Breastfeeding for beginners

[NaatQ968]

Hi! First pregnancy, really looking to breast feed, is there any decent simple blogs I can read or does anyone have any simple advice? I don't know the first thing about it so just looking for some help please if anyone can help❤️

You've probably seen this already: www.nhs.uk/start4life/baby/feeding-your-baby/breastfeeding/how-to-breastfeed/latching-on/

Don't be afraid to ask midwives for help when you're in the hospital. Some also have breastfeeding consultants who come around every day. For me it was way more helpful having someone right there and then, I'd watched videos etc beforehand... but real time guidance was invaluable for me. I asked for help several times and felt confident by the time I went home.

I'd recommend finding your local breastfeeding support group and asking if you can pop along before your baby arrives (I know our local one welcomes mums to be). You can ask all your questions, see babies feeding, and you have your contacts already there if you need ant support after your baby is born.

There are also some good articles and videos on the NCT website, like this one:
www.nct.org.uk/baby-toddler/feeding/early-days/breastfeeding-positions-which-are-best-for-you

Follow some people like Kathryn Stagg and Lyndsey Hookway on Instagram. Kathryn does a breastfeeding your baby week by week post which is amazing!

Watch YouTube videos! Google exaggerated latch.

A lovely old midwife gave me the best advice “ when they have their mouth wide open yelling just shove it in” your nipple of course. Also remember many videos and photos show older babies latched on. Newborns have tiny mouths so cannot fit the whole areola area in their mouths so don’t try.
They have tiny stomachs so feed little and often initially.
It can hurt like hell for the first month, just relax and it will get better.
You need space and time so work out when your baby doesn’t feed, they do give you downtime, and plan visitors during this time.

By a ring doorbell so that you don’t have people banging on the door for hours.
Prepare for a feed so that you have a drink, phone and TV remote on the same side as your free hand.
Smart phones and Alexa are your friends.

A useful tip is when you are positioning the baby (so they can tilt their head back and latch like a baby bird) that support you the bottom of the back of their head, so that your hand is in a v-shape, so as not to restrict them tilting their head back. Thus video is helpful

I don't want to scare you, but I struggled a lot with breastfeeding (also first baby). People keep saying to listen to the midwifes and nurses advice, but I thing they advice is the one that would work the best on paper, not in real life (every baby, every breast and every milk production is different).
My baby couldn't latch on my breasts ( I also wasn't sure how to do it properly) and ended up with blistered, bleeding nipples 12 hours after birth. I've asked the midwifes if I could use nipple shields (I had them in the hospital with me) as it was so painful, I could bearly breastfeed. They told me not to, as it will cause nipple confusion. My breast also got so filled with milk, it didn't help the breastfeeding. I also wanted to use breast pump ( also had it with me) but they told me again not to, as it will mess up the milk production. By the time I went home, my breast were so filled with milk and my nipples were so blistered, I couldn't breastfeed my baby. One day later my milk was gone complitely. Took me a 250£ electric breastpump and expressing milk every 2 hours in tears to make my milk supply to come back after 4 days. It was a very difficult time, I was blaming myself constantly that it will be my fault to not be able to provide my baby with breast milk.
Now she's 9 weeks old and we found a system what's works for both of us. I breastfeed at daytime using nipple shields, she gets the breastmilk from the bottle at night when I also pump after every feeding. She is gaining weight well and I also get the bonding time with her.
I guess all I'm saying I was very naive thinking breastfeeding will be easy. I'm sure it is for some, but I really wasn't prepared for all the difficulties.

