Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

[Zayash]

Re: Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

@Sasha21

OP ur description of being hungry and latching and pulling back and crying and then relatching reminds me of my bf days. I think ur oversupply is not as much of an issue as the fast flow is. I had the same prob with my daughter but the difference is my milk supply was not great at all. How I know about the flow being too fast is from pumping. And for some reason the flow was really fast on one side and slower on the other side. So when this whole crying episode and latching relatching thing was going on, if I fed her from the other side she would stop crying. Sadly that side also had lower milk supply so she would still end up hungry.

My mom gave me a tip for fast flow that helped while feeding from the fast side. Instead of her clamping tight and causing u pain, u should hold ur breast and apply that pressure yourself. You have to hold it in such a way do that u are cupping the breast and the nipple is between ur middle finger and ring finger (or index and middle, whatever is more comfy), and ur also pulling back ur breast a bit. So slight clamp down pressure from the fingers, and pull back pressure from ur hand. That slows down the flow and it would help my baby feed from the fast side. So like two fingers on each side of the nipple, and put just enough pressure that doesn’t make u uncomfortable. It definitely slows the flow and i really think it will help. Your good supply of milk is a blessing so plz don’t get discouraged by the fast flow, because once ur baby is a little older she’ll be able to handle the faster flow and u won’t have to do anything.

Also invest in a better pump, do u have an electrical pump or a manual one. The manual ones are just to help with engorgement cuz they’re practically useless if ur actually trying to fill bottles. My friend had a good milk supply and ebf her baby, she tried the manual pump and could hardly get anything out after pumping for 5 min. And with the electric pump she could fill up a bottle in less than 10 min.

If ur not sure if you’ll last with the bf, and ur in the US, the hospitals there also rent out breast pumps to patients on a monthly basis. They are high quality pumps and are good with keeping ur supply up even if u decide to only express and feed the breast milk to ur baby. And when u have expressed bm then someone else can also feed the baby so u can take a break. And also bottle feeding is faster than bf. So give it a try if it’s possible to get a hospital grade electric. Breast pump. If u have any questions feel free to MSG me. Also if ur baby has colic I know a great tummy massage that has helped everyone I ever told about it (after they had tried everything else), babies with reflux as well.

Hey thanks Sasha 21 for your message.
Im still bfing my now 10 week old daughter.
The constant feeding hasnt stopped. I asked the lactation consultant to come for a home visit last week and she said her latch is shallow because of a posterior tongue tie plus an upper lip tie. She also gave me the good news that nobody will snip it in our area ( I’m in Scotland) and that I’ll need to get it done privately. The services are only available in England and at the moment I dont think I can make 5-6 hours long journey for something that has 60-70% chances of success.
I bought the medela swing but to be honest with the constant feeding, I hardly get time and energy to pump.

I think Im slowly getting my sanity back. She still screams a lot but now i don’t run around like a manic to try and stop her from crying.
I take a deep breath, drink some water and then try the consolation. Which works most of the times.
But still do have those days ever so often when I look at her screaming and wonder when will it ever get better!

Ps Ive sent you a pm.