BLS for littlies

Just popping in to answer some questions for Balmaingirl :)

How much Motiliuma re you on per day?

I was on Motilium for over 12 months, I was on 60-80mg per day, and I tried to wean down numerous times but seemed to loose too much of my supply, I was able to maintain it for short preiods of time at around 30mg, but DD wasn't the best feeder so I believe that had a big impact on my supply.

270grams of weight gain a fortnight is great especially for a little bubba at 7 months of age, DD was a similar size to your DD at the same age :hug:, and they do go through peaks and troughs in their gains, they can't really gain huge ammounts every week for long periods of time.

The good thing about Motilium is you can adjust it to what you need, I recommend finding a GP who is also a LC, or a good GP who understand BF'ing more than your Paed, that way you are able to get bigger sripts for higher amounts, most only give up to 30mg a day which is the "standard", but I needed more than double that, and as soon as I went up to that it made a HUGE difference. The GP I went to was amazing and I wish I had been able to get into seeing her earlier. DD wasn't even on the charts, WHO or Blue Book, she was under by about 1kg. We did end up have to using F top ups for a while jsut to get her to put on weight, while I waited for my appointment with the GP/LC. It is ok to use Motilium long term so don't be concerned, I know if can be a bit dissappointing that you need a drug to help your supply, but it is a lot cheaper than using F ;) I also found that going to the Dr's and getting bigger scripts make them a lot cheaper as well.

If you want to try and wean off the Motilium in the future this is the most gentle way to do it, just very slowly drop off one tablet over the period of a few days, and see how thigns go, then if gains are still good try dropping another tablet. It is really a bit of trial and error and the great thing with it, if you find that by dropping it your supply drops too much you can start it back up again.

For this bub I will be getting a script from the very start as I will be highly likley starting with expressing only, so I will be doing everything I can to be boosting my supply. I also drank Aktavite, I tried Blessed Thistle and Lactation Cookies! But in the end the Motilium made a huge difference.

Happy to share any more information with you, this bub I am plannign to have to skip the F top ups and go all the way with or without Motilium :D
Take care xxoo

Weight gain should be looked at over an entire month, so for the last month your DD gained 770 grams which is AWESOME! That's more than the average 150grams per week and slightly less than 200 grams a week.

We are doing well :) Thanks for asking :) We were supposed to see the dietician today but they rang and cancelled because she's sick (and I'd rather not see her sick anyway LOL) Hopefully next week we will get another appt. Will update you then! Tristan's next weigh is on the 25th.

Thanks MummyTummy, Beema and Sally.

Beema, I was on 60mg per day for 10 days and then I have been phasing it down really gradually, I'm down to 20mg at the moment. I'd also been drinking a nursing tea twice a day, but haven't for the last day or two - I'm going to start making an effort with it again now though. I think I'd like to start taking some sort of probiotic too.

I went to the GP today to get them to sign a form for me and while I was there took the opportunity to ask about cutting down on the motilium and weight gain and she said she thought the 500g was just a catch up fortnight and 270g is fine, but if it drops down to just go back and get more motilium to take ongoing, so it's good to know they will consider doing that at our normal GP.

Hi,

It's a sad truth that we spend the first year of their life fattening them up and the rest of their life trying to thin them out. her weight gains recently from what you have written are far higher than average. 6-12mnths 50+ g per week is fine (not that they are normally weighed very week)
In the rest of society people that are tall and lean are the ideal. Us short fatties are sniffed at. We don't *have* to be in proportion.

You are doing a really good juob with the breastfeeding and solids. Try not to worry too much.

Thanks Barb, I am feeling a lot more confident now.

Beema - where do you buy aktavite from? I asked for it in the pharmacy and they said they stopped selling it years ago! You sound like you're well equipped with all the right info for success with your next bub - good luck!

You can get aktavite from the supermarket next to the Milo, it's in an orange container.

Thanks black_rose - just bought some :)

Well, it looks like I might be in the same boat as you were Beema.... My milk supply appears to be all but gone :( over the last two days DD seems to have been sucking frequently, but only doing very few big gulps. She wants milk every time I offer it, even every half an hour, but she's messing around, fussing, scratching/pinching/pulling on my boob and moaning an awful lot. She seems a lot more frustrated than she was before, but she is still very compliant and accepting, bless her!

I've restarted the motilium with the few tablets I have left (gone straight in with 6 a day) and made a doctors appointment for Monday to get more subscribed.

I'm trying to stay as calm as possible, because I know stress won't help, but I hate that she's not getting what she needs from me, plus we have a very high maintenance house guest from overseas who expects me to run around and doesn't understand at all.

Hun, how old is she now? That behaviour sounds pretty normal for most babies at either the 3 - 4 month mark, or at some point after 6 months. Many babies can finish a feed in under 5 minutes after the first couple of months - in fact my DS1 never, ever took longer than 10 minutes to feed, and only fed for longer than 5 minutes once or twice even as a newborn. Once they are alert, babies are easily distracted at the breast and generally don't hang around there for long, and are fussy while there.

Do you have any other signs that are causing you to think low supply? Is she still having plenty of wet nappies? Please try not to panic because milk supply suddenly reducing is extremely uncommon if the baby is being fed from the breast on demand.

Somehow I lost my whole reply so i'm going to post it again in a nutshell, coz it's getting close to bedtime!

