Well Abby was my first now she was, well in the hospital I started feeding her there obviously she went she straight to the boob, I had a slight struggle with her when I first started a feeding, I thought I had her properly latched on, but I got home and she was, she was, she got quite upset and realised actually I wasn't latching her properly, so I think probably the first couple of days she wasn't getting enough food, and then with a bit of a, the help from the visitor, the health visitors, and I also used a nipple shield for a little while with her just to get the confidence up and for her to really, sort of get the feeling of latching on properly, 'cause that was the problem she wasn't latching on properly, so yes so that was Abby. And then Rosie, having breastfed once before I thought it was going to be, plain sailing and I assumed that you'd almost pick up where you left off 'cause towards the end of breastfeeding you're far more confident and relaxed with it and you can sort of well not quite feed whilst walking round the house but, so I didn't, I assumed it would be very, very easy feeding Rosie but what I'd forgotten is actually with Rosie, oh well, she hadn't breastfed before whilst I'd done it before she hadn't. So she had to learn again, so again, it was about, a health visitor who came around and said, “Right try changing the angle because you're feeding in a position for feeding an older child, so what you need to do is actually remember she's still very little and, raise her back up to that position for, of the newborn feeding”. So, again, again, as soon as we got that sorted, it's been a, she was, she was fine from there.
Well this is it you think you know, you think if you've done the breastfeeding before and you just assume you'll pick up where you left off, and so having already breastfed one child I assumed that I would, you know, go to hospital, have a second baby and put the baby straight on and off we'd go. And whilst I was more confident the second time round it still wasn't as easy as I had anticipated I had expected it to be, as I say, I'd expected to feed her instantly and she would latch on, but what I was forgetting in the equation is that whilst I'd breastfed before she hadn't and that, the first time round both mother and child are learning to breastfeed, second time round whilst the mother may have confidence in it the child has never fed before so yeah had to really, then had to do a slight, take a step back and I had to reassess my positioning of her I was, I was holding her in a way that I'd, I would have held an older child to feed and actually what the health, the health visitor came round and said, “No what you need to do is remember she's a smaller child I guess, smaller baby you need to lift her right up onto, and give her more assistance in feeding, you need to position her rather than her find the position” so yeah so that was something that slightly took, not, it was a lot easier feeding the second time round, but as I say, I hadn't expected to have that, just initial hitch where it's like, “Oh ok”.
How long did it take you to get it right?
Probably three or four days to really, you know, get back into finding the right position and really getting her, held in closer and, it was getting used to, lifting the rest of her body I would say is the main thing and just getting her for the whole, the whole of her raised up. And then once obviously you've done it a few times you then, find a position that's natural to you and the health visitor had suggested trying different positions, maybe trying the, as she called it, 'The rugby ball' position sort of under, which I tried for a little while I, it didn't really work for me I know it works for some people, so I then changed it back again [laughs].
How did you know you had to do something different, what was going wrong?
Well that was, the health visitor came round and said, “Well have you tried this position? Let's try that for you” and, you know, “We'll talk through the posture and say right, well you need to be sitting like this and if you try your child at that angle”.
Was she unsettled or fussy, not getting the milk?
No she was, she was getting the milk, as I say, and she was never as hungry as her sister, I was getting slightly sore nipples the second time and so it was, again it was onto, it was the issue of latching on properly, and I think what I did the second time is with the help of that health visitor really worked it out from a very early stage, getting that position right we were then able to see it through, so I'd never used a nipple shield with my youngest daughter.
So once you'd got it right did the sore nipples subside?
Absolutely, yeah, it was just, it was, it was never cracking it was, they just, it was almost went a sort of a little bit, not blue but [sighs] they're almost like a little sore across the top.
Quite raw?
Yeah quite raw, it wasn't the cracking but it was just, it was definitely sore. And also the other thing that surprised me with second child is the, the after pains that come on with, with the breastfeeding that was something that again, I had no idea about, I hadn't realised that, no because really with the second child which I hadn't had at all with the first child, was these after pains where it's like a contraction, and it is your uterus contracting but as soon as the baby latches on it was really, it's like, “Woah” [laughs] which as I say took me by surprise when it first happened. |
