Dear Fiona, you asked what does Chloe see that we don't and vice versa, my
question is, are epidurals widely used in England, is there a long routine
separation between birth and first attempt to feed?  My experience in 2
different settings was that early experience at BF seems to cancel out the
effects of epidural (neural pathways, Linda?) and the reverse, long delays
made huge differences.
Have had an interesting case this week of a severely dehydrated, high bili
(15) baby.  When I got involved on day 5 (with weight loss of 17 oz!) we
simply fed (mostly pumped colostrum and milk) by bottle and day 6.  By day
7 baby was taking breast sometimes, day 8 all of the time, even breast
(once) that she doesn't like!  Remember the discussion on Lactnet a while
back that these severely compromised babies don't seem to remember using
the bottle on the really bad days and go back to breast easily?

My other observation was why this post c-sec mom was discharged at exactly
2 1/2 days, with a yellowing baby with a weight loss of 10 oz at this point
and no one saw this as a major red flag.  This bit about expecting a 10%
weight loss and not looking at the whole picture is lethal!  Birth weight
was 7-3 and mom was trying to tell anyone who would listen that she didn't
think the baby was nursing well.

I've communicated with the ob dir at this hosp and plan to send her copies
of a couple of BF "apgars" for consideration. I also suggested that maybe
her staff needs to listen to Molly Pessl in Philadelphia on Dec 5.
Sincerely, Pat in SNJ