He won't eat! (long)

gatsbygirl

Breastfeeding is turning into a nightmare for us right now. LO started off nursing great for the first 12 weeks. Then he got sick, cut two teeth and on top of all that I've got an oversupply and fast letdown problem. We had about 6 weeks of green diapers that got consistently worse until they were regularly 100% dark green. So, we decided to start block feeding. It's working in that his diapers are beginning to get more yellow, probably around 60 (green)/40 (yellow) now.

The problem is, LO HATES it. He's become so used to my overfull breasts + fast letdown that he only wants to nurse until the first letdown. After that, he fusses and cries and will end up screaming he gets so mad. I have to use breast compressions the entire feed to keep him on for longer than a second or two. Also, if my letdown take more than 10 seconds, he cries. I thought teething might be part of the problem, but as soon as I switch to the other (full) breast, he latches on no problem and eats frantically until he falls asleep.

I'm at my wits end. We had issues like this with my DD and she ended up refusing the breast completely by 8 mo. I was supplementing her with formula though so I always thought that was the problem. DS is EBF and only gets bottles of pumped milk 1-2 days a week when I'm at work. At most, he gets 4 bottles per week. We also waited until he was nearly 5 weeks old to introduce a bottle, so I don't think it's a bottle preference problem.

I just don't know what to do anymore. It's so horrible to see him screaming because he's hungry but refusing to latch on. His wet diapers are starting to smell very strong now too, which makes me worry he's beginning to get dehydrated.