This is not a case I've had to deal with myself, I'm glad to say,
but it happened recently at a Rome hospital. I've been asked to get an
opinion on it, in case the mother contacts an LC or LLL leader here.
        After giving birth, this woman produced a lot of milk from one
breast, but nothing at all from the other. It was impossible to get a drop
out. She became very engorged, and then got mastitis.
        It turned out she had had an operation on that breast some years
earlier for an intraductal papilloma. It's assumed the surgeon must have
tied the ducts. The hospital had a very simple solution to this problem:
they told the mother she wouldn't be able to breastfeed, and gave her pills
to dry up her milk. The mother apparently accepted this, and went home
bottle-feeding.
        In the unlikely event that this mother were to contact us, what
should we say? If she were to put the baby back to the breast, she could
start producing milk again. But what about the blocked-off breast? How could
she deal with the engorgement?
                        Anna Lowenstein
                            Zagarolo, Italy