Been exclusively breastfeeding for 2 months now! I had been collecting colostrum prior to the birth (as had Gestational diabetes). Baby latched on fine immediately after the birth and had a good feed. After that though, the first 12 hours were tough. He would latch, suck for a few seconds, then fall asleep. We think he was exhausted from the birth (it was a quick birth). The midwives had me collecting more colostrum through the night, which we syringe-fed to him instead. Finally at 5am, the morning after his birth, he latched and had a good long feed. We never looked back! So my advice is, keep persevering. It is hard at first. My nipples hurt and became scabbed in the first couple of weeks whilst we both got the hang of it. Use Lanolin cream to soothe your nipples. I attended a virtual breastfeeding course when pregnant - think this was useful

I watched a video on YouTube called Dr Newman’s visual guide to breastfeeding. It has really helped with our latch - I wished I’d watched it in pregnancy and maybe would have avoided the nipple trauma from initial bad latching!

Amy Brown's The Positive Breastfeeding Book is great.

Or see if your local branch of NCT does a course? I found that great!

These presentations are also brilliant in terms of an introduction.

www.youtube.com/channel/UCjxDyrZ92jcD00KB6oOpRJQ/videos

I didn’t know anything at all either and I found watching YouTube videos really helpful.

This one in particular was quite useful m.youtube.com/watch?v=dtO0KvF_d30

It can be tough at times. I know some aren’t but I found my health visitor to be really helpful with questions too. Have an 11 month old now and still BF :)

If you are on Instagram I really recommend Milk Making Mama - she gives brilliant advice and I found it very approachable / easy to engage with. Also agree a local breastfeeding group is worth their weight in gold if you have one and you’d be welcome in advance of the birth. I’m due #2 any day and going along to a La Leche League meeting this week to pick up the threads of people who can help.

Milk making mama is good on Instagram.

I think just the fact you're planning to do some research is a good start, I know so many people who didn't and assumed it would come naturally.

I'm pretty guilty of that too, definitely didn't do enough. There's a Jane the Virgin episode where she's learning to breastfeed and talks about shoving as much of her boob into the babies mouth as possible like a burger. That was my main aim 😅 luckily the midwives and neonatal nurses in the hospital helped a lot.

@Tina8800

I don't want to scare you, but I struggled a lot with breastfeeding (also first baby). People keep saying to listen to the midwifes and nurses advice, but I thing they advice is the one that would work the best on paper, not in real life (every baby, every breast and every milk production is different). My baby couldn't latch on my breasts ( I also wasn't sure how to do it properly) and ended up with blistered, bleeding nipples 12 hours after birth. I've asked the midwifes if I could use nipple shields (I had them in the hospital with me) as it was so painful, I could bearly breastfeed. They told me not to, as it will cause nipple confusion. My breast also got so filled with milk, it didn't help the breastfeeding. I also wanted to use breast pump ( also had it with me) but they told me again not to, as it will mess up the milk production. By the time I went home, my breast were so filled with milk and my nipples were so blistered, I couldn't breastfeed my baby. One day later my milk was gone complitely. Took me a 250£ electric breastpump and expressing milk every 2 hours in tears to make my milk supply to come back after 4 days. It was a very difficult time, I was blaming myself constantly that it will be my fault to not be able to provide my baby with breast milk. Now she's 9 weeks old and we found a system what's works for both of us. I breastfeed at daytime using nipple shields, she gets the breastmilk from the bottle at night when I also pump after every feeding. She is gaining weight well and I also get the bonding time with her. I guess all I'm saying I was very naive thinking breastfeeding will be easy. I'm sure it is for some, but I really wasn't prepared for all the difficulties.

This isn't helpful- it's a bit "I wasn't able to do it so that makes it impossible". I had about 100 stories just like this before I had DC1, everyone was trying to convince me not to do it. If it was so difficult in the majority of cases then you can be sure the human race would have been in trouble a very long time ago. Even now when I'm expecting DC2 people are trying to convince me that even though I was successful with BFing DC1 that I shouldn't bother attempt it- I apparently put too much pressure on myself, lost too much weight etc etc- I only exclusively BF until 6 months and stopped altogether at 8 (I plan on trying the same timeline with DC2), and never went back to my pre pregnancy weight so it's simply not true.

