Any breastfeeding pros?

[litasail]

I don't "go" here, so apologies if this is intrusive, but you may want to also post this on MM Moms. There are some BFing pros over there, including moms who have nursed twins.

[lexus]

I have no advice but just want to wish you well. I hope you find a solution that works well for you and your twins.

[lala]

If there are moms who have nursed twins on MMM, definitely ask there b/c I feel like I know a lot about certain nursing problems but not necessarily the ones you are having. I wish I could help! I'm glad they are gaining well and that everyone is ok, though. Congratulations!

I do think it's possible they are getting used to the faster flow of the bottle so that nursing is harder. Also, is is possible it's an overactive let down or something like that? That might explain the head shaking.

I would definitely recommend seeing a lactation consultant. It certainly can't hurt and they can evaluate for latch, OALD, foremilk/hindmilk, etc. Good luck!

[ashb62]

Do you tandem nurse or nurse one at a time? My boys hated tandem nursing and were much more efficient one at a time. I know many twin moms swear by tandem nursing, but it just didn't work for us.

My guys were lazy nursers, too. It does get better. I had to supplement with pumped milk after every feeding in the beginning. I was eventually able to stop pumping, though we did supplement with formula once a day. Pumping sucks. I feel you there.

If your ultimate goal is to EBF and stop pumping, the best way to do that is getting them on the breast as much as possible. I know it's time consuming, especially with a toddler, but once you get to that point and don't have to pump or wash pump parts and bottles, you'll be saving time.

I can't really help with the foremilk hind milk issue. I would definitely schedule an appointment with a lactation consultant.

I agree with lala about an overactive letdown being a possibility. Maybe try unlatching when you feel the letdown ( just catch it in a towel or burp cloth) then relatch?

FWIW, I had a rough start BFing my twins. They were lazy nursers, didn't gain well, and I had mastitis twice. But we started finding our groove around 4 or 5 weeks and then it got so much easier at 12 weeks. We were able to drop the formula at 5 months and they nursed until they were 20 months. Overall, it was a really great experience.

Edit to tag @sing4mysavior and thecheshirekat. I'm pretty sure they both BFed their twins.

[dizzycooks]

My baby is 12/29 so similar age, a singleton and bit larger than yours, but even now although she's gaining well, she eats every two hours at the most and struggles to get the nipple in her mouth properly. I'd let them nurse a few minutes and the. Try them again a bit later. I can't imagine trying to tandem nurse, it sounds super frustrating so if you can I'd try to focus on one at a time even if it's a few minutes.
Idk if you're on a bmb but the January 16 board on tcf has been great, you're welcome to come hang out, there are several moms of multiples over there working on the bfing routine too.

[momin2013]

No experience nursing twins, but for the first four weeks of his life, DS just would.not.latch without it being a screamfest, so I started pumping and bottle-feeding pretty much from the beginning. I hear you, it is a LOT of work to pump full-time; it's basically around the clock bottle-feed, get the baby settled, pump, wash previous bottles, make up next bottles, repeat. One tip if you're not doing it already is to store your pump parts in a ziploc in the fridge, and just wash everything at the end of the day.

The frequency they're eating sounds pretty normal to me. The "watery milk" issue could be a hindmilk issue, but I'm guessing that's normal as well; I have no clue how to know this one way or the other, though. Remember once the milk you've pumped has been sitting in a bottle for a while it sort of separates and will definitely 'seem' watery, but you just need to warm it slightly/swirl the bottle to mix it back up again.

My experience with DS ended up working out pretty great. I just got into the bottle-feeding and pumping habit for the first few weeks, but I was just too exhausted and stressed out to force the nursing issue. Then when he was about 4 weeks old, I decided to try latching him again. I would pump for a minute to get the milk flowing, then DH would quickly hand DS to me and I was able to latch him on. From there, we replaced bottles with nursing sessions until I was nursing exclusively and droppped the bottles altogether. My feeling is that he just needed to "grow a little" to get the hang of it, but I realize there could have been other issues at work too. There's no way to really know what the problem was, but it ended up working out just fine.

Tl;dr: Keep up the great work, I can imagine how exhausting it is! It sounds like what's going on for you is very well within the range of normal, and as long as you feel up to it, I'd KOKO a bit longer and hopefully it will all work out fine!

