I need your help PLEASE! He won't latch and I don't know what to do
I am at my witts end here. My son is 12 days old and we've been having feeding problems from day one. He was born tongue-tied and that made it incredibly painfull to nurse and he wasn't getting enough to eat. I saw a lactation consultant and had his tongue-tie fixed when he was 6 days old, and things seemed to get better. Now they're worse. For the last two days he is refusing to latch on. I offer it to him and get everything positioned like I should, and he puts his mouth around my nipple but won't latch down on it. He just has his mouth open around it and screams and shakes his head back and forth. I will try for 15 or 20 minutes and he just screams and shakes his head and refuses to latch on. I've been pumping and giving that to him in a bottle since he obviously has to eat, and supplementing with formula when I don't have enough breastmilk. I just tried again to feed him and the same thing happened. He refused to latch down and just screamed and shook his head back and forth. I don't know what to do. I don't want to give up on breastfeeding, but it's so discouraging I'm not sure how to get him to latch back on again. I go back to work in a month so I want to breastfeed him as much as possible beforehand. Do you ladies have any advice or words of wisdom to help me and my little man have a better nursing experience? Please. I don't know what else to do :(
He is getting close to his 3 week growth spurt and this is normal behaviour when a growth spurt is arriving.Stop with the bottles and formula as well,this may be causing more of a problem.Nipple confusion,just keep giving him the breast and do not giving him anymore bottles,baby will learn that is all he is getting.
Awww.....you sound like a good mama for still hanging in there!! Just keep pumping to keep your supply up. If your son is only 12 days your supply is still probably trying to get adjusted. Another thing you could try is to try bf him while he is very sleepy and not starving. Has he ever latched on good? What about diff positions? I know you have prob tried all of this but maybe it will be of some use to you. GL! I am still bf my son who is 14 months old and some of it has been trying!!
You're describing nipple prefrence to a T. Beating it requires dumping bottles. Make sure you're trying to latch at the FIRST sign of hunger, and express a little milk before latching.
NO bottles.
He doesn't have very much awake time that is quiet. He's either sleeping, or he wakes up crying for food so I have to try to calm him down before he eats. Him refusing to latch on just started up two days ago out of the blue, I'm not sure why. I have all-day school once a week and can't have him there with me so he has to have bottles once a week. Up until now it's never been a problem with him going back and forth between bottle and nipple. I called a lactation consultant at the hospital where I delivered him and I'm waiting on a call back, maybe I can get an appointment in with them and they can help too. Thank you all for the advice, and I watched some of the youtube videos, they were really helpful! I bookmarked the page.
Quoting gdiamante:
You're describing nipple prefrence to a T. Beating it requires dumping bottles. Make sure you're trying to latch at the FIRST sign of hunger, and express a little milk before latching.
NO bottles.
YEP its nipple preference and growth spurt, cut bottles..have caregiver give him syringe of milk or finger feed or even use a sippy with no valve but NO more bottles..only offer the breast when youa re home, he will eat becuase he knows how to eat give him no option
the first thing i thought was "thrush" perhaps he has a yeast infection in his mouth and it makes it painful for him to nurse.
the second, if he takes bottles fine but doesn't want to nurse, perhaps you have an overactive let down, that gags him when he tries to eat. does your milk come out forcefully? when he did nurse, did he seems to gag or choke while eating? you could try pumping a little bit until you get let down, and then nurse him, because your supply will be slower
i agree to dump the bottles and the formula, those will do nothing but hinder your breastfeeding relationship
In ER with baby
- triforcechick
on Mar. 13, 2010 at 2:20 PM