eczema and bleeding

I have had nipple eczema.

Coupled with the mastitis, I would wager that your problems may be more due to a less-than perfect latch than the mastitis. For a lot of mums, eczema on the nipples doesn't occur til solids are introduced IE there is food other than breastmilk in baby's mouth that gets left on your nipples.

Working on your latch will help minimze any pain you may be feeling, help nipples to heal up, and prevent further sores even if you skin is tender with the eczema. Do you have a bfing clinic or LLL meeting where you can get some hands on help with your latch?

Stay away from Lansinoh or other lanolin nipple ointments, as lanolin is usually irritating to eczema. There is a good homeopathic ointment called Unda 270 that is helpful and should be safe for baby - check with your ND (I used it when my DD was over a year).

I have that fair sensitive type skin too and am prone to eczema and skin problems of all sorts. Nursing - had problems with both my babies. To cut a long story short, treatments I used to combat thrush and nipple trauma (my dd had a high palate and was hard to nurse) seemed to aggravate my skin more. I developed some kind of contact dermatitis from using thrush topical treatments (even GSE). I had to stop using anything. Actually I cheated and still used a bit of Newman's APNO as I was in so much pain. I even popped the occasional Percocet it was so painful. But in the end it cleared up. With my dd (with the high palate), it took 4 mo to get to exclusive nursing and 6m before I was totally pain free. With my ds (he was 1 mo early and in NICU getting bottles), it took 6w to get to exclusive nursing and about 3mo before I got to pain free.

I bet you have fair skin! And if you have red hair, it's apparently even worse.

BTW I don't think a little blood in the milk will hurt baby.

You could try pumping again. How long since you've nursed? Both my kids were easier to nurse as they got older cause their mouths were bigger. That was one of my problems - getting a good latch.