3 day old first born - baby blues

[TLH0307]

Hello. I feel so bad posting this I’m sat here in tears. My fiancé is so supportive but I don’t want to burden him because he’s doing such a fantastic job already supporting me and baby.

I just don’t feel like I’m doing a good job. I’ve just had the midwife round and I’ve so far had two nights at home with baby - both completely sleepless after spending 5 hours straight breastfeeding and being unsure whether she was getting enough. Anyway it turns out she has been getting enough (lots of dirty nappies). I can’t carry on breastfeeding and I’ve discussed it with my MW who understands my reasons, I’ve been feeding through bleeding nipples (I know everyone else has but personally it’s left me feeling useless and depressed), and I’d rather see feeding as a time to hold my baby and bond not hold my baby and cry and be filled with dread about the next feed. I feel useless that I’ve not been able to continue Bf and that I couldn’t settle her before I gave in and gave her her first formula feed this afternoon. She was straight to sleep after that and settled so well.

Has anybody been in a similar boat? I know this post is probably all over the place and confusing. But I just want to know I’m not alone in feeling so down and like I’m messing up.

Day 5 for me.

I'll never forget it as long as I live.

Could you try combination/pumping? I BF and combination fed for 7 months (and only stopped because DM was dying and I wasn't able to feed enough). Take all the help you can get.

Big hugs.... it's so hard and no matter what you think, this isn't you - it's 100% down to hormones.

You won't regret not breastfeeding! You'd regret spending your first few weeks upset and crying though. I had twins and tripped to breastfeed but couldn't in the end. I was so upset for a day. Then I started bottle feeding and it changed my whole outlook. Thank God we have options these days! Enjoy your baby and feed her whatever way makes you happier. That's the most important thing.

It really saddens me that ff is seen as such a ‘do it it’s great’. Yet you aren’t allowed to say the same of bf.
It’s not great - it’s a major cause if p n d. It has long term health implications for both baby and Mum. Support the op - but don’t lie to her. All those who are saying just ff it’s fine you are lying, I’m sure, if you say you have never felt a twinge of guilt about it.
Ff entirely is NOT the right thing for her baby. It needs the nutrients and compounds in breast milk which simply don’t exist in formula milk which is primarily dried whey and synthetic vitamins.
The op needed sleep and support. Surely the best thing would have been to give a few bottles, give her nipples a rest and continue bf once or twice a day - then hopefully building it back up a bit once she was finding it easier. Nipple shields can offer great short term relief too.
Everyone feels shit on day 3 (hormones) and many many people find bf hard initially.it gets easier!

OP I just came on here to echo what (almost) everyone else has said. Ignore rainbows “advice”- you do what is best for you and for baby! If that’s formula feeding then that’s fantastic!!

I’m currently 3 days postpartum and feeling a little weepy too. I’m lucky in the respect that breastfeeding seems to be ok with my nipples (for now! Let’s not be naive pattern!!) but I’m fully prepared to embrace whatever happens with regard to feeding my baby. At the end of the day so long as baby is fed and happy and you are feeling happier then you’re doing the most amazing job!! Enjoy squishy baby cuddles- you’ve waited a long time for them after all!!

How are you doing op? Be kind to yourself and be honest with your health visitor when she comes (next week?).
You're doing brilliantly!

I just can’t equate how many people pile on to say ff it’s fine with the hoards and hoards of people who then pile on to other boards to say how they bitterly regret not bf and how much it affected their mental health later on.
Sigh - I give up. Don’t even consider mix feeding op - ff ‘it’s fine’ you’ll feel amazing, raising a newborn will suddenly seem easy, it’s the best possible thing for their health long term, you’ll never regret it.
Good luck!

I easily mix fed.

I’m very glad I didn’t have you on my thread telling me my body would think my baby had died when I was struggling second time around

Totally agree with this.

FF is not a magic pill but jumping on here and having big claims like radiator mentions (from PP) is NOT HELPFUL and I agree with radiator to some extent in that there is no right or wrong.

OP I hope things are getting easier. Big hugs x

I've reported Rainbow's post. Ffs.

Pipe down, Rainbows... please don't put pressure on other people to follow your own ideals.

You're doing great, OP. It all gets easier.

It's people like Rainbows that made me feel like a terrible mother when I couldn't breast feed my twins.

See this is the problem. Why have I been reported. It’s ok for you to all encourage to ff - but not me to mix feed or bf?
My concern is that a lot of people she may later feel she didn’t have enough support or help to keep bf and later feel worse about it.
It’s nothing about my own ideals- I took bottles and formula into the hospital for my second child when she was born having struggled massively with my first. I only kept feeding my first after a lot of support and people pointing out to me it was ff or bf - there is a way in the middle to do both.
Encouraging someone to give up bf after 3 days is really worrisome in my opinion. She needs to know there’s support and other options for her. Not just ‘right let’s just ff then’.
And clearly if you were all super happy to ff and had no long term guilt or issues over it then you wouldn’t be feeling bad by my comments!!!

And grumpy you pipe down - you are encouraging the op to follow your ideals

Wasn’t not was

Saying to the mum of a newborn that her body will think her baby has died is a truly awful thing to say. Regardless of your opinions on bf/ff or mixed feeding, if you can't see how horribly insensitive a thing that is to say to a new mum then I'm not sure there is much point in engaging in conversation. We all have anxieties over how we parent, and we all do the best we can for our kids and ourselves. We all need support to be able to do that. Jumping up and down on someone's perfectly reasonable choice and invoking the image of a dead baby is neither helpful or supportive. It's just cruel.

