Expert: ruth kraft - 1/13/2009

Question
Hi

I'm the mother of a 3 month old baby. My little girl was very good at latching from day 1 (big mouthful) and I never got much pain in my nipples. After nearly 3 months, she changed the way she latches. Her bottom lip is not wide open and disappears as she sucks. She gets very noisy and after a couple of minutes she cries and stops feeding, at least until she has a good burp as it looks like she's swallowing a lot of air. I have tried different positions and also to take her away from the breast and re-try but after a couple of times, she becomes frustrated and rejects the breast. The main issue with the current latching problem is that she gets very windy and looks in pain (crying pitch) after the feeds. It's also very frustrating for me and I have stopped going out because I fear the stress of breastfeeding in public.

Your help would be much appreciated.

Thanks & regards
Laura Pino

Answer
I am wondering if she is tongue tied ( her frenulum is shorter than average ) I would suggest that you have someone from La leche League or a lactation consultant look at her to rule out that problem . if it isn't that, it sounds like you will just have to retrain her to nurse. That isn't a very common thing to have to do so I suspect something else... If you are not sure about the LLL community in your area, you can find a counselor /group on LLL.org or find the wic program locally as they often have breastfeeding consults too.

I'm sorry I can't help more . sometimes figuring out whats wrong without physically watching the baby nurse, is too difficult and I don't like to give you advice that wont work...

Ruth Kraft
www.honoringwomen.com