Dear Geraldine,
I am just about to have my second baby and am nervous of developing mastitis. When I breastfed my son 2 years ago, I developed mastitis. It was not properly diagnosed even though I had a fever, lumps and excruciating pain. The antibiotics didn’t work and the mastitis developed into an abscess, which again was misdiagnosed until I ended up in A&E. I was told that my large breasts masked the severity of the infection which is why it was missed.
Now to my horror, by breasts have grown even more and I am worried that if they were too large last time, does it mean that I will be more likely to go through it all again. Selfishly, I would rather not breastfeed at all!
Annie Sulivan
Dear Annie,
It breaks my heart to read emails like this. I understand what a tough position you are in but I am sure that we can get through this together without mastitis or and abscess. I am going to outline a few things for you with regards to feeding with larger breast but you can find a more detailed version in the Mastitis Guide or the Beginners Guide to Breastfeeding.
1. Mastitis is a result of the breast not being drained properly. With larger breasts, it can be difficult to ’see what you are doing’ when trying to get baby latched onto the breast. You can roll up a muslin and pop that underneath the breast, right at the back near your rib cage to lift the breast so that you can see what you are doing.
2. Larger breasts are also more mobile in that they will fall to their natural resting position. If you have lifted the breast, just be careful that the breast doesn’t start to slip or move downwards, or it will fall out of baby’s mouth and the lower half of the breast won’t be drained.
3. There are many warning signs you can pick up on before you develop mastitis. Knowing when you are more at risk of developing mastitis, will ensure that you are on top of things if they start to go pear shaped. Second time mums produce more milk the second time round than they do first time round. Depending on how big your baby is and how effectively your baby feeds is crucial in the early days when your milk is coming in. If you are producing too much milk for your baby to drain and your breasts feel like they are going to explode, you can do one complete pump to drain the excess milk. (that is just one pump, not once a day as the more you pump the more you will produce)
4. Use you cold compresses to reduce swelling so that the milk ducts are able to dilate and allow the milk through (in between feeds)
5. Use hot compresses to increase and maintain milk flow during the feed.
6. If you are struggling to get your breasts to a comfortable level, come and see me and I will help you reduce your supply so that you are not prone to developing mastitis.
Something went wrong with your breastfeeding – it is very common and you are not alone. The real problem was that you didn’t know how to assess and manage things properly. I will make sure that you are educated and well informed so that you can respond quickly and effectively at the first sniff of a problem.
Don’t give up on breastfeeding your baby just yet, there is so much we can do to get you feeding well and loving it!
Kind regards,
Geraldine
