It was Gigi's reply to the other ABA thread on here that I got a notification for that made me come back & have a bit of a lurk.
But you know what, for the life of me I can't think of what it was I told Gigi about biting!
Gah.. its been so long since I did any ABA stuff. let me think...
Chest to Chest, Chin to breast..
It really does help to go back to the ABC's of breastfeeding. P&A is the key to solving a lot of problems. Biting is no different. Like Gigi said if you can get your P&A right then you should be able to get her to stop biting. I have had biters. Iain who is 15 months is a bit of a biter too. But not as bad as what you are going through.
There are 2 things I use to help get it across what I mean when I talk about attachment. Think of a burger, a big take away shop burger, not a ****y little big mac from Macca's. Now when you bite into that burger you tend to place the lower bun on your lower lip/teeth & then sort of *fold* ( thats not the right word.....) the rest of the burger into your mouth.
You need to do this with your breast when she attaches. She needs to get the underside of your areola at the bottom lip & have the rest of the areola/nipple to fold into her mouth so she gets a nice mouth full of breast.
See if you stuck that burger in your face & just tried to bite into it, you would end up with a mess and not much in your mouth. Its the same with BFing, if she is just coming at you & getting on, its likely she isn't attaching as good as she should.
What you need to do to get this is for you to bring your breast down to her mouth from her nose. So if you try this you should understand what I mean. Place the ball of the palm of your hand on your nose & drag it down to your lower lip. So you need to do that with the underside of your areola& then as that hits her lower lip & she opens to get the breast, you need to shove the top side of your areola/nipple into her mouth.. KWIM?
I know she is older so it will be a bit harder to do it exactly like that but if you can still achieved the same results then do what works.
The other thing to think about & even do is where you nipple should be in her mouth. Suck your thumb. If you put it in your mouth & suck the tip of your thumb should be right at the back of your mouth near the soft palate. This is where your nipple should be in her mouth. Which you should be able to achieve by doing the above when she latches on.
Another thing actually to help is watch her tongue if you can. When she is attached & smiling can you see her tongue cupped around your nipple? Her tongue, if she is attached properly should be forward & curled around your nipple/areola. Its actually really cute LOL. If she starts to muck about & you see her grinning at you & you can't see her tongue, get her off as she is gonna bite!
She can't or more so shouldn't be able to bite if her tongue is forward because essentially she is going to bite her tongue if she does.
Really during these stages of biting (mine bite when they are teething also) all you can really do is be alert & ready for it so you can stop her before she does it.
Watch for her signs of being finished at the breast & be ready with a finger to slip it in & get her off when she is done so she doesn't get that chance to slip her tongue back & bite down.
Make sure she is hungry so she feeds & not mess about. Let her come to you for a feed so you know she is hungry.
Offer her something cool & hard to chew on before a feed. Maybe rub her gums with your finger as well.
She will understand that it hurts & no more boob if she keeps doing it if you are consistent with putting her down when she does it.
Don't let your gaurd down during feeds until you are sure she has stopped with the biting!
Shanti I have had the same issues with my bubba with biting. a gf of mine who is an aba councellor gave me great support and we got thru.
My grand mother always said to me growing up ( she had 8 babies) That if you give them a quick flick with your finger when they do it they will stop cos they don't like it and it is instant consequence.
I really struggled to do that cos I didnt want to hurt my baby but one day she bite me so deliberately I reacted by instinct and flicked her cheek lightly and said no and took her off. She had been biting me and then looking at me with a cheeky little grin. It had become a game to get my reaction. I also realised that I was expecting her to be feeding alot longer than she needed to now and so I was trying to encourage her to feed longer than she needed to. At the end essentially she was just bored and when I looked really closely she would slip the nipple down from the back of her mouth and then bite it as it slipped thru her cheeks. I tarted to notice when this happened and stopped her by pre empting her response. I was probably that more than giving her the flick but I think it also helped me and her. Me because it helped my psyche... I felt like I was showing her a consequence that it wasn't a game and I didn't like it. And for her she learnt to watch my expression and understood I didn't like it. She isn't evil and I think she wanted to know that too. What I did wasn't cruel of really all that hurtful but it did shock her a little bit. christ she hits her head 5 times a day 10 times harder than what I flicked her but it wasnt what she expected from me so it made her think.
