First Year Check In + Chatter 2/1-15

[lily]

How old is your LO?

Are you nursing, pumping, supplementing? How’s it going?

0-3 mo
Nursing in public: questions, experiences, anecdotes?


4-8 mo
If you’ve introduced solids, how is LO doing?
If you haven’t, how do you feel about introducing?

If you’ve returned to work, how is that transition going?


9-12mo
What’s your favorite tip for dealing with a hungry yet distractible baby?



Questions/AW?

[lily]

k congrats on your new LO! Replying over here so I don’t bump last month’s thread. I hope things are getting better. Sounds like you could definitely benefit from some in person help- have you looked for your local La Leche League group and/or an IBCLC? La Leche League provides free support by accredited Leaders. IBCLC is international board certified lactation consultant: the gold standard for lactation medical professionals.

www.llli.org/get-help/

uslca.org/resources/find-an-ibclc

That said, for deeper latch have you tried laid back positioning? Get comfortably leaned back- a recliner or propped up with pillows on a bed or couch, then put baby tummy to tummy against you so her whole front is against yours. Let his cheek rest on your bare breast, and see if she’ll latch. She may find her way to the nipple; you may prefer to assist her. Gravity will help her get and maintain a deeper latch.

breastfeedingusa.org/content/article/some-ins-and-outs-laid-back-breastfeeding

I like the “flipple technique”



General latch tips - I keep this saved on my phone so sorry it refers to LO with male pronouns:
Make sure LO has room to tilt head back when accepting breast. Tickle his nose with your nipple until he opens wide. Push your breast into his mouth and roll your nipple in last. He should have a big mouthful of breast, and your nipple should be aimed at the roof of his mouth. It's an offset latch, not directly centered on your nipple/areola. Make sure baby's nose is clear to breathe, which it should be if he tilted his head back to accept breast. Look at lips. They should be flanged outward over your breast, not tucked in. LO will have his tongue out over his gums; you may be able to feel it on the underside of your nipple, especially as he gets things situated in his mouth before settling in to nurse.

I found it helpful to think of pushing on LO's chin with the underside of my breast when he opened wide, to keep his mouth open as I rolled breast & nipple into mouth. Your partner might can help hold chin in open position. It's okay to need 4 hands to latch at first, if 4 hands are available.

Some women find holding boob like a sandwich can help LO get an appropriate mouthful when they are still small. If you have inverted nipples, this may cause your nipple to retreat further into your breast, which isn't ideal. If cradle or cross cradle is giving you issues, try football or laid back.

Make sure LO's body is totally against yours and well supported. So baby's tummy & thighs should be against you as much as possible. This keeps a sleepy baby from relaxing, body weight pulling away from you, thereby pulling to a shallow latch. Baby should relax into you, not away.
Bring the baby to the breast, not the breast to the baby. So don't lean down; instead, put more pillows under baby or your arm to bring baby up. You don't want to get a good latch and then have to sit up or straighten up for your comfort and mess up the latch!
If you need to try again, slip a finger in the corner of LO's mouth between gums to break suction, remove nipple, try again.
If LO is too distracted, flailing, etc you can swaddle to nurse. Provided of course that LO is not too sleepy.

Hope this was helpful.

[vvvvvfee]

How old is your LO?: 7 months

Are you nursing, pumping, supplementing? How’s it going?: Nursing at home and pumping 3x a day at work.

4-8 mo
If you’ve introduced solids, how is LO doing?: It's going well. He is pretty enthusiastic about food. We do more BLW at home and I send various spoonable things to daycare along with his bottles- yogurt, oatmeal, applesauce, mashed sweet potatoes, etc.

If you’ve returned to work, how is that transition going?: I'm a little concerned bc I'm not always getting the 12 oz that I need and while I have a freezer stash, it's not huge. I remember this happening with my previous 2 and I guess it somehow worked out ok- at 8 months or so I dropped down to pumping 2x a day and was still getting about the same amount. I think I had more of a cushion last time bc I was tandem nursing, though. I really hate the unnecessary stresses of pumping.

Questions/AW?: I also spilled 4 oz of pumped milk this morning, which was really upsetting!! ugh.

[Speedy]

Howdy Mamas! I hope everyone is making it through this deep freeze okay.

How old is your LO?
7.5 months (I almost just wrote 9 months. What the heck?)

