Breastfeeding after reduction

[mrskcbrown]

Hi all! Im having my third and looking to hear stories of women who have breastfed or are breastfeeding after a reduction. I hear that it is very possible but Im looking for tips etc. I was always told that once you have a reduction you cant breast feed and thats why I was unsuccessful with my first two pregnancies. I am going to try my hardest this time around, checking his/her weight, getting supplements for my milk supply and reading up on it. Thanks in advance. xoxo

 

[Rhiannon137]

I had a reduction (from a G/H to a C/D) about 7 years ago. I was not able to breastfeed, BUT I have been able to give my baby exclusively breast milk since he was born in March...

I had assumed I would not be able to BF but, after my son was born, I had lots of colostrum and I would get milk if I squeezed my breast. I thought - great, let's do this! My son latched well, and had a good suck (we had lots of visits with lactation consultants), but as days turned into weeks, he kept losing weight. It seemed like even though my breasts were making plenty of milk, it wasn't flowing properly. The LCs suspected my letdown reflex was not working - probably because of cutting nerves during the surgery. I started giving my son bottles of formula to get his weight/hydration back on track, and started to spend a lot of time pumping. I found that if I vigorously massaged my breasts (kind of like milking a cow LOL) during pumping I would get at least 10X more milk than if I just let it flow.

Over the next few weeks, I used less and less formula until my supply caught up to (and eventually surpassed) his needs. Now he gets all bottled breast milk. It's not a perfect situation, but it works for us. For the first month or two, I tried to combination feed by also actually BFing, but had to give that up. Since my milk flow would pretty much stop after 30 seconds, DS would quickly get frustrated and aggressive.

Hopefully BFing will work for you, but I wanted to share my story of partial success after reduction in case you had to explore alternatives. Good luck!

 

[mrskcbrown]

I had a reduction (from a G/H to a C/D) about 7 years ago. I was not able to breastfeed, BUT I have been able to give my baby exclusively breast milk since he was born in March...

I had assumed I would not be able to BF but, after my son was born, I had lots of colostrum and I would get milk if I squeezed my breast. I thought - great, let's do this! My son latched well, and had a good suck (we had lots of visits with lactation consultants), but as days turned into weeks, he kept losing weight. It seemed like even though my breasts were making plenty of milk, it wasn't flowing properly. The LCs suspected my letdown reflex was not working - probably because of cutting nerves during the surgery. I started giving my son bottles of formula to get his weight/hydration back on track, and started to spend a lot of time pumping. I found that if I vigorously massaged my breasts (kind of like milking a cow LOL) during pumping I would get at least 10X more milk than if I just let it flow.

Over the next few weeks, I used less and less formula until my supply caught up to (and eventually surpassed) his needs. Now he gets all bottled breast milk. It's not a perfect situation, but it works for us. For the first month or two, I tried to combination feed by also actually BFing, but had to give that up. Since my milk flow would pretty much stop after 30 seconds, DS would quickly get frustrated and aggressive.

Hopefully BFing will work for you, but I wanted to share my story of partial success after reduction in case you had to explore alternatives. Good luck!

Thank you soo much!! I did get colostrum with my other two but I think I gave up too soon. I would try to pump days after the birth and Id get just a little bit. I feel like if Id stuck with it daily it may have increased. I think I hindered myself because the DR who did my surgery many moons ago told me that Id probably not be able to breastfeed, and so I gave up. I also didnt know that babies do not need that much milk right after birth and in the days following. So as you can see, I had a lot of I dont knows!!

Did you have to take any pills to increase your milk or did the daily massages do it for you?

Thanks for sharing with me

 

[olivehead]

I was desperately trying to breast feed after a reduction (mine was in 2006) but after five days of very sore nipples, poor latching, and baby dropping weight, I had to concede to giving her bottles. My pediatrician ordered me to do formula supplements since baby lost a pound three days after birth, so I felt like the odds were stacked against us early. So depressing! Like Rhiannon, I'd had tons of colostrum in the hospital - even the nurses kept remarking about it - so I was feeling hopeful about the situation.

I'm pumping as much as I can but I'm only getting about 2 ounces of breastmilk per pumping session. Baby is 7 days old now and her appetite is only increasing - I hate it that I have to resort to giving her formula already. She's drinking 1 bottle of breastmilk to every 2 bottles of formula. I keep pumping and pumping hoping my milk supply goes up but I'm not sure if that's going to happen. I keep reasoning that at least she's getting SOME breastmilk but meh. Not what I had planned.

Hope everything goes better for you!

 

[mrskcbrown]

I was desperately. Trying to breast feed after a reduction (mine was in 2006) but after a five days of very sore nipples, poor latching, and baby dropping weight, I had to concede to giving her bottles. My pediatrician ordered me to do formula supplements since baby lost a pound three days after birth, so I felt like the odds were stacked against us early. So depressing! Like Rhiannon, I'd had tons of colostrum in the hospital - even the nurses kept remarking about it - so I was feeling hopeful about the situation.

I'm pumping as much as I can but I'm only getting about 2 ounces of breastmilk per pumping session. Baby is 7 days old now and her appetite is only increasing - I hate it that I have to resort to giving her formula already. She's drinking 1 bottle of breastmilk to every 2 bottles of formula. I keep pumping and pumping hoping my milk supply goes up but I'm not sure if that's going to happen. I keep reasoning that at least she's getting SOME breastmilk but meh. Not what I had planned.

