Back in 1991, I succeeded at getting my adopted daughter nursing.  We finally succeeded the day before her first birthday.  Like Karleen, I've been in touch with many moms who have gotten older babies, and even children who were no longer babies, to take the breast.  Recently, I've heard from several moms who have encouraged their children to let them squirt milk from the breast into their mouths, and that has progressed into the child trying to take the milk right from the source.  It wouldn't have helped me, because I wasn't producing enough milk until after my daughter started nursing, but for anyone who is, it would be worth a try.  

With Julia, what made the biggest difference was threading the tube of a nursing supplementer through a wide-based bottle nipple and feeding her with that.  Since she had freaked out when I had tried to hold her facing into my breast, I started her feedings in the position she had been taking her bottle feeds in.  Without there being a bottle in the way, I could gradually turn her closer and closer, until she was starting with the bottle nipple placed over my breast.  I tried to move that, once she was almost asleep, to see if she would latch onto my breast.  She would open her mouth, but close it when her tongue touched my skin.  We then went to a latex nipple shield, with the Lact-Aid tube taped under it.  After a couple days of that, we were there!  It had taken over five months to get her from gastrostromy fed and not allowing me to hold her facing me, to happy, secure nursing baby.  She still tells me, every once in a while how comfortable and safe she felt when she nursed.

If anyone needs more details on combining the tube and bottle nipple, email me.  It is has to be done exactly right to work.
 		 	   		  
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