I hope that helps some what... if it helps, Barb said to me when I posted.." maybe grand ma has something there" or something to that effect and it made me feel better
Bella
PS she has stopped now but it is really scary and I still flinch a little when I see her start to play with my nipple
I feel your pain (literally!). DD is 14 months old and has just gone through a 2 week phase of doing exactly what your bub is doing. Funnily enough we had an almost identical start to our BFing journey, too, and it took us about four months to get into the swing of it after comp feeds, nipple shields and weak sucks (after time spent in the NICU for a brain injury sustained during birth).
Anyway! She's getting her first set of molars through at the moment, and I'm quite sure that has something to do with it. She's also just started sleeping through the night, having two full days a week at daycare (during which time I don't express at work), and feeding about four times a day instead of about ten, so I'm pretty sure my milk supply has taken a dive, too.
In other words, I think her biting is a combination of teething, and frustration that she's no longer getting as much milk as she did before.
I've been responding by instinct- when she bites, she does so hard, and with all eight teeth. She's drawn blood a couple of times. So, my first instinct is to shout, loudly- I've been yelling "BAH!" (which is the correction Bark Busters dog trainers use- I've been well-trained by them after our quest to get our dog behaving!!).
It stops her biting, though it amuses her, too. I then pop her straight off the boob and say firmly, "No biting, biting makes mummy sad. Any more biting and there'll be no more boobies for you."
I then put her straight onto the opposite boob (I started doing this on the assumption that she was biting because the flow had dwindled on the first boob). Usually, she sucks for a while then bites that too, at which point I yell, "BAH!" again (and try not to laugh, because damn- she's still cute, even when she's biting me :P), pop her off, and say. "No biting, no more boobies until you stop biting."
Usually she doesn't even fuss at this declaration- she just hops down and wanders off happily (which has led me to another theory- that she's not really hungry at all at that point, and it's all a big game to her).
I have to admit, this approach didn't seem to be getting me anywhere fast- she was still biting me every single feed for nearly two weeks. But then she suddenly stopped doing it (and there's been no change in the milk quantity or in her molars breaking through)- so I think being very consistent in my reaction eventually paid dividends.
Hang in there, and be consistent, is all I can say. Hopefully the novelty will wear off very soon as it did for Sophie. I was a hairs' breadth away from just chucking it in and weaning her- we're *almost* ready as it is- but I'm glad I didn't give up. I want to go out on a high after all we've battled to get here.
THank you so much to everyone who posted since my last post. You've all been very supportive and helpful I really appreciate it as I really started to think (about a wk ago) that maybe DD was weaning herself but now it seems we've come out the other side as she has not bitten me hard for , must be 4 days now..... only nips here and there!
It appears that by me being consistent, and when she bites, i hold my breath, try to push past the pain (like in labour ) and quickly place my finger to break the seal and her grip and take her off and put her down and say "no biting, you hurt mummy when you bite me" and then that seemed to work.... doing that again and again.... instead of shouting "OUCH!" cos she seemed to LOVE that when i did that so i had to stop doing that which I did and I feel that has helped it to stop!
Efjay - some wonderful advice thank you. I have made sure she comes to me for a feed (most of the time) now rather than me offering it as much.... seeing as she is 12mths now she doesnt' seem to want it as much, which is sad tho for me!
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) and quickly place my finger to break the seal and her grip and take her off and put her down and say "no biting, you hurt mummy when you bite me" and then that seemed to work.... doing that again and again.... instead of shouting "OUCH!" cos she seemed to LOVE that when i did that so i had to stop doing that which I did and I feel that has helped it to stop!
thank you. I have made sure she comes to me for a feed (most of the time) now rather than me offering it as much.... seeing as she is 12mths now she doesnt' seem to want it as much, which is sad tho 
for me!
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