OP, I would suggest looking for a breastfeeding information course in your area before baby comes. I stayed away from La Leche League personally because I felt they were a bit puritanical for me but some people find them brilliant. My midwifery practice were running one so maybe ask local public health or at the GP.

Be prepared with your equipment. Bottles, sterilising equipment, nursing bras and other clothes, muslins, electric pump, hand pump, nipple shields, breast pads, nipple cream and hot water bottle- whoever said that breast feeding is low maintenance is a dirty liar .

Do your reading and you will learn that milk can take days after baby is born to come in- totally normal!! Baby's stomach is tiny and they will not starve. I have thought about looking into something called "colostrum harvesting" this time but haven't had a chance yet, might not do it though. Skin to skin is very important, I think attempting latching from the very beginning is essential but not necessarily with the view to feeding- remember baby has never actually ingested anything orally so will have to learn this.

Lastly be clear about what you want and let everyone around you and baby know exactly what that is- make sure your partner is up to speed and able to advocate on your behalf if necessary. Don't be pressured into anything, and take it easy on yourself too.

Congratulations and I wish you a model pregnancy

Still breastfeeding DS at 14 months and apart from an initial wobble in the first week, it’s been really straightforward and one of my favourite things about my first year of motherhood.

If you have big boobs, you may not be able to be “hands free”. I got myself quite worked up about having to hold my boob in place when everyone else seemed to be able to just plonk their baby on! In reality, the weight of 36KK boobs were never going to stay in his mouth.

I ended up having an oversupply so used a Hakkaa to collect from the other side and ended up donating over 5l to the milk bank.

We tried lots of different positions until we found what worked (and it was different for each side). A feeding pillow is invaluable. Thrupenny Bits was perfect for me as a tall mum with big boobs.

Ultimately the support is vital. I come from a family where no one ever breastfed and not many friends seemed to be able to breastfeed successfully so I went into it assuming that I wouldn’t be able to. Maybe that helped mentally, as I just took those difficult early days feed by feed and day by day until it got easier.

Wishing you lots of luck and support!

@44MollyRover I didn't try to convince her not to do it. The whole point of my post was that even if she can't do it for some reason straight away (as many of us can't) don't give up, find a way what's works the best insteaf; even if it's not the "ideal" only breastfeeding from the brests. I experienced a very hard time due to the wrong advices and the fact that noone talks about the difficulties as "it is not helpful".
And the "Do your reading and you will learn that milk can take days after baby is born to come in- totally normal!! Baby's stomach is tiny and they will not starve".: yes, milk doesn't come for days BUT colostrum is not always enough. My baby was starving so much on day 2 (she's been on my breast all the time, but still wasn't enough) that in a hospital they give her formula and she eat 150ml in one go! Some babies have more appetite than others, it is a very bad advice to give someone saying that whatever you produce should be enough; it's just going to make the mum feel horrible if it's isn't.

I didn't think your post was particularly helpful either @Tina8800, simply because I'm not sure what actual advice you were offering OP. Your summary of "don't be naive that it will be easy" isn't great - I think OP knows it won't be necessarily be easy, hence why she wants to research. I think @MollyRover was really just pointing out that tales of woe aren't useful. But I'm sorry you've had such a shit time.

Your own breastfeeding journey sounds typical of someone who didn't have the right support going into it or learning to do it. It's such a shame the NHS doesn't offer more. But it's a great cautionary tale on why the OP should indeed research as much as possible.

Hi,
I found it pretty easy. Not boasting, just not everyone struggles with it. I went in with the mindset, I'll give it a go but am happy to use formula. So low pressure. Then at a few months old I thought I can't imagine doing this if she had teeth and bites, if she bites I'll stop. She didn't bite so I kept it up for 2.5 years. I remember making sure the baby's head, shoulders and hips are in a straight line, and bringing the baby to the breast, not the other way around.