Are you nursing, pumping, supplementing? How’s it going?
Nursing and supplementing. He gets about 8 oz of formula a day now, which isn't too bad.


4-8 mo
If you’ve introduced solids, how is LO doing?
He wasn't interested in purees or chunky textures at all, so we went right to finger foods/BLW. He loves it lol. He's so excited when I put down some peanut butter toast, or some pork or beef. He doesn't actually eat much, but he definitely gums the heck out of it! The dog is loving it too since he gets the leftovers lol

[Speedy]

vvvvvfee, oh no! I did that once when I was working on my freezer stash. I legitimately cried

[Dramaphile]

How old is your LO? 15 weeks

Are you nursing, pumping, supplementing? How’s it going? Nursing and pumping at work. Pumping has been going well, I pump a lot of milk and have had to actually cut myself off because my left boob especially seems to have an endless supply. Limiting how much I pump seems to have helped with the engorgement. Nursing has been going pretty well, although I had an appointment with an IBCLC over the weekend and discovered the reason my LO wants to eat every couple of hours is because he is only taking milk in small amounts. He only took 2 oz in a weighted feed, and MH says he's taking his bottles in "snack" sessions, a couple of ounces at a time. The LC thinks he's got reflux, and the fussiness at the beginning of a feed that I attributed to strong letdown is actually from the reflux. He's low in the weight percentiles (9%), but still tracking from where he was at 2 months, so we'll see what the ped says in a few weeks. Going to try to come in and do another weight check in a couple of weeks and in the meantime I'm trying some different nursing positions and a probiotic for baby.

0-3 mo
Nursing in public: questions, experiences, anecdotes? Nursing in public is NBD to me. I got a lot of practice with my first child, as we went to a lot of events and sports games and were really active and out and about. All our friends got real used to me just whipping out a boob. I usually use the two shirt method, or use a receiving blanket or scarf to cover the top of my boob so it's less obvious that it's out. I've gotten good at nursing in a carrier as well. My favorite thing that happened recently while I was NIP was when I was at Starbucks and ordered a breakfast sandwich and a couple of drinks (one to take home to MH) and then baby wanted to eat while I was waiting, so I sat down to feed him at a table. My order came up and sat there for a few minutes, and then the sweet (male!) barista realized it was mine and brought it over to me.

If you’ve returned to work, how is that transition going? The work transition is going fine, breastfeeding-wise. I am lucky to have my own office to pump in and time to do so. What's harder is the transition at home - MH is a stay-at-home dad and it's hard for me to find the time/energyto help around the house because I go from work to parenting at home/making dinner/wanting to spend time with my kids, and then I put them to bed and maybe last an hour before I'm passing out on the couch. I haven't figured out any kind of balance at this point.

Questions/AW?

[Speedy]

Urgh. F has started pinching while he's nursing. I say "no", move his hand, and give him something else to hold but he keeps going back. Hopefully it's just a phase T.T

[potatocakes]

Speedy, we struggled with that with DD, and DS isn't doing tiny pincer grasp yet, but just runs his nails all over me. I redirect to my clothes instead of skin, but I basically always have baby claw marks on my chest. Better than when he was winding up and thumping me with a closed fist a couple weeks ago, I guess!

[potatocakes]

How old is your LO? 6 months today!

Are you nursing, pumping, supplementing? How’s it going? Nursing when together, pumping at work. It's going well, I'm starting to notice that the oversupply I need to maintain for pumping is impacting DS when I feed him (lots of spit up, vs very little/none when he's fed appropriately sized bottle.


4-8 mo
If you’ve introduced solids, how is LO doing? He's eating just about anything we give him. I need to get more intentional about it now that he's 6 months. I'd like to be doing more BLW, but he just tries to pick things up with his mouth still, direct from the tray, and doesn't have coordination to use his hands to pick things up, so yells at us for more food.
If you haven’t, how do you feel about introducing? It was such a big deal with my DD, and this time around, I'll feed him a spoonful of anything I think he can swallow. It's been fun to not have it be stressful!

If you’ve returned to work, how is that transition going? I'm really pleased with myself for speaking up when people schedule impromptu meetings that interfere with my pumping. Yesterday, I said "can we meet in 20 minutes instead so I can pump first?" and today was "I usually pump at 9:30, but am happy to push that back to 9:45 if we think we can keep this meeting to 30 minutes". The churn of getting to work/working all day/picking up kids/trying to workout/dinner/etc. etc. etc. is really tough, though.