Disclaimer 1: This post is written by me as a patient and ordinary mom, not as a pharmacist. All tips and tricks here are practical, not medical. If you need personalized medical advice regarding breastfeeding, please consult your doctor, public health nurse, lactation consultant or other trusted member of your healthcare team.
Disclaimer 2: The Amazon link is affiliate. I figured that if I’m linking a product I may as well create an opportunity to reinvest in the blog. None of the other links have any sort of affiliation.
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To the greatest delight of my delivery team, my baby latched on right away.
To my greatest frustration, it felt like a mouthful of razors mutilating a very sensitive body part.
I’ve always wanted to breastfeed. I grew up watching my mom, champion breastfeeder, nurse my younger brothers. She looked so relaxed, cuddling them in the rocking chair as they ate. When asked about it, she glowed as she shared how happy it made her. I was eager to one day follow in her footsteps.
Pharmacy school had taught me some basics (the highlights: “it’s called breastfeeding, not nipple feeding” and “if you use gentian violet to treat thrush, you should take a picture of your baby’s first goth look”) and my prenatal class provided other pointers. I felt totally ready to feed my newborn! I even envisioned becoming so enthused with breastfeeding that I would go on to train as a lactation consultant to help other women get the most out of nursing.
Imagine my shock and disappointment when baby did not agree to the sweet, zen-like feeds I signed up for!
My knowledge may be limited but I knew breastfeeding should not hurt. Pain almost always means poor latch. Except that everyone (the nurses, the aids, the doctors, even veteran nursing moms who offered their help – it’s a really small town!) told me his latch was perfect. Tongue ties were ruled out (very important! – this is probably the most common cause of a bad latch that looks fine from the outside). Eventually, they would give up with a “pain is normal at first, you need to power through it”. (Did you know that about a generation ago, doctors actually recommended that pregnant women rub steel wool on their nipples to desensitize them? I’m not sure how widespread this was, but in my quest for solutions, I encountered many older moms who had breastfed kids 20+ years ago and spoke very highly of this practice. Personally, would not recommend.)
Our small, remote hospital had no lactation professionals on staff and it would be a few days before I would have access to the knowledgeable public health nurses (they visit after your first night home and we had an extended hospital stay due to birth complications). A lot of people did their best and I am so so so grateful for the patience and compassion that were shown to me. That said, advice came in two formats. One was like those bad drawing tutorials: “here’s how you draw the eyes and the nose…then draw the rest of the owl” (“here’s how you get the baby interested in the boob and to open his mouth…then you breastfeed him”). The other was like puzzle pieces that I couldn’t quite fit together. Something about breast compressions, something about skin-to-skin, something about un-latching and relatching…but why?
The good news was that it eventually got better! I did get some help from public health, though by then my nipples were like ground beef and I needed to heal. I did a lot of googling (not very helpful, actually – which is why I decided to write this post) and a lot of experimenting. By 6 weeks I was completely pain-free.
So I’m sharing what worked for me (or what would have worked had I discovered it sooner). Hopefully someone who needs it will come across it and reach pain free status in less time!
Tips and Tricks
1- Put the baby on the breast and not the breast in the baby: I don’t know why this makes a difference to the latch but it does. Learning this changed everything for me. Also, if you can do it quickly, before baby has a chance to clamp down, he’ll get more of the breast in his mouth. Deeper latch = less nipple pain.
2- Familiarize yourself with the mechanics of breastfeeding: Did you know that the baby does not “suck” out the milk? In fact, baby only needs to suck enough to stay hooked on. He uses his cheeks and his tongue (hence the importance of diagnosing tongue-ties) to trigger smooth (involuntary) muscles in the breast which squeeze out the milk (this is the letdown that you may or may not feel). I didn’t learn this until waaay too late. While knowing doesn’t directly help the pain, it does assist with troubleshooting. Also, as much as I despise pumping (I’m lazy mmkay), I found it helpful to see my letdown and my milk supply at different times of day. Not everyone responds to a pump, though, so be reassured that pump failure does not mean supply problem.
3- Use pillows: This should be the first thing they teach you about breastfeeding! In prenatal class and in the hospital, they showed me the cross-craddle and football holds. Then I was expected to hold my nearly 10 pound, voracious baby in those positions with my weak, exhausted post-partum arms for hours. What were they thinking? Luckily my husband, who is way more of a rule-breaker than me, quickly assembled a soft baby table using a stack of pillows. Baby was more stable (good for the latch), I was no longer destroying my arms and back, plus I was hands-free more often.
4- In fact, make yourself a whole comfy nook: Pillows, blankets, distractions, beverages, snacks. Remember the smooth muscles of the breast? The more relaxed you are, the better they squeeze. (This is to prevent milk from spraying everywhere in case of an emergency where you have to unlatch baby and run… maybe not that useful today, but it was when breastfeeding was invented.) The better they squeeze, the more milk baby gets. The more milk baby gets, the less he wiggles around trying to get the flow going. The less he wiggles, the less he clamps down incorrectly. Bonus: breastfeeding becomes more of a chill, relaxing experience for you and less of a chore.
Demo nursing nook for you. Highly recommend the round couch. Also the creative kitty-litter container table. 13$ at Walmart. Includes litter.
