with all due respect, there are a number of things in life and breastfeeding that we may not understand the exacts of how or why they work for certain situations that do not make immediate sense but they do. I personally loathe nipple shields. more often than not, they are the Bane of my existence, and at the same time the insurance that my practice will never die because I have yet to meet a mother who delivered at one hospital here that didn't have one given to her in the hospital before discharge. I thoroughly dislike them, moms are not shown how to use them, or when, not instructed on how to wean from them. they are usually given a size that doesn't fit them.  in the case I described, the highly motivated mother tried every position and hold, and I mean really tried. she took baby to chiro, and she tried suffering through the pain of bub only getting three fourths of the nipple in her mouth, no matter what position or hold she used. with three other small children under foot she did not have the luxury of express and feed while dad worked (I did suggest it,btw) and family was hours away and friends telling her to just feed formula if it was that hard and painful. and much as it pained me, in this case a nipple shield was the tool of last resort, AND it was the tool that allowed this mother to Feed her baby at the breast successfully until baby got big enough to do so easily on her own. I dislike tools, and this  tool in particular, however, in this car it was the one that helped mom be successful. it didn't make me feel any warmer about shields, I still hate them. but on occasion we may come across a situation where an oft misused and abused tool, can and does work in a situation it would not otherwise be used for. in this dyad, with this issue, it was what helped them succeed where nothing else did. an unconventional solution for an unconventional situation. and it worked. without the benefit of a fiberoptic camera in bub's mouth, i can not tell you why it did when nothing else would, just that it did. i begrudgingly accepted it and allowed myself to share in mums joy.

Angela Hartfelder IBCLC,RLC

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