Rough start

"Dan Kegel" wrote in message
news:Ztk_a.132604$Ho3.16966@sccrnsc03...
Hi folks! I'm a freshly-minted dad. My son is just five days old,
and breastfeeding has been an adventure already.
He was delivered via (unplanned) c-section, and
the first chance to try breastfeeding was 18 hours
or so after delivery. Not much went on that first day.
The second and third day it became clear he really wanted
to eat, and he spent a lot of time at the breast.
The hospital's lactation consultant suggested using
a nipple shield temporarily since my wife's nipples seemed
flat and ds was having trouble latching on.
On the fourth day we went home from the hospital,
and ds was increasingly lethargic, wouldn't wake for
his evening feeding. We think he was dehydrated even
though he had produced five wet diapers that day.
Also, we were having trouble with painful and bleeding nipples.
We called the pediatrician, who advised us to
come in to meet with a nurse practitioner / lactation expert
the next day, and to get through the night,
use a pump and feed him from a bottle, then give him formula
if he wanted more.
The nurse had us try latching him on asymetrically,
with more of the lower aeriola in his mouth than the upper aeriola,
and feeding suddenly became about half as painful.
He also seems to be getting more milk.
We're back to breast only and no pump, at least for
now, and have another appointment with the nurse tomorrow.

So that's how things stand on day five. Wish us luck!
- Dan


Welcome and congratulations.
I'm not much help on the bf problems that your wife has had, but others here
are experts in the area. I can just repeat that which was said to me before
I gave birth to our DD almost 1 year ago .... "it gets easier with time".
This was so true for us and I hope this will also be the case with you
..... and for the record it was only on day 5 that I realised that I didn't
need a midwife to latch DD onto me every single feed and I could in fact do
this bf thing OK by myself.
I will however, suggest that you try and stick with the bf and limit the
bottles as much as possible to avoid nipple confusion.
Cheers
Amanda

I'm sorry to hear about the difficult start, but am glad you
have things back on track. Stay subscribed to this newsgroup
and post if you have any problems.

Good luck,
Larry

Dan Kegel writes:
: Hi folks! I'm a freshly-minted dad. My son is just five days old,
: and breastfeeding has been an adventure already.
: He was delivered via (unplanned) c-section, and
: the first chance to try breastfeeding was 18 hours
: or so after delivery. Not much went on that first day.
: The second and third day it became clear he really wanted
: to eat, and he spent a lot of time at the breast.
: The hospital's lactation consultant suggested using
: a nipple shield temporarily since my wife's nipples seemed
: flat and ds was having trouble latching on.
: On the fourth day we went home from the hospital,
: and ds was increasingly lethargic, wouldn't wake for
: his evening feeding. We think he was dehydrated even
: though he had produced five wet diapers that day.
: Also, we were having trouble with painful and bleeding nipples.
: We called the pediatrician, who advised us to
: come in to meet with a nurse practitioner / lactation expert
: the next day, and to get through the night,
: use a pump and feed him from a bottle, then give him formula
: if he wanted more.
: The nurse had us try latching him on asymetrically,
: with more of the lower aeriola in his mouth than the upper aeriola,
: and feeding suddenly became about half as painful.
: He also seems to be getting more milk.
: We're back to breast only and no pump, at least for
: now, and have another appointment with the nurse tomorrow.

: So that's how things stand on day five. Wish us luck!
: - Dan

Dan Kegel wrote:
On the fourth day we went home from the hospital,
and ds was increasingly lethargic, wouldn't wake for
his evening feeding.

Day 8 or so, and he seems to be establishing a bit of
a pattern. (We've been keeping a diary so we can tell.)
He'll sleep for 4-5 hours between feedings
at night or after a particularly traumatic session,
otherwise it's 2-3 hours.
Our lactation consultant is having us try a supplemental
breastfeeding system (fancy name for a canteen of formula
around mom's neck and a tiny sillicone tube held to the
nipple), which when we can get him latched on does seem
to work as advertized; he gets breast milk from the nipple
and formula from the tube at the same time.
Mom and baby are having to be very patient with the latchon
problem - sometimes it takes many, many tries, and getting
frustrated just makes it worse.
Anyway, we can tell from our log that ds is definitely
getting enough to eat, so we're trying not to freak about
the 5 hour sleeps.

BTW we have new Fischer-Price baby monitors which work well,
but I noticed something interesting: periodically I got
horrid interference, and I tracked it down to a cellphone
power brick (not even plugged in to a cellphone!) plugged
in to the same outlet. Removing the power brick solved
the interference. (I considered complaining to Sprint about
their noisy power brick, but figured posting on Usenet would
be more useful...)
- Dan

For me pumping daily helped early on to stretch out my flat nipples
which in the long run made things better. Perhaps that could help
your wife too.

KC


Dan Kegel wrote in message ...
Dan Kegel wrote:
On the fourth day we went home from the hospital,
and ds was increasingly lethargic, wouldn't wake for
his evening feeding.

Day 8 or so, and he seems to be establishing a bit of
a pattern. (We've been keeping a diary so we can tell.)
He'll sleep for 4-5 hours between feedings
at night or after a particularly traumatic session,
otherwise it's 2-3 hours.
Our lactation consultant is having us try a supplemental
breastfeeding system (fancy name for a canteen of formula
around mom's neck and a tiny sillicone tube held to the
nipple), which when we can get him latched on does seem
to work as advertized; he gets breast milk from the nipple
and formula from the tube at the same time.
Mom and baby are having to be very patient with the latchon
problem - sometimes it takes many, many tries, and getting
frustrated just makes it worse.
Anyway, we can tell from our log that ds is definitely
getting enough to eat, so we're trying not to freak about
the 5 hour sleeps.

BTW we have new Fischer-Price baby monitors which work well,
but I noticed something interesting: periodically I got
horrid interference, and I tracked it down to a cellphone
power brick (not even plugged in to a cellphone!) plugged
in to the same outlet. Removing the power brick solved
the interference. (I considered complaining to Sprint about
their noisy power brick, but figured posting on Usenet would
be more useful...)
- Dan

KC wrote:
For me pumping daily helped early on to stretch out my flat nipples
which in the long run made things better. Perhaps that could help
your wife too.

We considered it, and I think we tried it once or twice,
but as it turns out, her nipples pop out pretty well once
ds has been trying to nurse for a minute. (They're quite
sensible, it seems; they only pop out when needed.)

We're making great progress. The SNS (supplemental nursing system)
appears to have given us the couple days of practice we needed
without starving ds or interfering with mom's milk supply,
and ds isn't doing the five hour comatose daytime sleeps anymore.
Mom has graduated to using the SNS without the tape -- it was just
getting in the way. She noticed something interesting:
the little SNS tube acts like a kind of nipple shield;
her nipple isn't as sore when she's using it.

All in all it looks like we got lucky. Hope the good luck keeps up.

- Dan