5- Do breast compressions: I hesitated about including this because I didn’t understand the point of compressions until much later so I can’t personally attest to their usefulness, but they probably would have helped. The point of breast compressions is that they increase the flow of milk to baby. Like I mentioned above, getting a better flow into baby encourages him to use and maintain a better latch.
6- Invest in a bra that fits: This is what sealed the deal, taking me from “almost painless” to “totally painless”. Boobs change shape and size after giving birth and the (way overpriced!) nursing bras I bought before giving birth ended up being way too small. Lack of support and too much squishing equals sore breasts at the best of times, so imagine what happens when they’re already a wreck from hungry baby, heavy milk and wild hormones.
7- Take ibuprofen around the clock: As long as you don’t have any contraindications, of course (the pharmacist in me always wants you to be safe with your meds!) Just make sure you eat something first. 600mg every 12 hours worked for me but you could take it every 6-8 hours if needed. It won’t improve baby’s latch, but it will speed up the healing. Bonus: this also works on your poor nether regions if you gave birth vaginally.
8- Get soft nipple pads: I used these pads by AlvaBaby
9- Cold compresses: Proceed with caution on this one! I included it because I personally found cold helpful, but I don’t know if it can affect letdown and/or supply or cause actual damage to the nipple if used for too long. (Also see above re:wet and thrush.) Anyway, I dampened some nursing pads then threw them in the freezer, just like the pads you can make to soothe your crotch after a vaginal birth. They were super soothing after brutal feeding sessions.
On Supplementating with Formula
According to lactation professionals, supplementing is a last, last resort (it interferes with building a good supply), but I did so for about 5 weeks because I couldn’t handle the pain. For the first three weeks we used a syringe. The experts disagree among themselves on whether bottle feeding too early can cause nipple confusion/preference and I didn’t want to take chances. Didn’t want him to learn bad habits while still trying to figure out proper latching. Lactation aids that attach to the breast do exist and are considered the ideal way to supplement, especially in cases of undersupply, but you can’t find them on Amazon or small-town Walmart. Besides, I was trying to give my breasts a break.
I started supplementing in hospital. My (ravenous beast of a) baby would eat for 2+ hours straight, during which I sobbed big wet tears from the pain. Eventually a sweet nurse brought over a bottle of formula and taught me to syringe feed. And from then on, if baby was still hungry once I reached my breaking point, he received a formula top up. It was also helpful during daddy’s nighttime shifts with baby, I didn’t have to wake up (or, given my baby’s ravenousness, stay up.). I bought a pump when baby was about a week old and I used it whenever possible (which wasn’t often since baby rarely went more than 30-60 minutes without eating) in hopes of getting rid of formula.
The day we forked out 60$ on a box of formula that we estimated would last us barely over a week (it would have probably lasted 3 days if we exclusively formula fed…I don’t know how anyone affords this!) was the day I decided to double down on the pumping. We used maybe 2 bottles out of the box? By week 5 I was able to exclusively breastfeed and by week 6 I was completely pain free.
Angry or guilty about struggling?
What I’m about to say isn’t a scientific thing or even something I came across in the literature. It’s just a mindset, a re-framing of sort.
When I realized I wouldn’t be of the lucky few to whom breastfeeding comes easily, I felt that primal anger you probably also felt if you’re reading this. Many women also mention feeling guilty, even if it’s not something we have control over.
It occurred to me, though, that from an evolutionary perspective, strong feelings are good. Without them, no one would have the drive to breastfeed their offspring and humans would not have survived long enough to invent formula.
But why is breastfeeding so hard for humans but not for other mammals?
Probably for the same reasons walking, communicating, hunting (and everything else) is harder for humans. For one, our fully developed brains wouldn’t fit through the birth canal so we’re born with the bare minimum. And for two, physically, we’re relatively puny. Our status as apex predators depends on our ability to form cohesive groups, rather than speed, strength or sharp claws. Therefore, a prehistoric mom and baby duo who have the support of other moms for most aspects of child rearing (including feeding) would have a significant advantage. Sure, breastfeeding comes naturally to some families, but I suspect that most need a village.
So whenever I got frustrated in those early days, I reminded myself that my struggles aren’t a personal failure – they’re just biology.
Final Words
If you’ve made it this far, I hope you found some comfort here and that your journey eases up faster than mine did!
That initial hump can be really hard, but it can (and usually does!) get so much better. These days, I do feel that joy I counted on pre-baby. I finally look forward to breastfeeding my little one. I don’t mind at all when he wakes up to eat. I find nursing sessions to be relaxing – an excuse to slow down, cuddle my baby and read a book (or watch TV, or get caught up on my social media). I can’t imagine including going to the kitchen, mixing formula and washing bottle on the regular! I love that, now that we’ve become good at it, breastfeeding totally caters to my laziness.
Should you be searching for reliable information on breastfeeding, I recommend Kelly Mom, the International Breastfeeding Center (warning: Dr Newman has a very… direct… way of wording things, but he is probably the best authority worldwide on breastfeeding and his website has a lot of great resources) and LaLeche League.
Feel free to share the tips and tricks you’ve discovered along the way, I’m always eager to learn more!
My Legs and the Giant Spoon 
This was uber helpful!!! I hope to breastfeed, I’ll use these tips 🙂
Thanks! Hopefully you won’t need them! And if you come across tips of your own, be sure to share!