My pregnancy was considered low-risk, so I made the informed decision to begin antenatal expressing late in my third trimester (36 weeks), and began to store some colostrum in our freezer, before my son was born at 39 weeks and 5 days.
He latched soon after birth, but over the next 72 hours, my nipples became grazed, bleeding, blistered and bruised. It was incredibly painful, so I gave them a rest overnight . I pumped every time he had a bottle feed, so that my body knew that it needed to make the milk for him, even though he wasn’t feeding directly from me that that time. My husband paced fed our son using the colostrum that I had collected during my pregnancy while I pumped – I was very lucky to have him stay overnight so we could share the load.
It was suggested by a midwife to use Lanolin on my nipples, which I chose to do (I’m not sensitive to it) and it was very helpful for my wound care, but the stinging on my nipples during showers was agony and it’s a pain I’ll never forget. That and the pain of nipple vasospasm I would have after feeds or if I left my shirt off for too long in the air conditioning (which was on frequently – my son was born in the middle of Summer!).
I was really lucky during my hospital stay, one of my favourite midwives from when I was a student was caring for us and she showed me how to feed in side-lying. This was the only way I could really get comfortable. We were discharged home, into the care of my wonderful midwives from Kindred Midwifery, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, who visited weekly for home visits. His weight gain was great, thanks to my abundant supply and he was already back to birthweight by day 7.
Unfortunately, feeding continued to be incredibly painful and when I got home my husband went into “problem-solving” mode and googled how to do the ‘Flipple’ or ‘Thumbs Up Technique’, which one of my midwives had suggested would help me to get a deeper latch. It took me ages to figure it out, as I couldn’t mentally process how to position my hands so they weren’t in the way of where my baby’s chin needed to touch the breast. We found a video where a lactation consultant showed how to use only one finger/thumb to “flick” the nipple in, and it made a huge difference. I also was restricted to feeding in side-lying for about a week, as that was one of the only positions I could manage without pain while my nipples healed. I think it got to about 8-10 days of age before I figured out how to get him latched again in cross-cradle. I cried the day I figured out how to sit upright and feed him – it was like my entire world view had shifted (literally)! My nipples had finally started to heal!
Around week 3 is when the wheels really started to fall off again and one of my midwives suggested seeing the wonderful Dr. Rebecca Baxter at for Brisbane Osteopathic Centre. At this point I could clearly see he also had torticollis, and he preferred feeding on one side over the other. Breastfeeding for me at this point involved a lot of loss of suction, clicking, milk leaking from his mouth during both breast and bottle feeds (he would have one bottle of expressed breast milk overnight), vasospasm, lipstick shaped nipples and he was very windy. My husband was very good at paced bottle feeding – but taking a baby taking an hour for a bottle is just a bit too long.
By 7 weeks, we also noticed that his poos were becoming more green, mucusy and he was covered in a rash that was like “newborn acne”. We also noticed blood in his stool the day after I ingested soy milk for the first time. I spoke to my GP and we decided to exclude dairy and soy, and saw a gradual improvement in his stooling and skin. I remained dairy and soy free to a degree for almost 11 months, and now at 3+ years my son tolerates dairy and soy in all forms.
Several midwifery colleagues recommended seeing an IBCLC trained in orofacial myology (the highly experienced Bridget Ingle) and I was so grateful for that advice, because she changed my life. Not only my breastfeeding journey, but my life’s purpose in terms of wanting to help parents the way she helped me. She identified oral ties, assisted me with positioning and suggested that my son may benefit from a release, so we chose that option. We were also given exercises by both our osteopath and IBCLC before and after his release to help with his recovery and learning to use his tongue again.
Breastfeeding gradually became more functional after the release, and we have been feeding ever since. I’ve been fortunate to breastfeed him through my wedding, through three surgeries, returning to work and attending daycare several days a week.
He is now over 3 years old, and I feel lucky to have had access to such good support to help me achieve this. If you would have told me when he was 3 days old that I’d breastfeed him for over 3 years, I would have thought you were insane. I’m really fortunate to have had people around me who supported me in seeing the big picture, and I hope to be able to do that for all the different families I encounter through my work.
