Our son's wedding is over (it was wonderful), catch-up and family trips
aren't quite over, but I can't keep this one to myself:

A first-time mom came to see me at just past 4 months, with a baby who was
thriving on a nipple shield.  She wanted to get rid of the shield, but the
baby had refused all her attempts, including lots of co-bathing, shared
sleep, and self-attachment attempts.  The shield was probably initiated in
the hospital because of poor positioning rather than any major problem; her
nipples and baby's anatomy were normal.  The mother is very much an
attachment parenting mother, and she hated the barrier.

We corrected positioning to get baby's chin buried in breast, and tried
playing games with the baby:  "Suck on my nose?  How silly!  Suck on my
chin?  How silly!  Suck on my elbow?  How silly!  Suck on my nipple?"  At
that point the baby caught on and balked each time.  Mom went home with
games and improved positioning, but came back about 3 weeks later with baby
still completely on the shield, still unhappy about even the feel of her
mother's bare breast.

I've always wished for dissolving nipple shields, or a succession of
flimsier and flimsier shields.  Lacking them, there's an idea I've had for
many years - never tried - that I posed to her, and she was happy to try it.
We tied a string firmly to the open end of a small, deflated party balloon
(the kind that blows up into a sausage).  That was to give us a solid grip
on the 8-10 cm long balloon no matter what.

Mom lay down with baby and propped herself on one elbow - their preferred
feeding position at the time.  I held the balloon against her breast so that
it would lie along the baby's tongue, with the tip of the balloon extending
just past her nipple tip.  The baby was much more willing to sample the
breast, with the familiar feel of something artificial between baby and mom.
But... gee (we could sense the baby thinking), this "nipple shield" didn't
stay put the way it was supposed to, slipping around here and there.  Baby
opened wider as if to make sure it all got in and to try to keep it in
place.

We had several latches that way - baby approaching the breast, trying to get
the "nipple shield" to perform by gaping/gathering much more than usual,
taking a few sucks, coming off.  A bit of fretting, but no crying, and good
let-down and swallowing.  We experimented with taping the balloon to
stabilize it just a bit, because my original plan of just pulling it out
after sucking was established wasn't very successful.  But the balloon
seemed to work best just held loosely in place and left in the baby's mouth
for those short sessions.  It slipped around in the mouth but didn't seem to
cause any problems; it was just too flimsy to matter.  On later latches, we
didn't even need the balloon.  At one point the baby nursed for several
minutes.  It was by far the best breastfeeding this baby had ever done.

In all, baby took perhaps a third of a feed.  But the behavior and sucking
made it clear that they were on the brink.  Mom wisely decided to head home,
let baby sleep in the car, and resume with a rested, still-somewhat-hungry
baby.  She took home the balloon and the nipple shield, not expecting to
need either one.

She didn't.  The next couple feeds involved the same fretting at first, the
same on-and-off feeding, and from then on everything was fine.  Within a
couple days, the mother had the strong sense that her baby was enjoying
breastfeeding more than ever.

Okay, I know all the problems with this.  Party balloons are most definitely
*not* designed for this purpose.  They're latex (we discussed this, washed
the balloon beforehand, considered using a non-latex glove, holding one
finger against the breast - which I also think would work well).  There's
the horrifying possibility of aspiration (which really didn't seem like a
genuine concern, once we tried it; we had a firm grip on an extremely
well-attached string, and there never was dramatic traction on it anyway).

But it was an extremely short-term tool, and this mother will always
celebrate the role a little party balloon had in their breastfeeding
relationship.  So will I :-)
--
Diane Wiessinger, MS, IBCLC  Ithaca, NY
www.wiessinger.baka.com

             ***********************************************

To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail
To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest)
To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
All commands go to [log in to unmask]

The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html