breastfeeding

So im pregnant with my 2nd child and i would really love to be able to breastfeed her. i was able to breastfeed my son with absolutely no issues for the first week, then when i went to leave the hospital i had a meeting with the lactation consultant who told me i was doing everything wrong and "corrected" my son's latch. it ended up making everything hurt and was starting to effect my supply, so i stopped.

so now i turn to you lovely ladies of BG and ask you, what are ur secrets to success??? id love if you could share your stories, any advice, some helpful tips?

  thank you!

Practice, practice, practice. Patience, patience, patience.

Those are the two main things (for me, anyway) It can be tiring and frustrating, but it gets easier and is totally worth it. Talk to more than one person if you think you're having issues. Read about it, ask questions, be comfortable with it! And always come ask on here if need be, plenty of women are happy to offer tips and advice!

Take everyone's suggestions in stride. Listen to what they have to say and then modify for what works for you and baby. Ultimately you are the best judge of what works for your baby. Be confident in your intuitions! I hold my boob the opposite from how they say to hold it but holding it their way didn't work and I nursed both my kids for 15 moths each doing it my way.

I've been breastfeeding my DD for 3 months, she is a natural at it. So, I don't have any terrific advice other than to stick to it. The first two weeks were miserable for me, with the bleeding and cracked nipples and engorgement. But yeah, just hang in there! I just want to be encouraging and wish you lots of luck!

Quoting Christen-Mary:" So im pregnant with my 2nd child and i would really love to be able to breastfeed her. i was able to ... [snip!] ... you, what are ur secrets to success??? id love if you could share your stories, any advice, some helpful tips?   thank you!"

My best advice (from personal past experience): Don't let them dumba**es at the hospital tell you how to do it. First of all, chances are they've never actually BF anyway. Secondly, every experience I have heard of (including my own) all they managed to do is screw it up. My plan for this baby is to tell them I know what I am doing and just let me and DD learn together. Last time, DD latched on perfectly at first and all was going well, then a nurse asked if I had ever BF'd before or went to any of the classes and I told her no and from then on everything went downhill. Random nurses and LC's started yanking on DD's head and pulling on my boobs (making it very stressfull) and then when DD stopped eating they decided we needed to stay in the hospital for 5 days (!!!) because she "wasn't eating" (even though I told them she was doing fine when her and I were alone). Then they decided it was because I have "goofy nipples" (the LC's exact words) so they made me put these goofy things over my nipple (which hurt btw) and causing nipple confusion and she stopped BFing all together. I ended up pumping for months (until I just couldn't take it anymore) because I couldn't get her to latch after that whole disaster!
Back in the day women were not "taught" how to BF, it came naturally between mother and baby... (don't get me wrong, there is no shame in asking for help but like I said, in my experience they don't help at all...)