Poop Color

[hlynne]

I think block feeding is when you start with the breast you finished with? Yup, I have been doing that for about a week now. It hasn't changed my supply, so thats good. No green and frothy since the bottle feedings 2 days ago so I hope we are going in the right direction!

I also just read the LLLeague article about the importance of finishing the first breast first. In the article it explains how you should always let the baby come off the breast themselves. I wasn't doing that all the time. Then sometimes, like right now, he is in and out of sleep on my breast. He has eaten enough I'm sure, but he's not letting go. Is he still waiting for a let down? Or, more likely, he's using me as a pacifier?

He used to not be a lazy eater, but I think he is now not wanting to work for the hind milk, lol. At a week old I went to a lactation specialist because I'm a new mom and had no clue what I was doing and wanted to make sure I was doing things right. Turned out he had already surpassed his birth weight my 6 oz. He's a chunky, happy boy so thats good!

 

[_Meep_]

With block feeding, you basically only feed from one breast for a set amount of time, usually 3+ hours, depending on how bad the OS is, before you switch to the other side for the same amount of time.

He's probably just dry-nursing for comfort. If more milk comes out and he doesn't want it, he's likely to just unlatch, so no worries.

Is he back to yellow poop now then? I hope so lol.

Haha I was so unconfident at first too. I was so sure something was wrong with the way we were breastfeeding, but her weight was always so good. I was so confused. Everyone kept telling me it must be going well, but I just felt that something wasn't quite right.

Eventually the cracks began to show. She had her first nursing strike at about three months old. I think we had six in total before they stopped. She wouldn't feed at all for up to two weeks at a time, so I had to do it while she was asleep.

We still don't really know why it happened, but I think OS/OALD, her tongue tie and early stop-start teething all had a part to play.

God I am so glad those days are over!!!

 

[hlynne]

No yellow poop yet. Just green and seedy. I stopped the probiotic and am making sure he finishes one breast before he goes to the next.

Seems you had more of an oversupply then I do from the way you have talked about it in previous posts. He does still choke during most let downs because I can't tell when its coming, but he wants to latch right back on once he catches his breath I hate when that happens! I wish I could tell when it was going to happen.

 

[_Meep_]

I can't remember when I started to feel my letdowns, but it didn't happen straight away.

Green and seedy is better than green and frothy! It sounds like you are moving in the right direction.

My oversupply was AWFUL. It totally fucked everything up for ages. I'm so glad it's over with.

I'm glad also that your little man doesn't seem to be developing any kind of aversion. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. I think I came close to PND over how stressful and worrying it was.

Fingers crossed for a yellow poop soon! You'll have to post a picture here lol.

 

[hlynne]

Meep - So we have yellow and seedy again!!!! Hooray!! It's not perfect, sometimes we have a bit of yellowish green, but I will take it!!

I know that it was definitely because he wasn't getting enough hind milk. I don't know if he had just gotten lazy once he got all of the fore milk because he would come off once he couldn't easily get anymore milk out. So I have to change my feeding position (football hold) once he is towards the end (if that makes sense). He stays latched on longer once I put him in that position. Sometimes I also have to use compression.

Today I was a bit nervous about 90 minutes before he went to bed. I always feed him to sleep and about 90 minutes before bedtime he almost drank me dry. I know thats not possible, but I could hardly even get any milk out myself of my one side. I totally had to save the other side or else I don't know how I would have gotten him to bed. I even defrosted some expressed milk and gave him some thinking he was really hungry but he only took 1/2 an ounce. Did you ever experience a lack of milk like that? Actually he didn't even drink much before bed. So I guess I wasn't lacking.
He only took two 30 minute naps today so maybe thats why. He usually takes a 2 hour nap in the afternoon. I don't think he was eating more often but maybe he was.

 

[_Meep_]

Hoorah!!!! I'm so pleased he's getting his yellow poops back! You are doing the right thing by finding a method of keeping him on the breast - hopefully he will learn that hindmilk is good and decide to stay on there and work for it.

Yeah, plenty of times I felt like my supply wasn't keeping up - usually during a growth spurt. If you just keep feeding as much as he wants, even if it seems like you're not making enough, you will catch up. That's the great thing about breastfeeding - the breast adjusts to make as much as it has to. I remember several times going to bed worrying that my boobs had become totally drained, tiny, useless and slow, but after a couple of nights I would wake up with enormous rocks again and a new burst of even-more-oversupply would begin. Lol.

You may well see more green poop again as your supply kicks up a notch, but you know what to do now, and as I've said before, there's really no need to worry about it much. In the not-too-distant future he will start solids, and you'll never see that kind of poop again - just horrible, smelly, chunky, disgusting big boy poop! Joy!