? For mamas with newborns

[Kontessa]

How is nursing going?

I have had issues in the past, my babies fail to thrive around 3-4 months. Like my son though I am again having horrible pain from the get go. I think the latch is good but it must not be because it is not simply sore. Baby latches on and I sob. Shooting pain from nipple to my spin and makes my back spasm. It hurts so much and I remember it from the past and it is like reliving something traumatic. I dread it. I rather give birth every 2 hours then nurse. Of course nursing is best so that is what we I will do but it is just horrible. Thankfully LLL meeting this coming weekend.

I think part of the issue is that I have very large breasts and areola the size of babies head so there is no way to get it all in her mouth, not humanly possible! Midwife came by today and said she thinks the latch is good though maybe not as center as it could be. So will keep working on it. I try and ice my breasts a few times a day, it helps. My nipples are on fire all the time. Using Lanolin but that does not seem to help. Using SunnyDew drops (a kind of liquid stevia) my midwife swears by for early nursing moms, it helps cool them but still clearly having issues.

With getting supply issues later I know this can't help that you know? I just have to cry through it while trying to figure out what is going on.

Baby is over 72 hours old, so bring on my hormonal break down. At least this baby I am clearly crying over something rather than nothing!

[elyag]

I'm sorry you're going through that. I had some shooting, horrific pain like that when I was nursing my DD and I found out we had thrush issues. She had been put on abx after she was born and ended up with thrush, which she passed to me. It was my first time nursing so I figured that's just how nursing felt. You couldn't imagine my relief when I found out it was thrush that was causing that pain!

Not saying that's what it is, but I thought I would throw it out there. I hope it starts getting better for you.

[copperfox]

Hugs to you!

Have you looked through kellymom.com? There's some amazing resources there. I was addicted to that site when I was learning to BF my DD 3yrs ago. It's normal to have all your questions & to cry -- though I know that's no consolation -- but there are people to help you get through the difficult times.

http://www.kellymom.com/bf/start/basics/index.html

Take care.

[smlame]

Hang in there Mama! It's so hard to do something OVER and OVER that is just so painful! One idea I have for you is some cranial sacral for your babe. My first had that within her first five days of life due to her smooshed head from long labor in a not great position. I noticed almost immediate relief in my nipple soreness after that. I think if LOs have any "pressure" resulting from birth, it can manifest in sore nipples for the mama. The chiropractor I saw all during my pregnancy is the one who did the therapy. It was great.

I'll be hoping for relief for you very soon!

[Kontessa]

Midwife did Cranial Sacral two days ago. She is wonderful. That is something I have heard great things about.

Thrush.... Well nursing was hurting from the get go, making me think latch, but it is so much worse now. Three people now though have mentioned it and so I am now wondering. No signs of it baby and I don't seem to have any signs other than crazy pain. Any idea on how I should go about treating it just in case that is what is going on?

[Starfish11]

So sorry to hear you are experiencing this Must be so frustrating along with painful.

[Carliegirl]

Don't they say to use yogurt on your nipples if you have thrush?

[jecombs]

Don't have my newest LO here yet, but thought I'd chime-in anyway. Have you tried any nipple sheilds to help with the pain? I used them with my DD and they saved our nursing relationship! It no longer hurt to nurse and DD was able to get a good, deep latch. She weaned off the sheilds around 2 mo. old and we continued to nurse until a couple of months past her 2nd b-day. Here is what they look like and they are available at Target, though I got mine from my LC.

[elyag]

Originally Posted by Kontessa

Midwife did Cranial Sacral two days ago. She is wonderful. That is something I have heard great things about.

Thrush.... Well nursing was hurting from the get go, making me think latch, but it is so much worse now. Three people now though have mentioned it and so I am now wondering. No signs of it baby and I don't seem to have any signs other than crazy pain. Any idea on how I should go about treating it just in case that is what is going on?

We didn't have any signs except my DD being extra fussy and my pain. I tried yogurt and Genetian Violet but then I was told by my midwife at the time that if it's reached that point, it's in the milk ducts so those wouldn't help. I eventually had to do prescription medicine for both my DD and I since it can be passed back and forth. The relief we got from it was so amazing that I didn't even mind that it was a prescription medicine which I usually try to stay away from.

It got so bad towards the end, I even got a yeast infection. It was running throughout my body. It was horrible.

[thefreckledmama]

I'm having the same issues with pain that you are, Kontessa. I believe ours is from latch issues as well.

I only have pain the first 30 seconds or so of his nursing-but that pain is excruciating, and my nipples are sore even when he's not feeding. I think our issue is mostly that his mouth doesn't open as wide as it needs to when latching on, so he ends up kind of sucking my nipple in rather than putting his mouth around it, but we're working on it.

[NullSet]

My breasts and areola are pretty large too. I've had pain nursing for two babies and no pain for one. Dd is a little over a week and the pain has started to get better. It got steadily worse and I think got better as the scabs softened and fell off. I reposition when I feel latch is wrong but I'm sure I don't catch some times when it's not quite right. At this point I've accepted it as a grin and bear it type of thing. I make a whole bunch of horrible faces in the first 10 seconds and then it's fine. I know it ends eventually. I'm definitely on the down slope, I'm expecting the pain to be entirely gone by the end of this week. I'm just happy that she's nursing so well and is happy and satisfied.

Sorry I can't be more help.

[Kontessa]

I wish I could say it is just the first 30 seconds of crazy internal cussing pain, it just goes on and on.

I am thinking about trying a nipple shield, thank you for all the advice mamas.

Does anyone know if I could use the shield just a few feedings a day to help give my nipples time to heal? Or is it an all or nothing deal?

[jecombs]

You can use the sheild however you want, it just depends on what your LO will tolerate. My DD grew to really want the sheild for daytime feedings, but I could get away with not using it at night because she was so sleepy.

[Mosaic]

DD will be a month old tomorrow, and we're still in square 1 with nursing. I've worked with the midwives, an RN, two LCs, an ENT and am now working with a LC/speech pathologist/oral myofunctional disorder specialist.

She was tongue-tied and we had it clipped but she's stil not latching on correctly. Now we're on a therapy routine using the nipple shield, a paci, bottles, and more finger exercises to retrain her tongue movement, strengthen her suck, and save our nursing relationship.

WRT to nipple shield, you can use it for part of feedings or for only some of the feedings just to give yourself a break. That said, if nursing hurts for the entire feed, there's no way that the latch is good. If the latch is bad, then the milk doesn't come out the way it should, and that could be why you have supply issues at 3-4 months. Right now we all have good supplies due to hormones; but once the hormones wane and our milk is more supply/demand, the bad nursing habits we have established will come to light in the form of low supply and slow weight gain.

Hang in there, and seek out more help. Contact other LCs or ask for other experts if your midwife can't make any new suggestions.