Support and Information
NURSING PROBLEMS
While we do not claim to be nursing experts, we, at Nato Bello, are certainly nursing advocates. For this reason, we want to share some nursing information that has been useful to us over the many nursing years.
If you’re having nursing difficulty, please seek help! Don’t suffer in silence. In our experience, support is the key to making nursing work.
- Speak to friends who nurse and seek out other nursing moms. Ask around and find out which moms in your social circles are nursing. Maybe your immediate friends don’t nurse but you may be able to speak to a friend of a friend. We would encourage you to cast off social constraint and approach nursing moms anywhere. If you don’t know a fellow nursing mom, look for one when you’re out and about. Most nursing moms are happy to offer advice or just a sympathetic ear to even complete strangers. We’re all in this together.
- Call a lactation consultant.
- Visit a nursing supportive pediatrician.
- Contact La Leche League.
La Leche League has chapters that meet in many cities and towns. Leaders are available to speak to you on the phone or in person at the meetings. Just having someone watch you nurse and listen to your problems can make the world of difference. The La Leche League leaders are a wealth of information and support. Visit La Leche League’s website to find a meeting or leader near you.
We can not recommend strongly enough the La Leche League Book:
The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding
You can order this book on their website but it is also widely available in stores and online. It is an affordable, comprehensive breastfeeding resource as well as an interesting, well written mommy manual.
Cranial Adjustment is another great option for troubled nursers. Cranial Adjustment is one type of Osteopathic Maniulative Treatment done by Doctors of Osteopathy (DO). This is a little known, miracle treatment for some nursing issues. It is extremely low risk, non-invasive, gentle and affordable.
If you happen to live in or near the South East Michigan area, here is the contact information for a wonderful and gifted DO. She specializes in DO adjustment and has treated countless newborns experiencing nursing trouble.
Dr. Lynn Beals-Becker
4470 Jackson Road
Ann Arbor, MI 48103
734-213-2996
To find a DO in your area visit this website and click on “Find a DO” in the upper right corner of the page:
Here is Jaminda’s story about having cranial adjustments done on her newborn:
Over the years, at La Leche League meetings, I often heard cranial adjustment recommended for babies having trouble nursing or experiencing colic. When my fist baby was born, she was a perfect nurser - calm and peaceful at the breast, good sucking, no colic. I naively thought that her easy nursing was the result of my abundant milk supply and commitment to keep her close to me and nurse on demand.
Six months ago, my son was born. I soon realized that I had almost nothing to do with my daughter's successful nursing. I did everything the same with my son and he was so difficult! We had a couple of days of bliss after he was born and then he got hungry. After having helped many friends and acquaintances with nursing trouble, I was at a loss. He seemed to be sucking the right way but was having trouble swallowing. He would gulp and burp a lot and was irritated and fussy at the breast. But, worst of all, he would get milk down his wind pipe all the time and just scream and cry. It was down hill from there. We had a home birth and my midwife diagnosed him as being tongue tied. We had his frenulum (the small piece of tissue connecting the tongue to your lower palette) clipped when he was 10 days old. This helped a bit with his nursing but he was still having the swallowing issue.
Once we took care of the tongue issue and were still having trouble, I turned to a local DO for cranial adjustment. This DO is known for having special training in adjustments and a focus on helping babies with nursing trouble. She always sees babies in nursing crisis right away, even if she has to come in on the weekend. She is kind, concerned, intelligent and a mom herself. But, most importantly, she has gifted hands.
When she came in the room for our fist appointment, I instantly I felt at ease. She listened at length as I told her all about the trouble we were having. My emotions were so raw after the birth and all of our nursing trouble. I felt sad and overwhelmed. She was sympathetic and reassuring and really gave me hope that she could help.
We put my son on her table on a special quilt she uses just for babies. She made small adjustments to his cranium by touching his head lightly. Then she actually put her finger in his mouth to adjust his palette. This all took no more than 10 minutes. The adjustments were really gentle without any cracking or sudden movements. DO adjustments, in general, are very different from my experience with chiropractic adjustments. My son was calm and quiet while she did the adjustments and afterward I put him right to the breast. I could feel the difference immediately!
We went back to her three more times. During the third visit, she said that she thought she had done all she could do for him. She told me to come back if there were any other problems or if his nursing took a turn for the worse. He was still having a little nursing trouble but it was nothing like it had been before we saw her. In retrospect, after talking with a lactation consultant, I am convinced that he had a combined problem with his tongue and his epiglottis that prevented regular swallowing. We tried everything to help him, and used a pacifier to soothe him when he was too frustrated to nurse. Things slowly got better but nothing made as much of a difference as the cranial adjustment.
Now that he is 2 year old. He is still nursing and has grown past this issue completely. It wasn't until he was 4 months old that he was really on his way to easy nursing. Cranial adjustment may not have completely changed the physical problems but it helped with all of mechanisms and motions involved in nursing and enabled him to overcompensate for the trouble with swallowing. This made it possible for him to nurse through the problems. I don't know what we would have done without it. Each time he got an adjustment, his nursing drastically improved.
Cranial Adjustment done by a licensed DO is so low risk, non-invasive and affordable, there is no reason not to try it at least once. Since my son was treated for his nursing troubles, I have sent many friends to this DO for cranial adjustments for their newborns. Each of these babies have had similar turn arounds in their nursing.