My BMW breasts are stuck on the night shift...

So, Miss P is 3 months old and she is on mixed feeds. Primarily BF with a few FF top ups during the day. She absolutely refuses to take a FF after about 5pm and wants to cluster feed at the breast. This is ok, she's gaining weight and I am satisfied she is receiving enough milk in total (I have had breast reductions and so I simply don't have enough BM to not comp with FF's). BUT... we are co-sleeping (which I love) and Miss P has decided that she won't sleep unless there is a nipple parked in her gob. When she falls into a deep sleep the nipple falls out, she wakes up, grunts, scratches at my chest and scrabbles around and if I don't re-park the nipple she will screech until I do. If I successfully re-park she settles back to sleep... until the nipple falls out and we start again ALL NIGHT LONG.

I'm exhausted. Really. If I re-park quickly Miss P doesn't make enough noise to wake DH, which is important as he has to get up early to be at work by 7am. I don't want him to be exhausted also when he has to focus at work. I can't successfully settle Miss P at night with any method other than the breast - snuggling, patting, shhhh-shhhhing, even a dummy. Which I know is just replacing one vehicle with another and won't fix the problem anyway. Doesn't matter... the dummy is a Hyundai and she demands the fully-optioned luxury vehicle.

After a good 10 hours of suckling my nipples get to feeling pretty sore and sorry for themselves, but at 4am I find the idea of sticking the boob in her gob and getting perhaps 30 minutes of rest is more appealing than any other solution I can come up with... I think my exhausted brain just isn't working properly.

I just need to keep trying with the settling techniques, right? DH suggested we try this weekend and he will settle her... but she hates anyone but me between the hours of 5pm and 8am. DH doesn't possess my delicious, luxurious breasts... and Miss P won't have a bar of him. I know she's not hungry, just sucking for comfort. But I'm not getting any sleep and I fear my nipples will soon fall off.

Perhaps AAMI will insure my breasts and I can get a rental when these ones break down?

Help. Please.

nickle - you sound like an awesome mum. you are doing brilliantly. it is quite possible Miss P is having a growth spurt, and this will pass. She will be building the supply (which is a brilliant thing).

I dont have any advice but had to say I LOVE you car analogy. It made me giggle. :lol:
:hug: I hope you find a solution and get to keep your nipples.

I just had to post because I love the way you worded that!!!

You have a suckelatorus on your hands!! Could it be the dummy isn't a good shape for her? You should try these hawaiian ones that are crazy dummies but babies seem to take to them better? They are called gumdrop pacifiers.

Good luck!!

That was the best description of what's happening! I wish I had some gold advice for you, but I hope it settles soon. My DD wouldn't settle for anyone but me to begin with, then she swapped and would only settle for DH, but I can't remember how old she was. We had to try a couple of different dummies before she found one she liked and that was a big help (and she weaned herself off the dummy at around 11 months old). Good luck :hug:

Love the description! I can understand how frustrated (and TIRED!) you must be! Congrats on breastfeeding, you sound like you're doing a brilliant job. I do hope it settles soon, I know DS had a huge spurt where he was feeding almost every 45 minutes. He's every 3-4 hours during the day and sleeps through now at 6 months.

In the meeeeantime....does DH settle bubba during the day at all? We had trouble with DH settling DS at night when we really wanted it, and we both got pretty tired. Then we thought about it: Why should he have settled for DH at night, when he wasn't the 'settler' any other time? So we tried when we weren't both strung out, and found we had a lot more patience in trying- now, I won't say it works every time, but DS seems more able to settle with DH now that he's done a few times and has some familiarity with it.

Good luck x

My LO used to do this. Rather than wait until she was fast asleep i would let her feed and fall asleep and then slide my finger in her mouth and take her off. At first she would stir and then want to get back on. I would let her feed (this was generally short) and then try again. At the start, she might go on & off many times and then i would just let her stay on if it didn't feel like she would settle (and i was getting tired). But after awhile, it was less and less times that she would wake up again and try to attach. I think i got good at working out the best time to take her off and she got used to sleeping without nipple in her mouth.

HTH

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My LO used to do this. Rather than wait until she was fast asleep i would let her feed and fall asleep and then slide my finger in her mouth and take her off. At first she would stir and then want to get back on. I would let her feed (this was generally short) and then try again. At the start, she might go on & off many times and then i would just let her stay on if it didn't feel like she would settle (and i was getting tired). But after awhile, it was less and less times that she would wake up again and try to attach. I think i got good at working out the best time to take her off and she got used to sleeping without nipple in her mouth.

HTH

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Ooh I like this idea!!!! Sounds logical and like a great way to teach them! I am stealing this! Lol...

DS used to do this too, major booby boy. We found he would sleep if DH put his little finger in his mouth, but then DH didn't sleep well, so then we tried a dummy and after spitting a few out in disgust we found one he liked (after swearing I didn't want my 1 month old to have a dummy I've never been so relieved!) I also did the same thing as MrsBexie - I eased the dummy out of his mouth in the drop off to deep sleep, so he knows it's gone but can't be bothered moving around to try find it again. I did the same thing with breastfeeding when he falls asleep on the boob. After a week of that tactic he spits out the dummy/boob himself and gives a big sigh then falls asleep properly. Hopefully. Most of the time. At least 70% :) Be careful not to take away boob/dummy too early cos then they do stir properly and you have to start again!