[Kcthepouchh8r]

I have no advice on nursing twins, just wanted to say congrats and best wishes with breast feeding. My milk supply was low and both my kids had dramatic weight loss, didn't gain weight and were dehydrated so I would assume that since they're growing it's fine but definitely call the hospital you delivered at and ask to speak to the LC.

[Deleted]

Hi! Only bf one baby but wanted to say congrats and wish you the best! It's so hard for most women to get a groove that early on so keep up the good work and hang in there. Other pps had some good suggestions. I just wanted you to know that with ds I was so overwhelmed and didn't realize some babies just nurse all the time!!! So that part, from my experience, is normal. I agree that if you aren't loving pumping, try to get them on the boob often. I didn't do bottles but didn't notice the time saving aspect of no bottles to clean etc until ds was about a month old. Congrats again on your new babies!!!

[thecheshirekat]

Hey mama! Congratulations on the babies! I did nurse my twins, and my boy twin had a particularly rough start and didn't actually learn to nurse until about 3-4 weeks after he was born and was on formula that whole time. It's not too late to get them on the breast so you can ease up on the pumping! Are you seeing a lactation consultant? We had a breastfeeding support group that met relatively locally and was cheap, so I went to that for a few weeks once I was able to get DS latching (DD took to the breast easily from the beginning, but we still had to supplement with formula in the beginning to get her strength and energy up to be able to effectively transfer milk).

Ditto what ash said, I couldn't tandem nurse until they were much older, so I fed one at a time, and what I ended up doing was switching off every 10 minutes. So I'd nurse DD for 10 minutes, then try with DS, then back to DD, then back to DS, until they were satisfied. As long as they kept gaining weight, I figured it must be working. I always put DS on the breast in the beginning, no matter how frustrating it was, before I gave him the bottle. I also never warmed their formula bottles, so he drank it cold, and I don't know if that helped him be a little more encouraged to get the milk from the tap or not, but it's how it worked out. I also supplemented with a bottle of formula every evening, when we hit the point where they were cluster feeding for hours and crying and I just felt like I couldn't make another drop of milk.

More than anything else, it just took us all some time and some perseverance. As the babies got bigger and stronger, they were able to figure things out, and I kept up with regular weight checks and weighed feeds with the support group until I could be confident that they were continuing to gain and transfer milk adequately.

Good luck, and feel free to PM any time if you have questions or just want to vent or cry .

[Deleted]

Jan 15, 2016 8:33:22 GMT -5 runningfish said:

The boys arrived via emergency c-section on New Years Eve. No NICU time which was my biggest fear, but everything else has just been kind of a nightmare honestly. I guess I'll blame that on sleep deprivation and focus on nursing for now. A couple questions:

My c was under general anesthesia. I was able to nurse a little in recovery but I honestly don't know how long or how successful it was. Baby B was a little out of it as he came second and was a little more affected by the anesthesia. He's still a super lazy nursery (well they both are). Is he too used to bottles now at two weeks to ever want to work at the boob?

Speaking of lazy. They BOTH latch just fine, but they nurse for maybe three minutes tops and then just shake their heads back and forth with my nipple on their mouths (but they don't latch again) then they get frustrated and scream and I give them a bottle. Any idea why?

Supply: so I said I would never pump if it came to it and yet here I am pumping. Which fucking sucks so kudos to you that did it for the long term. I'm currently pumping enough to feed them breaatmilk at day and formula at night. However, my breaatmilk looks watery? Like a foremilk issue? I can get 9-10 ounces in about ten minutes which I'm sure is too much. But when I keep pumping after that initial output nothing else comes out. So no hindmilk? Do I need to just keep pumping longer?

Also they eat all the time. Whether it's formula or breast milk so that's fine right? They're just being newborns and aren't necessarily starving bc my milk sucks, yes?

They were 5.12 and 6.2 at birth and at their two week appt were 6.4 and 6.11 so they're gaining fine if that means anything. Life would just be so much easier if I could nurse them during the day and night and not have to worry about pumps and parts and bottles and formula and heating and ugh. It's exhausting.

Way tl;dr I need help breastfeeding. Any help you can give.

Quoting so i don't miss anything
1. Congratulations! Welcome to the world of multiples!!! (sounds like it was maybe a scary delivery? sorry, i hope you're all healing/adjusting ok)

2. it's not too late to work back to only BF...like pp said, if you want them to BF, then BF as often as they want (which is for freaking EVER in the beginning), but the more you do it, the better they get and the better your supply can regulate. 