DD is 8 months old. She always fusses a bit, and is terribly distracted when out, but improved at home at leaset when my milk supply increased from taking the motilium. I am more concerned however that she just doesn't seem to be taking many big gulps all of a sudden - she stays on the breast or pulls off but keeps going straight back on, but just seems to hang out there rather than feeding.

I haven't noticed a decrease in wet nappies.

There are a couple of things that also point towards me thinking my supply is decreasing:
- She had started going for longer between feeds but is wanting to feed more often again
- I am supposed to weigh her every fortnight and this Wed gone was weigh day. I'd done a sneaky mid-fortnight weigh the week before however, and she had gained 280g in that week! However this week she had gained 0 from the previous week. I know you're supposed to look at weight gain on a month by month basis and if I hadn't done the sneaky mid-fortnight weigh I would've just seen a perfectly reasonable 280g gain for 2 weeks, but now I know what I know this is just another thing that makes me wonder - serves me right for werighing when i shouldn't have...
- I don't usually express, but I did one evening last week, and got 60ml each side. Tonight I expressed at the same time of night and got 50ml all up
- I've just got a gut feeling that it's dropped and I'm a big believer in mums instinct

I might be barking up the wrong tree, or talkiing myself into my worry being justified, but i do feel that my supply is dwindling. It seems like most people who have taken motilium to boost supply have ended up needing it more than just for a one off, and i feel like I am facing the situation that Beema described. The other possibility is that with having my guest here and going out more often, given that DD feeds poorly when we are out (I usually try to go out only for short periods of time so that she has a max of 1 feed out and can easily catch up later if she feeds badly) may have caused my supply to drop.

I'm feeling a bit stressed about it, but only as a short term thing. I find the situation tiring but i am determined too. If I need to take motilium long term I'm ok with that - I'm really committed to breastfeeding and if this is a way to enable that this is fine with me. I just don't like the thought of DD going hungry for now, but I guess the supply will increase quicker if I let her suck often rather than offering a formula top-up in the interim (which i doubt she would take anyway as she has refused the bottle for months now).

On a positive note, DD's had a cold (yet again) and has been off her food (as in solids) but seems to be back on track as of today, which makes the situation seem a bit better.

Gee hun, you are really having a busy time. I am also a big believer in mumma's instincts, so although nothing there rings too many alarm bells for me, I can see why you are worried. If in doubt it is probably not a bad idea to act on this now, just in case, so well done for picking up on it and doing something.

You are doing a great job hun :hug:

Thanks for the encouragement :)

We're off to Europe in a few weeks too, so I want to make sure it's straight and if I don't end up going on motilium long-term at least getting some to take with me in case all that travel stuffs things up!

All the best hun. I hope you have a great trip.

Cheers :)

:hug: It is great that you are on the ball and really looking at ways in which you can continue BF'ing, Motilium was soo good for me, and I am glad it was an option and I could deal much better with using that then doing the forumla thing. I completely understand the feeling of expressing good amounts then not so good amounts, a fellow BB'er and I would express each night together at the same time, chatting on MSN and we always did comparrisons, cheering each other on, no matter how much milk we got, she generally always got quite a bit more than I did, then there were a few days where it was the other way around and while I was very excited I felt for her as I knew what it was like to express smaller amounts.

Best to get your prescriptions and everything now, so you can have a fabulous time in Europe :dance:!!

You are doing a great job, and that you are still going for the BF'ing :D
Take care xxoo

Aw thanks Beema :) the encouragement is very comforting xx

Your support team sounds like a fantastic idea, I bet it really helped. I hate expressing at the best of times, but with the added pressure of worrying about quantity it's even worse. It must've been nice to be able to go through it with someone else.

Yeah, that was me BG. Beema and I rode that rollercoaster ride together. I think without each other for encouragement and support either of us, or even both of us could quite easily have given up on BF altogether.

Well done on knowing what you want and taking the steps to achieve it! :hug:

Oh good on you both! I think it's lovely you could offer each other that support.

How are you going with b/f with Emmelyn MummyTummy? I always log on on my iPhone so don't see peoples sigs/tickers etc, but tonight I'm on the computer and oh what a cutie your new little bundle is!

B/F is going just awesome this time around. She seems to know exactly what to do. There is no mucking around, she feeds for max 10 mins at a time, which I was worried about, but the weight is going on fast and she is pooing and weeing with the best of them. I can't believe how different it is this time.

With DS we needed to feed for an hour at a time at this age, I had to use nipple shields for a few months, I had to fight him to latch on in the first place.... and then fight him to stay on! There were also a number of other things that happened throughout our feeding journey - such as supply riding the rollercoaster of oversupply then undersupply. I know it is still early days with E, but if I wasn't living it, I would not think the same person could have such different experiences from one baby to the next.

That is fantastic MT! You must be so relieved and how nice to hear that success can be achieved second time around.

I went to my GP today... First of all she was reluctant to give me another script, but has done in the end. BUT she won't prescribe motilium long term... She said that it caused breast cancer in rats when testing in 6+ month use and that it hadn't been proven safe for infants. She suggested it might be time for me to stop breastfeeding :cry:

Initially I was very upset, and I am really quite concerned about our trip to the UK, but I think I'm going to try calling the paed tomorrow and see if I have any luck getting it for longer term. I'm also thinking the ABA might be able to point me in the direction of a dr who will prescribe it.