Blood when expressing

[Herefordeals]

Hello,

I'm new to MN having read many threads over the past couple of years. If I'm putting this in the wrong place forgive me!

Issue is, I've been exclusively expressing for the past 11 months. Had one bout of mastitis in that time which cleared with a course of antibiotics and apart from that, I've been relatively lucky (apart from the endless steralising, planning and time spent expressing!).

Yesterday I expressed when I woke up and the milk was a dark pink colour with blood visible on the machine. I had no pain/symptoms of mastitis so took it easy on that side for the rest of the day and hoped it was a one off. This morning the same thing has happened but on the other side. No obvious cracks, no pain, never had this before and supply seems to be normal.

I had covid for the first time a week ago and supply dropped during that time but ironically, today it seemed to have improved again (minus the blood!).

Anyone had this or able to share some wisdom? I already feel like a bit of a failure for not being able to breastfeed normally and this is panicking me that my days of being able to feed baby are numbered.

There's likely a crack you just can't see. It's fine to give to the baby - if they were breastfeeding directly you wouldn't have even known there was any blood in there. I do appreciate it doesn't feel right though (I used to pump as couldn't get my sons to latch) I remember sobbing when I saw the pink milk in the bottles. But I was also in agony expressing, so that didn't help!

Get yourself some nipple cream and hopefully that will help!

Well done for expressing for this long!

Ps you are NOT a failure! 11 months is amazing. I managed 6 weeks exclusively expressing and a further 6 weeks mixed with my eldest. My second I did BF for 6 weeks but hated every second of it, it was so painful. I then expressed for 5-6 weeks. With my third when he wouldn't latch I went straight to bottle as I couldn't do that again.

Thanks for your message! Got some Lasinoh today but just seems so strange that it happened on one side yesterday, then this morning the other side, after 11 months of never happening before! No pain and expressed an hour later and no sign of any blood. Weird!
Feel slightly relieved by your experience too - Dr Google had me in a panic about it.

I think us mums put too much pressure on ourselves when it comes to feeding!