I'm so sick of this, why does he do it?!

DS is driving me nuts. I feed him 6 times a day, 4am, 8 30am, 11am, 1 30pm, 3pm and a 3 hour ish cluster feed at 6pm! This is fine, I usually enjoy feeding him but lately he is being so frustrating! Literally every feed goes like this: feed one side 5 mins- have hissy fit (violently throw head up and down, same with legs, sometimes cry)- swap sides- feeds fine for 5 mins- hissy fit- swap sides-feed fine for 5 mins... You see where this is going?
Sitting him up doesn't help he still chucks his tanty until I turn him around and then he's fine until the next one. Night times are worse, tonight it was every 2mins, at least it felt like it...
I have no idea why he's doing this. I'm not pressuring him- if he doesn't want any milk I dont push it, but he does, if I put him down he comes over to me and attaches himself! I just dont understand, I think if I did it'd be so much less irritating!

:help: I'm getting so annoyed with him and I hate being angry with him. I just want my peaceful little feeder back. :(

On a possibly related/ possibly not related note; he always feeds to sleep and aside from night sleeps stays in my arms until he wakes up, if I put him down he wakes up after 15/20mins and is still tired and grumpy but wont re-settle whereas if I hold him he'll sleep for 1-3 hours depending on which nap it is.
ETA- not sure why I added that bit, but it seemed important...?

Has af returned yet?
Is he learnig to crawl or walk or anything like that?

Yea, AF came back at 3 months so I doubt that's it.
He's experimenting with letting go of things while standing...

I forgot to add that he does the above routine for a while then either falls asleep or wont take either side at which point he's still throwing himself around so I put him down and he comes crawling back or cries because he wants to be held :wall:

Hi,

Can you sense the hissy fit coming? Can you pre-empt by swapping him before he gets cranky about it? he can prbably get all he wants in 5 mins. At the end of a feed get u and do something else. If tired, into the sling for a sleep. Or a walk outside.
You couldn't be pregnant?
Welcome to life with a toddler - try not to take it personally. Sometimes we just have days.....weeks like that - regardless of how we feed them

I try to catch him before he get's *too* cranky, so as soon as he starts thrashing about I swap him.
RE 5 mins being enough: He does still want more though, this is why I dont understand it, I dont get why he HAS to have the other side so suddenly only to go back a few mins later.
He does the same when I try and lie him in the sling too.
I dont think I'm pregnant, but that's a whole other thread. Lol I have had a few preg symptoms lately but still getting AF so I doubt it very much.
*sigh* toddler... cant believe I'm here already. Lol when did this happen, and why was I not informed?!

MY DD is doing a similar thing but wants to swap to a dummy, she doesn't get angry but refuses to suck until she has had a couple of sucks on her dummy then back to the breast. My theory is that she has decided that it makes her let down come..... I would give her a dummy when she came off the boob and then sometimes just as I did it a let down would come so I would put her straight back on the boob to drink it... I think she associates now that if she swaps to a dummy that she will get a let down when she goes back on..... she doesn't do it if I have left a feed go too long and am engorged and so she has heaps of supply and doesn't have to work for it.

I have a theory that bf babies are superstitious like the Irish! PMSL!! They associate anything and everything with their let down and so will try to recreate the same set of things to get more milk "now damn it now!!"

Anyway it is just a theory... I have only had one baby to observe tho:)

Bella

Any chance of an ear infection or something that makes sucking a bit uncomfy??
It's also the time when they are learning about wanting and asking and demanding and so on - and it can be pretty mad! Another option might be one go on each side and then a drink of water or milk??
good luck!

He has a little fluid in his left ear but we've been treating with homeopathic drops, for nearly a week. It should be getting better by now? This has been going on for a few weeks, if it was the fluid in his ear causing it I think he would have had a full on infection by the time we got him looked at. I'm not sure that makes sense....

Maybe back to the doctor and check? Also - what happens if you feed him with him upright - sitting beside you or something similar?

It doesn't make a difference if he's sitting up or lying down, he still does it.
He's so violent when he does it too, I'm worried he's going to hurt his neck one day :(

Oh yes, illness or teething - also possibilities

Still doing it. :wall:

I found my DS would do this when he wasn't wanting to feed so often. I've since stopped offering and just waited for him to ask for a feed. Invariably it's at the same time i would offer but sometimes not. Turned out he was ready to drop a couple of feeds through the day (only to pick them back up a few weeks later of course :wall:).
Once I figured that out he was happy to feed properly again.