I found this book really helpful to make me feel more prepared. I also made contact with the local breastfeeding group who were really friendly and very helpful when I needed them. I found it fairly easy with my first. I think having realistic expectations helps, which is why the book helped I think.

www.amazon.co.uk/Food-Love-Formula-Successful-Breastfeeding/dp/0954930959?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

You've had a lot of great advice.
The only thing I'd say is that I was told by a nurse that the baby should feed every 2 hours or so to begin and if it was more then something was wrong.
Nonsense! It can feel like you have a baby constantly attached to you, especially when establishing feeding and during growth spurts. It's normal.
I had a little fold up table with drinks, snacks and everything I might need to begin. But once we got going I could basically go to the loo whilst feeding the baby if required 😄.
But! - don't worry too much about topping up with formula or if it doesn't work out...no one will know when they are 10 years old if they were bottle or breast fed. So much pressure when all you need to do is what is right for you and your baby.
Good luck. Even when it's 'straightforward' it isn't always easy..but it was worth it for me. And terribly convenient!

Hi OP. Good for you having a positive attitude to breastfeeding. Your determination will stand you in good stead!

If you ever wanted to ask an expert, Oxfordshire Maternity Voices Partnership support a weekly infant feeding Facebook live with the John Radcliffe Infant Feeding midwives. It’s on Thursdays at 2pm and they are excellent! There are many back episodes available on YouTube too: m.youtube.com/channel/UCvikHbQOhxxrdA04hMOjcrw/videos

Otherwise, my advice would be: Look up the flipple technique; get an oral assessment if you suspect tongue tie (and get ties cut privately for speed); make breastfeeding your full time job for the first few weeks; have a look at Lucy Ruddle and Lucy Webber’s material online for accessible information that you can process in a state of extreme sleep deprivation

Best of luck to you x

Not what you have asked but my most valuable piece of breastfeeding advice:

Buy some lansinoh nipple cream. Even if you have a good latch your nipples can get sore and this soothes and protects. You can use it before and after feeding and it's safe for baby. It's also good as a lip balm.

The things that helped me and I referred back to were:

Tummy to mummy.
Bring baby to the breast.
Be led by baby and feed on demand to establish supply.
Rub a little milk in to your nipples after each feed to help soothe and heal.
It WILL be toe-curling painful to begin with, but if you're prepared for that you know you can persevere past it.
You will both cry a lot in the early days, this is normal and it will pass.

I had great community midwives who were extremely supportive but also totally no-nonsense direct speaking Yorkshire women. Their clinics and post-natal groups were wonderful. Their honesty was much appreciated and it worked - it wasn't an easy start and my toes did curl, but I kept at it and one day it "clicked".

All the best OP!

Nature Bond do a 'haakaa' style expressing cup that my partner called grenades They were extremely useful in the first few weeks, I am so so glad I got them beforehand for many reasons. The first time my baby latched in hospital, he had an extremely powerful but slightly haphazard latch, which left a gouge down the middle of one nipple. I carried on but it got too painful, I was sobbing in pain as he tried to feed on that side. It left that breast out of service for days (which was the issue that led me to combi feed). I slathered it in the nipple cream but that didn't make a difference in healing it. I think I started putting the 'grendades' on by day 3, I think it took a couple of hours of the scab having milk flowing through/around it, and it was healed. No pain. It was fucking miraculous. Plus I saved up a lot of 'drip milk' so my partner could feed him when I was too exhausted.

Also if you keep putting the grenades on, you can see when your milk properly comes through.

I combi fed for the first 4 months, then switched to EBF and happily still BF at 7.5 months. If you feel you need to bottle feed occasionally, if you understand the mechanics of breastfeeding and the capacity of your own breasts, it doesn't necessarily mean your breastfeeding journey will prematurely end. It doesn't have to be one or the other. Read about 'the magic number' and long term milk production.

I think it's important to mention that there are people who have a certain breast type that should be discouraged from soldiering on with breastfeeding if it is not going well in those first few days. I think they're called tubular breasts. It's rare, but an important thing to know about if you have them and plan to breastfeed.