Charlotte’s Breastfeeding Story.

I am still struggling with breast feeding. It has been (and still is) so hard and I completely underestimated how much so when I was pregnant. I think I naively thought as my pregnancy was straightforward that breastfeeding would also be fine. 

When Art was born he was checked for tongue tie and they said there was no evidence of one. A midwife helped me to get him to latch on shortly after birth and then we were left to it. I was asked if we needed more help but I said it was ok. We were shown again how to latch and that was that. 

Art was born at 5.50am on Sunday 08/04/18 and we were home by 4.30pm. The next morning, we had a midwife at our house by 8.30am. She was lovely and again helped me with latching and showed various feeding positions. She identified that he had a ‘bit of a tongue tie’ but said to see how we got on. 

My milk came in by day 3 after feeding all the time and Art only lost 3% of his birth weight. I persevered relentlessly with feeding but found it extremely painful. It was worse by far, than my stitches. 

We had the lovely lady from local breastfeeding support (Henry) come visit a couple of days later who helped with positioning. She couldn’t check his tongue tie as he was too sleepy. 

We were discharged by my midwife soon after and again she checked and said he had a bit of tongue tie but that it shouldn’t cause any trouble. The Health visitor who came to my home said the same thing. I asked how long it would take my nipples to heal (by this stage they were extremely cracked and painful). She told me a couple of days and just to put of breastmilk on them and to use a good balm. Everyone told me we had a good latch and that we just had to keep trying. 

 I tried shields, I tried pumping, I tried silver cups. I fed this tiny human relentlessly in the hope that the pain would lessen and it would get easier. I carried on this way for two months. By this stage my nipples were very damaged and every feed would have me in tears. The pain was absolutely excruciating. It was shooting nerve pain that went all the way through me and had me sobbing. It was horrendous. I felt hopeless and like I was just doing it wrong. I didn’t have the confidence to get help. So many people have said it just ‘clicks’ but we have never had that moment. 

On the 10 May, I went to the baby clinic and spoke to the same breastfeeding support lady who came to my home. She took one look at me and recommended that I go to the tongue tie drop-in clinic at the hospital the following week. Because he had always steadily put on weight and remained in his percentile (25th) I don’t think we were really given the support we needed prior to this. It wasn’t the first time I’d been to the clinic and spoken to someone about it. 

15/5 Art and I went to the tongue tie clinic. I was a bit of an emotional wreck by this stage. When it came to our turn, I pretty much broke down and sobbed to the midwife. She was amazing. So professional and supportive. I had a missed call and an email by the time we got home saying that they would carry out the snip in two days time. I’d been put to the top of the list. 

It was carried out and it made a huge immediate difference. My nipples have slowly healed and the pain gradually lessened. My health visitor review at home 6-8 weeks said I was borderline depressed and to seek additional help. I put that all down to breastfeeding. I think didn’t seek help as it felt as though it was something I was doing wrong and not a problem. You are always told ‘if it hurts, you’re doing something wrong’. 

I made an appointment to see Carol Goddard to get some further support in July. I could’ve gone back to the Royal London but I wanted overall support and help with positioning. I’ve also had additional help at the clinic from Marjorie at Henry but her time is limited. Carol carried out a second tongue tie snip as there was scar tissue and further tissue that they would’ve been unable to get to the first time. She gave me the option to go back to the Royal London but I made the decision to get it done right away. This has again helped and we do now have some pain-free feeds. I still email her for support. We have also had two cranial osteopathy sessions for Art to help with a tight jaw and feeding overall. 

Within the last month, I have had mastitis. It may’ve been down to increased feeding due to the hot weather, trying different feeding positions and Art falling asleep and not draining the breast. It came on very quickly, and while it was painful, I can honestly say it was far less painful than feeding with tongue tie. I saw one GP who was great and one who was very uninterested at my follow-up appointment. She seemed to just treat me as a new mother... I have also had blocked ducts on several other occasions. I still get shooting pains in the breast that was infected. 

I’ve always had plenty of milk and have given up pumping. I completely hate it and have tried three different pumps. Feeds last from 10 mins to an hour. I still struggle with feeding in public as it can be hard to get a good latch, especially now Art is old enough to be distracted. 

I’ve never been to my local breastfeeding cafe as it’s been hard for me to get to as it’s a 25 minute walk away and there is limited space for prams. With so much pain wearing a carrier has been a struggle. I do still plan to get there. 

Sorry this is SO long! But as you can see breastfeeding has been absolutely horrible on the whole. I had intended to breastfeed for at least a year but now I take it day by day, week by week. I hope to make it to six months. I would go through labour again over going through the months of excruciating pain. If there is anyway you can help prepare mums to be, do it! We will continue to persevere and Art is a happy, healthy baby as a result.