Teething troubles – breastfeeding an older baby

Poking around in Bubby D’s mouth today (one of the rare occasions when she’ll actually let me get a finger in there without either biting it or clamping her lips so tightly shut you’d think her muscles were made of iron) I discovered the reason for my recent breastfeeding discomfort.

A couple of weeks ago, she had only her two bottom teeth.

Now, it turns out she has three more – top right, right canine, and an upper molar.

No wonder she’s in a bit of a muddle with such a random array of emerging teeth causing discomfort in just about every area of her mouth!

But unfortunately for me that also means that we’ve gone back to a place I’d hoped not to revisit now that she’s older…and that place involves sore, cracked nipples and the threat of mastitis.

All she wants to do at the moment is comfort feed – and all I want to do is avoid feeding because of the discomfort (that’s putting it mildly) that it causes me.

So…what can I do to help things heal and get feeding back on track? Well, this is what I’m thinking:

1/ Prevent infection. I really, really don’t want another encounter with mastitis if I can help it. One of the best ways to do this is to air dry the area after each feed, and massage in a little breastmilk. Lansinoh is also brilliant to help soothe and protect, and safe for babies too – so if I can find my trusty tube I’ll be slathering on a bit of that!

2/ Gently help Bubby D relearn how to latch correctly with additional teeth. The best way to do this is to keep altering the latch – if she latches on incorrectly, insert a finger into the side of her mouth, and break the feeding vacuum allowing her to detach without taking a mouthful of me with her! It might cause a bit of fussing from Bubby D and continually having to latch and relatch isn’t the most fun of processes, but eventually she should learn that latching on correctly will mean she gets to the milk more quickly.

3/ If the pain continues once feeding has started, because the lower teeth are grazing the nipple, it is possible to teach a baby to suck without clamping down so hard by pressing the index finger lightly on the lower jaw as it starts to close. This is one I’ve been trying today and fingers crossed it seems to have helped so far.

4/ If all else fails, whip out the nipple shields.

So that’s the plan. Fingers crossed in a couple of weeks the teeth will be fully through, and normal pleasant feeding service will have resumed – for both me and Bubby D.