need help/encouragement

elabarr

Hi All-

My DD is 4 months old. I have used a nipple shield for most of those 4 months. She has been EBF from the beginning and I have never had to supplement with formula. She has also had bottles since she was a couple of days old.

She had been nursing for at least an hour per session (30 min each side) with the shield and eating every 3 hours. So by the time she was done nursing, I had 2 hours until she wanted to eat again. I decided about 2 weeks ago to wean her off the shield because I was just feeling like that's all I ever did was nurse, and it still hurt even with the shield.  It seemed like it was going great at first. Her latch didn't seem that great but I could hear her getting milk and my nipples stopped hurting almost immediately, and her sessions went from 1 hour to less than 10 min total but she seemed pretty content.  However, over the last couple of days she has cried every time I've tried to nurse her, to the point of only nursing for about 1 min per side, 2 if I'm lucky. I am so terrified she isn't getting enough to eat now. For example, she "nursed" (1-2 min per breast if i was lucky) every two hours today, her last session at 7, and then was screaming from then until we gave in and gave her a bottle at 8:45. She has been content since then.Each time she nursed today I could hear her swallowing milk for the time she would actually latch.

Has anyone else been through this? It's a terrible feeling to have your child push away from you and scream every time you try to feed her. Any help/thoughts/advice would be appreciated! I am about to lose it.