I was induced 3 weeks early, given diamorphine in labour and forgotten about.. anyway by the time baby was born, she had been pressed against my pubic bone for hours so she had a keffel haematoma, a broken nose and two black eyes. She wouldn’t wake up at all for me to feed her. 12 hours later, still in maternity ward she still hadn’t latched. I hand expressed some colostrum and the midwife gave it to her in a syringe. She gave me some nipple shields and discharged me.

I took my baby home who still hadn’t woke to latch or cry and I couldn’t feed her. By 5am I messaged a breastfeeding consultant who came straight out to see me out of hours! 

She told me to express using an electric pump and give her a bottle as she hadn’t fed in 12 hours and was starting to look very jaundiced. She then attempted to latch her but it was impossible. She came out 3 times a day for a week and my baby wouldn’t latch, the pain was excruciating, her latch was so shallow and I would scream

So I would pump and bottle feed her every day but attempt to feed too without success. She was checked for tongue tie but didn’t have one.

I was so upset that I couldn’t feed and hated pumping, and then I got mastitis. I was in too much pain to feed so started completely bottle feeding. My consultant then showed me how to use my nipple shields and after a couple of weeks.  At six weeks old she finally latched on to a shield. Phew, right?

Wrong, because then she got bronchiolitis and wouldn’t feed at all. I managed to wean her off shields at ten weeks old with a lot of practice!

At a month old my lactation consultant told me I can successfully pump and should do so as she believed my breastfeeding journey come to an end. She explained a lot of women do this because unfortunately sometimes some women just can’t feed and she could seen how hard I was trying without luck.

But I had SO much determination and wouldn’t take no as an answer! I’m so glad I persevered and now I exclusively breastfeed my beautiful 5 month old girl.