3. they might need more assistance latching. if they latch well initially then get tired and unlatch, it doesn't necessarily mean they are done. the hardest part in the beginning was keeping two babies latched, because it took so many hands to get them both on and KEEP them on. (that gets better with time, promise) the wiggling around and screaming sounds like they are still hungry and you said yourself, they'll eat more from a bottle. i would suggest gently stroking their cheeks as they eat and relatching (you may need to help their heads into position...often when babies are rooting and screaming they can't figure out how to get back on--sorry if that's like a "duh") If you want to work off of bottles, you can use a syringe and squirt just a bit into their mouths as you re-latch them to help entice them to keep going. 

4. yeah, pumping sucks. and if you want them ALL bf, i'd focus on that and supplement with formula (only if you HAVE to) but nurse nurse nurse. it is so so much in the beginning, all.the.time. that's good. good for them (their bellies are the size of walnuts...they fill up and empty so quickly. so just keep nursing. 
so. pumping. it sounds like your body is making enough for two babies! yay! if it full out stops after 10 minutes, you can adjust the pump dials, don't go full throttle from the start...and pump for about 30 minutes (your body only knows to keep producing if you tell it to.) that said...BABIES are much more efficient at telling your body what to do than a pump, so nurse nurse nurse. (again, assuming full BF is your goal)

5. they aren't starving. they are growing, and i assume have enough wet and poopy diapers? their skin and lips are not chapped? then you're doing fine and babies just eat all time...and it's double with two! (seriously...feeding people for like 12-16 hours a day in the beginning...if you can stick it out for like 6 weeks, it starts to make sense, then 12 weeks, then it drops and i remember 16 weeks being like....WE CAN REALLY DO THIS, we can go all the way!!! and ended up nursing for 3 years which i NEVER EVER planned to do)

6. so yeah, keep going! it's NEVER a bad idea to meet with an LC and make sure everything looks ok in person (obvs we can't tell over the internet), but it sounds like you have everything in place...just keep on keeping on! 

Nurse all the time! YOU stay hydrated and fed. You still need all that protein you needed when you were pregnant. Everytime they nurse, make sure you're drinking! (water hehe) Try to offer less formula/bottles and offer the breast more often. 

You can do this! congrats on the NO nicu time, having twins is AMAZING (but so freaking hard in the beginning). take it easy on yourself and make it through the next hour...or the next 30 minutes...or the next 10. one step at a time.

[gastro]

You've gotten some wonderful advice so I just wanted to say congrats on the twins. You got this!

[NandaB]

Congrats! Sorry things were scary, but I'm sure they will be just fine. I have no real advice, but if BFing is important to you then keep on keeping on. Its not too late for them to get it. And if you don't, that's ok too.

How are you feeling?

[Deleted]

Congratulations on the twins!!

I don't have twins, but my first baby was 4 weeks premature, and we really struggled with breastfeeding for the first 5 weeks, then struggled a little for another month or so. He was bottle and tube fed in the hospital, then I breastfed once I got home. Preemies definitely seem to struggle with the latch and the stamina to stay on. My son did exactly what you're describing, bumping his head around, popping off shortly after latching and just generally not having a very strong sucking reflex.

My midwife did a house visit, which helped a lot, even just for reassurance. In my case it was a combination of a strong let-down, DS just being little and tired (he had a good latch, he just couldn't keep it up for long) and needing to latch over and over, which was hell on the nipples!

Get a lactation consultant if you can, it really helps. For me, knowing DS was still gaining well and his latch was good was enough encouragement to keep going. Once he got bigger and stronger, he turned into a nursing pro and my nips no longer hurt.

Good luck to you, I hope it all goes well!

[andrewsgal]

Congrats on the boys I have no advice to add.

[jag01]

Congratulations! Glad to hear that everyone is healthy. Looking forward to hearing names.

[nicolewi]

Congrats. I have never had twins and have no words of wisdom, other than to say that I have hated BF many times in the first couple months, but each time by 5 months or so it was great. Love/hate relationship. If it's important to you, keep trying. It WILL get better, although it certainly sounds awful right now. Twins, and the pumping, too! Ugh!!