HI

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!

Good luck.