Hope everything goes better for you!

Congrats on your new baby!! Dont beat yourself up. You are doing what you can and doing great. Im not even sure if I can either. Im going to try and if it doesnt work out than formula it is. I know I didnt try the last two times and at least you are trying now. Id give it a month. Thanks for your input, and please keep me posted on how its going for you

 

[olivehead]

Thank you for the kind words...it's easy to get down on yourself about it but you're right! I'm doing everything I can. I'll definitely keep you updated as we move forward.

Best of luck with your pregnancy and baby to come!

 

[mrskcbrown]

Thank you for the kind words...it's easy to get down on yourself about it but you're right! I'm doing everything I can. I'll definitely keep you updated as we move forward.

Best of luck with your pregnancy and baby to come!

Thank you very much.

 

[tinymumma]

I haven't had a reduction, so I can't help there, however to boost your supply, make some lactation cookies! Google recipes, they are quite bitter, so lots of chocolate in them is totally welcome Male sure they have flaxseed, rolled oats and brewers yeast in the recipe otherwise they won't be as effective. Also, it's most powerful in it's raw form (yummy!!) But best leave that until you're not pregnant. You can eat the baked cookies while pregnant though When breastfeeding, have two with each feed and they can boost your supply up to 40%!
Sorry I wasn't any help with the original question though xox Best of luck mummah

 

[olivehead]

I'll have to give those a try! I'd also been told today by a friend that there is a tea sold at nutrient/vitamin shops called Mother's Milk that helped boost her supply. At this point I'm certainly open to herbal supplements!

 

[Rhiannon137]

I started writing this as a response to a PM from olivehead, but thought it might be useful for others...

My supply definitely increased over time, but this happened on the scale of weeks/months, rather than overnight. I forget what my daily totals were in the first weeks, but I definitely remember looking at my sad little 15-30 mL collections and wondering why I was wasting my time. By the time DS was 2 months, I was making ~500 mL per day, which increased slowly and steadily to 800-900 mL per day. I did take a supplement called MotherLove (mostly fenugreek) for a few weeks. I don't know if it really helped, but it made me feel like I was doing something. I tried the lactation cookies, but they gave me such foul gas that I had to stop. I switched from a Medela Pump in style to a rented Medlea Symphony hospital pump at about 1 month. That seemed to make a positive difference. The mechanics are different so you get stronger suction, but a more comfortable feel.

I didn't do any major overhauls to my diet - just tried to make sure I was taking in lots of calories (especially protein) and drinking lots of water. I had read that oatmeal was helpful, so I eat that when I think of it. I also find myself craving dairy (unusual for me) so I have lots of milk, yogurt, cheese and ice cream. I had suffered from HG for almost half of my pregnancy, and only put on about 5 pounds by delivery, so my body did not have much in reserve. My supply definitely dips if I don't take in enough calories.

What seemed to help the most with supply was doing "double pump" sessions whenever possible: pump for 10-15 min, break for 10 min, pump for another 10 min. I still do this for almost all of my pumping (4X per day now). A little manual expression at the end seems to help get everything out too. Some people advocate a "power pump" session where you alternate 10 min pumping with 10 min breaks for an hour. This just gave me cracked, sore nipples.

From a mental/time perspective, three things were particularly helpful to me:

I wasted a lot of mental energy stressing about giving DS formula. This was silly of me. I had not expected to be able to BF at all and had no problem with the idea of giving him formula. Then, when it looked briefly like I could BF, I was heartbroken at the thought of not doing it exclusively. I was stressed, he was hungry, and there was no logic in it. Any breast milk is helpful to the baby, and formula is healthy and nourishing too. You'll feel better if your baby is full and happy.

The EPing (or mostly-pumping) route can be time-consuming and stressful. Mentally giving myself permission to stop if it was really making life miserable made it easier to keep going. Like with most things, I got into a routine.

Giving myself permission to stop trying to BF was also huge. This is a very personal decision, but in my case it changed everything. I tried for over two months in addition to the pumping and bottled feeds hoping that we could eventually make it work. It was taking so much time and energy, causing me pain, and frustrating the baby. One day I realized that neither of us was getting anything positive from the experience, and just let it go. I felt much more bonded with him after that just giving him his bottles, or letting him snuggle against my leg while I pumped.

So that was a bit of a long ramble, but hopefully it will help some folks. Feel free to reach out to me with questions.

 

[olivehead]

Thank you, thank you Rhiannon for taking the time to respond. I'm definitely feeling encouraged! I'm up to about 50-60 mL per pumping session - I'll have to give your "double pumping" a try!

I also bought this herbal tea called Mother's Milk that someone suggested to me - apparently it can help with your supply. We'll see if it helps at all.

Thanks again for sharing your experience!

 

[mrskcbrown]

You ladies rock! I am going to try all of the above. Im not due until May 2, but I wanted to get my arsenal ready. I want to at least have the knowledge in hand. Now if I can just get over this nausea

 

[olivehead]

Best of luck mrskcbrown!

 

[mrskcbrown]

Best of luck mrskcbrown!

OMG your daughters are gorgeous and so are you!!

 

[olivehead]

Awww thank you! Daddy is a lucky guy!