Sorry, this is a bit long. Bear with me. My little girl is 10 weeks old. Breastfeeding was going well in the beginning, she was gaining plenty and I was able to pump and keep a small stash in the refrigerator for the occasional nighttime feeding with my husband. Then somewhere between the one and two month mark is where it gets a little complicated.
First of all, at her two month appointment, she had barely gained any weight. She had been kind of a fussy eater for a bit, but I assumed growth spurt or something. Then in the days following that appointment, she got EXTREMELY fussy and would scream when latching. Then I finally figured out why.
A few days after she was born, she had a hemangioma on her nose. It grew very quickly, but the pediatrician said it was fine because they go away on their own. Finally when it began to get these weird black spots, she sent us to a dermatologist, and over the course of the next week, it ulcerated badly, to the point where there's just a giant hole in her nose right now. So this was all right before that two month checkup, and I finally realized that breastfeeding was actually hurting her because her nose was slightly pressed against me. Then I began pumping, and she's a much happier eater with the bottle since it doesn't touch her nose. However, my supply is not what it used to be, and I'm not sure what exactly is affecting it.
I recently began taking birth control (with no estrogen) because my period returned. She also had not been eating much the last few weeks due to the pain. So I assume one of these things affected my supply, but which one? Should I stop taking birth control? My supply isn't horrible, but it's not what I would like it to be, and I'm trying my best to avoid formula supplementation. I pump about 25-30 ounces a day, but she always eats it all and I struggle to keep up with her demands. For the first two days, I pumped every hour and added a "power pumping" session to try and increase my supply. Now I'm pumping every two hours, for a minimum of 15 minutes (using a Medela Pump in Style Advanced, double pumping). I've been doing this for about 5 days now and my supply hasn't budged. I'm drinking mother's milk tea, eating oatmeal every morning with flax seed meal and brewer's yeast sprinkled on top, I made lactation cookies, drinking lots and lots of water (my urine is almost clear), and eating 4-5 meals a day with snacks in between. So my question is, is there something else I can do? Or is it just the birth control? I'm going to try going off of it for a bit to see. I know that I CAN produce the amount of milk needed, because I've done it before. I just don't know how many more days I can go with barely scraping by to get her what she needs. I will eventually attempt breastfeeding again, but it could take a month or so for this wound to actually heal enough to where it doesn't hurt her.
TL;DR: I have to EP but I want to increase my supply in order to meet my daughter's demands, but I'm not sure if my birth control is affecting my supply or if there's something else I should be doing besides the normal water/food/galactagogues/pumping.
Submitted April 07, 2017 at 03:19PM by dinozaur91 http://ift.tt/2og3jag breastfeeding
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