It has been ages since my darling had any problems nursing. Now because of the blocked airway, she has problems suckling and she would just come and latch eagerly, only to unlatch feeling frustrated because she can’t breathe while she’s latching due to the phelgm. Then there are times that she can latch and drink but when the letdown comes (which is within a minute), she just can’t cope with the sudden strong gush of milk and ends up unlatching and crying again (and of course, there’d be milk spraying everywhere).
I feel so sad whenever she fails to nurse. I can see that strong desire of hers to latch on and suckle (she’d behave like a hungry little puppy), but that look of disappointment and frustration when she can’t drink is just so heart-breaking… 🙁
The most difficult part about her not being able to nurse is that if she doesn’t nurse, it means that she’s not drinking anything else. She’s always been fussy about what we put into her mouth and that includes fluids. Till now, she doesn’t like water and even glucose (which the doctor recommended feeding her when she’s ill). In fact, she’s so against any other method of feeding fluids (or milk for that matter) these days: she’d put the cap back on the sippy cup when we bring it near her then push it away (she did the same to the bottle when my hubby tried using the bottle which we haven’t used for ages). It’s almost impossible to get her to drink fluids and of course, that’s terrible because she needs more fluids when she’s ill. Sigh.
We brought her back to the doctor on Tuesday because she couldn’t drink milk on Monday night. He rented us a nebulizer to clear her airway. It worked well and she nursed immediately after the treatment at the clinic. But this problem came back on Thursday afternoon so we brought her back to the clinic on Friday. We were told to carry on with the current medication as well as the use of the nebulizer. Last night she had some difficulty latching still but the two feeds today so far were fine and I hope there’d be no more hiccups from now on…