I don't have specific experience in the issue of tandem (triandem?) nursing, but do have some experience with cold sores in the breastfeeding dyad. Cold sores are caused by the herpes virus, and are contagious, being spread by contact. My younger son acquired a cold sore at daycare when he was 11 mos. I thought nothing of it and breastfed as usual, and unfortunately acquired several blisters on the left breast. This was unbelievably painful for both of us - especially since it was a primary outbreak. Cold sores are spread by contact, so avoiding contact minimizes spread. Treating with an anti viral cream (Zovirax or Denavir) may speed healing and minimize the chance of spread. If the lesion is in an area that can be covered, covering with an occlusive dressing also minimizes spread. Herpes virus is not known to be transmissable by breastmilk, so the risk is not really in breastfeeding, but in contact. I would think you could minimize risk to the non-affected nursling by washing the breast between nurslings, or limiting the affected nursling to one breast and the non-affected to the other. In the case of three nurslings, you could perhaps encourage the 3 yr old who is currently affected and the 5 yr old who is not (but has been exposed himself in the past) to use the same side and reserve the other side for the infant. Unfortunately, herpes is known to be transmissable even when there is no current outbreak, so there is no way that I know of to completely eliminate the risk of transmission. (Either this info may help you feel better about continuing to breastfeed during an outbreak, or scare you to death, I'm not sure which!) I'm not sure of any good way to avoid contracting it yourself, but if you do, the same anti-viral creams work, or you could take systemic anti-viral meds to speed healing. I found the outbreak on the breast to be very painful, and also had enlarged lymph nodes under my arm. My beloved FP had recently moved away and I could not convince the new doc to give me meds so suffered through for close to 2 weeks. I would hope if you found yourself in a similar situation you would have better luck! We were able to persevere through this episode and get back to painfree breastfeeding eventually. Jennifer Tieman Family Physician Mom to 4, including my nursling Caroline Rose (age 32 mos.) *********************************************** 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(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html