And for what it’s worth ouch - how you feel about my comments says more about you than me.
But I would have formula or mix fed twins too - I cannot possibly imagine bf two exclusively.

I wasn’t trying to be insensitive - rather the opposite - that it was her hormones kicking in and making her feel shit, as nature would be expecting her to be feeding her baby and lack of feeding would signal to body there is no baby hence dry up your milk please. Hormones go haywire when you stop feeding.

But my hormones didn't go haywire when I stopped trying to feed! Quite the opposite in fact. And it wasn't a choice not to breastfeed... My twins were born 7 weeks early and spent 3 weeks in the SCBU and despite pumping around the clock my body only produced a tiny amount and then stopped completely.
You're right though, my reaction to your comments do say more about me than you, because I was desperately upset and guilty that I couldn't feed them myself, so much so that I felt like a failure. It was only the people around me who persuaded me that formula feeding was perfectly fine who made me feel more cheerful about things. Fast forward ten years and I have tall, slim, healthy girls who are never sick. I think that is what is important in the long run.

Yes - agree. But will the op feel the same? Her circumstances are different - she does produce milk, her baby was getting enough but she had bleeding nipples and was exhausted. Imo mix feeding would/could be a good option in the short term to enable the benefits of both ff and bf. Ff is perfectly fine - but am I really such a demon for trying to support bf or mix feeding after 3 days so the op can feel like she’s got choices - it’s not bf and have bleeding nipples and poor mental health or ff exclusively

most peoples hormones go haywire when they stop bf - you then feel better physically usually once you’ve stopped but it takes a couple of weeks for hormones to settle and for milk to stop

Rainbows, when in a hole, stop digging.
What I objected to was your extraordinary comment about, well I'm not going to repeat it.

Bog off footle. People are allowed different opinions to you.
It’s not an exteroidary comment - perhaps if you had bf then you would actually know about the practicalities of stopping!!
It’s never a good idea to exclusively bf then stop abruptly for mum or baby. It’s always much better to stop slowly.

@Rainbowsandflowers78 I had to stop breastfeeding my baby last week. I spent a week desperately trying. I hired a private lactation consultant who essentially said that the combination of my baby's small mouth / short tongue, her size, and my breasts / nipples meant that it would be 'extremely difficult' for the first six to eight weeks until she got bigger. This was on top of a traumatic C-Section with 2 extra hours of surgery afterwards meaning I didn't get to see or hold my baby for 3 hours after she was born. And yet I still kept trying. I tried after 72 hours of constant feeding and not single a moment of sleep. I tried when I was hallucinating and trying to put my pillow into the cot because I was convinced it was the baby. I tried even after we had to take her to A&E because she was starving and dehydrated. I kept trying until I eventually managed to admit to my husband that I was making plans to kill myself and he called the midwife who took one look at me and told me to stop and switch to formula feeding. I have no doubt that she saved my life.

You don't know why women choose to formula feed. You don't know what they go through to make that decision. But I've told you now what I went through. Do you still think it's okay to tell me that my body thinks my baby's died? Because I can tell you that DESPITE the damage done to the bonding process thanks to the trauma of trying and failing to breastfeed, my uterus still contracts when she cries. I still get a rush of oxytocin when I hold her close and feel her skin against mine. I still wake immediately knowing what she needs from the smallest snuffle. I am far from being a perfect mum but my body responds to my baby.

Peach - please stop making me out to be a demon - I’m not. I came on here to give the op support.
Your experience with your first was like mine. I had the hallucations from exhaustion too. My baby wouldn’t latch, wouldn’t sleep, we had to syringe and cup feed her formula (advice of midwives I’ve no idea why they didn’t advise a bottle. Like you we also hired a lactation consultant who also said I’d likely never be able to feed with this baby. But then we tried nipple shields and somehow it worked enough for me to feed her like that. Although she still never slept, had colic probably from all the air in shields, had slowish weight gain. I fed every 3 hours for about 6 months. It was crippling. Hence why I said i went into hospital with formula for my second, who then randomly latched straight after birth and fed like a dream with zero issues. That is until she got very sick from a virus and was on life support in intensive care - obviously I couldn’t feed her then and for a day my boobs went crazy. I then pumped exclusively every 3/4 hours whilst she was in intensive care (believe me not easy - we were all over the place and upset and zero sleep wondering if she was going to survive) and by a miracle when she came off life support she tentatively was able to start bf again alongside tube feeding top ups of expressed milk. We reesrablished bf with no tube feeds after about a week. That was hard as medical staff preferred me to ff her to know her fluid intake etc.
Everyone has their own story and own struggles.
If you want to ff that’s fine. But if you want to bf and you’re struggling like the op you need as much support as possible. Yes ‘permission’ to switch to ff is part of that (although you don’t need it) but it’s importanr to think of all aspects. My point was if she gave up after 3 days she might longer term have regrets that she could have continued on a bit longer. In your case surely now you can think well I’ve done everything I can.

And I think it’s important actually for people to know how hard breastfeeding is and how much of a struggle some people find it as then maybe people like the op wouldn’t be sat there thinking she’s not good enough cos she’s finding it painful and she’s exhausted. We should be able to discuss these things without people getting upset. Surely more support for new mums is just needed all round? In our parents day new mums were kept in hospital for a week to give them support - wish this could be reintroduced!