How do I drop a feed? That probably sounds like a stupid question but DS feeds to sleep for every sleep and he's definately not ready to drop a nap. He wont (at least not at this stage) settle without a feed.

Could it be a supply issue? My breasts never feel as heavy or full as they used to, maybe he's having trouble getting let down or getting it out? I know he's really efficient at getting it out by now, I think I'm just clutching at straws. :/

he's definately teething, lots of drool, chewing everything, sooky, etc but I doubt it's the cause he's been doing it for weeks now.

Pretty sure he's having a growth spurt too, he slept lots yesterday and despite the battles he's had quite a few big feeds in the last few days.

I really hope this all settles down soon, it's doing my head in!

It's unlikely to be supply. It's probably a combination of things - teething, developmental, sore ears... Maybe the big feeds are a sign that things are settling down. When he starts fussing, maybe try jsut putting him down and doing something else? He might get hte message that if he wants to feed, then he needs to just feed....? I dunno sorry - hope this phase passes soon.

Thanks Marcellus, ok. It was just a thought. Re putting him down, that's what the ABA lady I spoke to at said too but if I do that he wont sleep and it just makes it worse.
She also said it was probably just because he's more aware now, but every bub goes through that and no-one else seems to have this problem. I dont think she really understood what I meant though. Just the impression I got.

This sort of thing is very common. DS did it at a much earlier age, but very much the same sort of thing. It is very frustrating and stressful :hug: With DS we batteld on for a month or so and then it miraculously went away.
So i fyou put him down, do you try rocking, or patting or something else? Does he respond to any other kind of settling?

He used to but stopped which is why I resorted to feeding him to sleep. I haven't really tried in a while because it was killing my back, but I'll give it a go this afternoon and see how we go. :)

Well it kind of worked. I let him switch sides a couple of times and when it got to the point where he didn't want either side I rocked/patted/paced the room with him and after about 3mins he reattached himself and fed to sleep. So although he didn't settle right away I didn't have to fight with him either. :) only problem is my lower back started getting the muscle spasms/ sharp stabbing pains again. :(

Ah. A bit of success!
Will he settle for lying down cuddles instead of rocking? That's what worked for DS when we transitioned out of feeding to sleep. Actually, he used to lie on top of me and fall asleep that way - somewhat more comfortable than standing up holding him - and then I'd roll him off once he was out to it.

Hi HZ. Sorry to hear you are having feeding issues. Do you feed 6 times a day because that is when it coincides with a nap? Or is he actually demanding that feed? The reason I ask is that DS was down to 3 feeds at 12 months, then a few weeks later he behaved the same to the point where I was spending more time calming him down after a feed than actually feeding him. I persisted a couple of days and then decided it wasn't worth the angst on both sides and I would wait for him to ask before giving him the next feed. He was not fed any formula so he didn't have a preference for that or anything, so I figured he would let me know when he was ready. He never asked again.... but I found out I was 5 weeks pregnant 3 weeks later - yep time of conception was the end of our bf relationship!

If you are feeding 6 times because it coincides with sleep time is there anything else you can substitute to make him feel warm, cosy and secure? Still holding him and gently stroke his face or something? Does he have a dummy?

We also had similar issues when he was teething, and teething did go on for sometime without any other symptoms. I also had another time where he started acting up (biting this time - lucky he only had the two bottom teeth!!), and then it stopped very suddenly. Good thing too, because he was about to be weaned!! :rofl:

Sometimes but mostly when I lie him down he just rolls over and crawls away as fast as he can. He thinks it's a great game. That is unless he REALLY wants his milk. In which case he'll drink a little before making a speedy exit.

MT - it's a bit of both, I feed him because he's tired but he does also want it. He "asked" (read: tried to attach through my 3 layers of clothing lol) for it just before his afternoon nap, but after a short feed (a couple of minutes) he was already wanting to switch sides. Then he decides he doesnt want either side, so I tried the rocking/ patting/ singing (really badly)/ pacing and he re-attached himself (grabbed my boob and put it his mouth) after about 5 mins.
Re other comforters; not really, he has a dummy but if I give it to him he just takes it straight back out and either looks at/ plays with it or throws it away.