Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

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Re: Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

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.

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Re: Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

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.

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Re: Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

Hi OP with the things ur describing ur LC said, they might be adding to ur bf probs. Ok the breast pump ur talking about is electric so I guess the manual thingie wasn’t the issue. Do u use the pump long enough to get multiple let downs. Cuz if u get engorged and have an oversupply then it doesn’t make sense to be just getting an oz in there.

I have a few qs. Do u ever bottle feed? Does she cry after the bottle feed or feel better after it? How many oz do u make in the bottle. Does she finish it and seem like she could have drunk more if there was more in there?

If she’s drinking her fill from the bottle and sleeping longer after it till she cries again for another meal, that means she’s only crying cuz she’s hungry. I bottle fed my baby after the six week mark and she typically fed every 2 hours. That increases over the next few weeks to about 3 hours and stays that much for a long time (only bottle fed, if u breast feed only then ofcourse that time will be shorter). So if u bottle feed and she’s fine for the next 2-3 hours that means she was just crying cuz she was hungry. Now if colic is the problem then she’ll not really be consoled by milk and still continue to cry even if she’s had her fill. In fact if she’s colicy at that time she won’t want to drink at all. My daughter as a new born (7 days old) would not drink any milk for 6-8 hours straight no matter how much I tried, because she was in too much pain.

I know u PMd me for the colic massage but I’ll just write it down here so everyone can read it.

Ok this is the best way i can describe the colic massage. Imagine a clock on ur baby’s navel. U massage clockwise but first do a few strokes from 4-6. Then a few strokes from 2-6. Then next u do strokes going clockwise from 10-6. And then finally u can go all around from 7-6 clockwise all the way. The point here is that the way the colon is shaped it goes around clockwise (while looking at the baby) and ends at the rectum. So what u want to do is to get rid of the gas from the end first. Which is from 4-6. So ur starting with the bottom right quadrant of the abdomen area. Then next the top right part of stomach under the rib cage. Down all the way to just above the groin area. So 2-6 of the circle. Then assuming u have gotten the gas moved from that part. U move further back Into the shape of the colon. And go from 10 all the way down to 6. So from the top left part of the stomach right under the rib cage. All the way around clockwise back to the 6 position. Do this a few times. And then now finally u can go in circles. So starting from 7 and go all the way clockwise to 6. I wasnt doing it like this in the beginning. As soon as I started she became much better, and all her colic symptoms went away completely. And by colic symptoms i mean inconsolable crying for 6-8 hrs straight.

I recently gave these instructions to a friend of mine who had a 4 month baby now and he was crying a lot after every bottle feed (but better after every bf) and had bad reflux, was throwing up a lot, to the point where he would choke on it and would always have to be propped up and watched while sleeping. She tried everything else, home remedies, changing formulas and was even doing the regular tummy maalish with no results. She started doing this and within a day the crying went away and the vomitting changed to regular baby spit up ( milk was digested milk instead of coming out just as is, and he was not choking on it). I told her to do it twice a day, hardly takes 5 min each time, once before the first feed in the morning and once before last feed at night, it makes a world of a difference. ( You have to do it when the baby is relaxed and not crying, u can’t do it during a colic episode)

Btw this was an old friend from school who I hadn’t spoken to in a few years but I heard about her off and on from other friends I was in touch with. And I called her because I had a dream about her, that she was worried and in some sort of trouble. I tracked down her number and gave her a call. Everything seemed fine and we got talking about our babies and the conversation inevitably went to colic. That’s how I relayed her all this info. She later called to thank me after she tried the massage. She tried it after trying every other tip I gave her cuz generally ppl think that hours of crying is not going to go away with some magic massage. But I assure u that if it’s her tummy bothering her this will work iA. And apart from this if she’s crying then she just might be hungry or sleepy. I remember at some point my daughter started crying a lot at a moments notice. I would be thinking omg its the colic, I realized she was crying cuz she wanted to sleep! Go figure.

Also after i started doing the colic massage her colic completely disappeared to a point where I would think maybe she’s grown out of it and I don’t need to do it now. I missed one day and boy there was hell to pay for that night. I didn’t miss another day till she turned 6 months. Then I stopped and miraculously she had finally grown out of her colic. Whew! That was a really difficult time, and now I just try to pass on this info as much as I can. I know the massage description is a little confusing, but I have a short video that I made using a doll as a baby, so if anyone wants that u can msg me and I can send it to u. Hope it helps.

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Re: Need some encouragement,feeling so isolated

I also read up on block feeding (cuz ofcourse with a low milk supply it was not something that I needed to know while I was bf) and found this page had some interesting information.
Breastfeeding Reporter - Breastfeeding Reporter - Block Feeding Dos & Don’ts

"What seems to be more and more common, though, is the assumption that any struggle with milk flow is due to oversupply, when there is usually another cause. As a result, some mothers bring down their milk production with block feeding when their supply is actually at a healthy level, leading to other problems, such as slow weight gain.

As I told the mother this morning, during the early weeks, most newborns cough and sputter during breastfeeding some of the time. It takes practice and maturity for babies to learn to coordinate sucking, swallowing, and breathing during breastfeeding. Some episodes of milk flow struggles and pulling away are completely normal and are not necessarily signs of OALD or oversupply."

It also said to try feeding the baby while ur lying down and the baby is on top of u so milk is not flowing down hill into her throat and instead it will be up hill and she will have more control over it. It might help control the fast flow. Maybe u can give that a try. But apart from that it had the lip tie and tongue tie issues stated too so I don’t really know how much that could be adding to it. Why don’t u get her evaluated by the ped so atleast they can tell u how much it is effecting her. I think the LC might also be saying that cuz thats the only other thing she can say with ur bf issues. The surgery can’t be performed here but it will still give u some info on what the prob might be. And if it’s just oversupply then really look into renting a hospital grade pump (maybe they do that there) and reduce ur on the breast time and replace with some bottle fed bm feeds. Even with ur current breast pump keep it on for longer like 15 min and u might get multiple let downs and more milk out. It will give u some time of and part of ur sanity back.