to decide to stop if that’s what you want to do and it’s ok to carry on if you want to. I’ve carried on combi feeding and it’s worked really well, but I still remember the hurt I felt in those early days which now seems so unnecessary. Sending you a massive hug.

Your experience sounds so similar to mine!

My baby lost a lot of weight by day 5 and we were re-admitted to hospital. We then topped up every feed and I began the dreaded 'triple feeding'. Anyway we quickly realised I couldn't pump 8 times a day, if I wanted any rest, so I did as many as I could (about 5 in the beginning). I used nipple shields, got a lactation consultant to check latch, positioning etc. she recommended a cranial osteopath.

We had about 5 sessions and my baby's feeding improved a little each time. There was no tongue tie. By month three I was ready to stop breastfeeding as she had dipped on her centile curve again. The week after she went up a bit higher than we expected. It was such an emotional rollercoaster! By month four we started reducing the top ups and she kept growing on her centile line. Anyway, we're month nine now, I'm still feeding her and she has a bottle of formula a day usually, as well as food, water etc.

Anyway...that's how it happened for me, but whatever you choose, don't feel guilty!

ScornedChicken · 02/01/2023 21:23

Sounds like you've tried so hard, which is admirable.

Wanted to put forward my own experience (might help, might not).

I had similar issues (wasn't taught correctly by midwife at the time, looking back the support was abysmal). DD didn't latch with enough nipple in her mouth. Each feed I was crying felt like glass cutting me. Ended up with massive black scabs on each nipple. I told the health visitor and she sent me to a special team who helped mums with latch. They taught me to press on my nipple and before baby went to feed I flicked nipple into her mouth. They also let her head tip back like a hinge motion (hard to describe). They also said she had some tongue tie and the GP said to leave it (must not have been that bad). I felt the day it stopped being painful was when she hit about 4mths (still not sure why).

I used to cry through feeds and my toes would be curling and I also had mastitis so not sure if that was a factor? I seemed to get a bit clogged. I just kept on and I'm a stubborn person and maybe not the wisest.

Do what ever feels comfortable for you and don't feel like you've failed in any way. Breast feeding is such a hard thing to do, so even if you felt you could do it for a short time, be proud you managed that. It's completely your call.

ShakeABake · 02/01/2023 22:11

When it comes to babies the single most important thing other than keeping them alive and healthy is your head space.

I FUCKING HATE BREASTFEEDING, I did it for 6 months as part of combi feeding with my first and this time around with my second, a stint in hospital for the baby forced my hand a little. It was the best decision I made. Pumping is like triple the work, you pump, you clean and sterilize the pump and then do all that for the bottle and then also have to feed the baby too.

As as another poster said, please do not feel guilty for how you feed your baby. There is a great meme I’ve seen that says something like, no one cares how you feed your baby, in a few years they’ll be eating McDonald’s fries they’ve dropped from the floor 😂

Breast milk is amazing IF YOU CAN DO IT AND YOU LIKE IT. Some mums power through not liking it and I am in awe of those, I am not one of those mums.

Also formula is life saving stuff if you read up on it’s history! Really made me respect formula feeding so much more than I did before (which was very narrow minded of me!).

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