I had three difficult no-latch cases going. One made a successful transition
from shield to breast last week, and now another finally decided to take the
breast. This second little guy first came to me at 3 wks of age. He was a
tongue-sucker extraordinaire..... never would open very wide, and would
"catch" his tongue instead of the breast. On top of this, mom has the
softest, mooshiest breast tissue I've ever worked with coupled with a large
diameter nipple.

We worked diligently on "open" mouth, and we did suck training to teach him
to suck on something without smashing it as he did his bottle nipple. Only
problem, dad did all the work and so when mom would try baby at breast, he
would go ballistic. We even tried a nipple shield, but it just made him mad.
Two weeks ago I advised the parents to back way, way off of trying to
breastfeed. I asked mom to bottle feed with baby close to the breast, sleep
with him close to breast, etc.  Well, 3 days ago (age 2 mos) they decided to
try in the middle of the night, and he latched on and ate!  He now goes
willingly to the breast; our only problem is that he still does not open
wide very often and so mom gets hurt and gives up on the third painful
round.  This little guy just wants to slurp that breast in so badly. I am
able to shape mom's breast enough and get baby on in a few tries, but mom
continues to struggle with duplicating this. Nevertheless, we are all
thrilled, and as dad said today, "it's all downhill now."

Lisa, sighing in relief as another baby comes through in Santa Maria, CA

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