First of all I would just like to tell you all that the other day I was at the hospital with my mum (she was getting x-rays), and I started to get a little thirsty so I went to find a vending machine. When I found one I decided to get a 600ml coca cola which cost three dollars, so I put three dollars into the vending machine and pressed the code to get the coke but it said that it was sold out (which there were still a few left!), so then I pressed the button which gives you back your money so that I could go to a different vending machine. When I pressed the button it gave me back five dollars! I was pretty happy. I know it's only another two dollars from what put in the machine (and completely irrelevant from my blog) but it's actually one of the luckiest things that have ever happened to me! So I was a little excited :)
Today's blog is about healing cracked and sore nipples. Anyone who has ever breastfed knows what this is like! It's sore, uncomfortable, and for some it can be hard to cope with. When I started breastfeeding it was only a bit tender for the first week and a half, but then it really began to hurt! They started to crack and even bleed a bit, which once caused poor Noah to begin vomiting up a bit of blood. At these times I was doing everything I could to encourage them to heal, which it what I want to talk about today! As mentioned in a previous post, I indeed did used to apply Lansinoh lanolin cream on them (pictured above) but this is not the only way to encourage your nipples to heal. Before you give up feeding because it hurts too much you should really try these, but please note that it will not happen over-night, it may take up to one week or two weeks. Just hang in there and it will get better.
As you may have noticed, I always recommend Lansinoh lanolin cream. Lansinoh is not the only brand of lanolin cream there is but it is the one that I really recommend! I'm sure that there are a lot of lanolin creams on the market but what I like about Lansinoh is that you don't have to wash it off before feeding your little one which you have to with a lot of other lanolin creams, there are probably other ones that you don't have to wash off either but this is by far my favourite. In fact my doctor told me about his Chinese burn theory, if someone were to give you a Chinese burn... it would hurt. But if you had a lotion on your arm the person Chinese burning you wouldn't be able to twist your skin and hurt it, so before feeds you could try dab a little bit of Lansinoh on and (hopefully) it wont hurt as much! It still hurts, but it did help a little bit when I tried it (but please remember that you cannot do this if you use a lanolin cream that you have to wash off before feeding your baby!). Another plus this product has is that it is additive free, which you may be able to see on the packaging in the picture above. Also lanolin does wonders for cracked lips, so if you have cracked, dry, or sore lips... you're welcome :)
Another useful tip is to air them out. When a lot of women are done feeding, they do their bra back up. Sometimes it is a better idea to just to keep them out for a bit so that they can air out, which is an easy, natural, and very beneficial way to encourage your nipples to heal. When your baby is done feeding there would still be saliva on your nipples, so when you coop them back up in your bra there would still be moisture on them which may delay the healing process. You don't have to do this every feed, but it would help to do it every couple of feeds.
Remember to change your breast pads regularly! This is important because if you leave them in for a long period of time, this can actually make bacteria grow and can cause your nipples to get worse and maybe even get an infection. As far as I'm concerned, it is not important which brand of breast pads you buy, just as long as you change them regularly.
When you are washing your nipples, use water only. Do NOT use soap, as it has a lot of chemicals which can make your nipples even more sore, and could potentially damage them. So when in the shower/bath, you can wash the rest of your body with soap, but try avoid your nipples.
It is said that cabbage leaves help soothe the nipples. I have actually never tried this because I never thought of it at the time (I wish I did now), but if you want to you could give it a go and maybe even comment if it worked for you.
So there are some helpful tips to encourage the healing of cracked and sore nipples, hope this helped!
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