Diary - the first month
On the 6th day my milk came in and Tom started latching on consistently.
This was a huge relief, and the engorgement was not as painful
as people had described.
A week later all of the nipple pain started, and although a nurse
recommended pumping and bottle feeding as a solution, it actually
hurt more to pump that to just nurse.
I tried ointments and medicated gel pads but they sting and were
inconvenient. A few days later my nipples were bleeding and really
painful. Ice was the only thing that helped me, or a frozen damp
rag.
A great interview on the La Leche site said that if you get your
nipple tip into the babies mouth back far enough - past his hard
pallet - this pain will be avoided!
That pain lasted about a week, which was really rough mainly
because I wanted nursing to be a great bonding loving experience
but I was flinching and just not enjoying it.
After that week was over nursing went quite well! Our pediatrician
suggested that I 'supplement' with some formula, just to make
sure Tom was getting enough to eat, even though our pediatrician
had weighed Tom before and after nursing and concluded that he
was getting adequate food. We did supplement nightly,
and my production seemed to go down, and Tom seemed frustrated
sometimes when nursing. I became concerned about whether I was
feeding Tom enough. This concern and frustration grew as time
went by and it was not until Tom was 2 months old and I had had
enough weirdness around nursing and stopped supplementing that
breastfeeding really felt like it was working naturally.
Now Tom is 8 months old and still nursing well. He gets too interested
in the world to nurse when we're out, so I give him a bottle when
we go anywhere. He also eats 'solid food' twice a day.
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