Beanie Kshetri was excited to become a mother. She had always been told that motherhood is the most wonderful feeling in the world and that breastfeeding is the thread connecting a mother to her child, fostering a unique bond. After giving birth to a daughter, Kshetri felt exactly that, but things changed for her during breastfeeding.
“My 14-month-old bites me during breastfeeding,” says Kshetri. “It makes me agitated and anxious. I have also been experiencing bursts of anger and have been feeling helpless.”
Aiming to get some answers, she took it to Facebook and shared her problem. Though she received various suggestions, none of them proved effective when she tried them.
“She keeps biting,” she says.
Kshetri, however, understood what she was going through was common. As babies began their teething process, many would bite their mothers during breastfeeding, with some doing it to seek attention. However, knowing that did not bring her any relief.
Shared experience
For Pratibha Bhattarai, motherhood was indeed an exciting feeling. She shared that since it was her first pregnancy, holding my baby in her hands and feeding the baby was the best feeling. However, it soon turned into a tumultuous experience as she grappled with the challenges of breastfeeding her newborn.
“When breastfeeding, my baby started biting and it started getting more painful. In around four months, the baby got teeth, and that teething made it very itchy for me as he started biting.”
Bhattarai is currently in Australia with her husband. As it is their first baby, they both find themselves clueless about what to do next.
“My husband was supportive, but sadly, there is not much he could do,” she says, acknowledging his efforts.
Looking for answers and advice, she turned to her relatives. Talking to them made things even worse as it made her guilty.
“Everyone said this was normal or would hurt [now and then] but [there was] no solution,” she says.
However, Bhattarai also found that she was not the only one with such experiences. When her sister-in-law had her baby in Nepal two months ago, she shared her experience with her.
“She was so relieved that somebody understood the pain and the anxiety she was also going through,” she says, recalling the emotional connection.
According to Sanju Karki, a practising nurse at Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, the issue is a common problem but there is no serious concern that should worry the new parents immediately.
“The babies can start to show such symptoms and behaviours early as they suck and bite on the breast or nipple with their jaws. So, the new mothers have not explicitly complained to us about when they come for their post-natal follow-ups, which is also for about six months after delivery.”
However, Karki says that after the babies turn four to six months old, they start to grow teeth and the same behaviour tends to have more impact on breastfeeding mothers.
Seeking help
Apart from the mothers who choose home birth, Karki informs that the hospital and nursing staff do orient the new mothers on post-natal care (how to take care of their newborns), how to breastfeed, and family planning steps.
“There is a 30 to 45 minutes of session for each mother, while they are in the hospital. It is also a one-year-long midwifery course in nursing,” says Karki.
Karki says, when the babies suck the most common problem that mothers will experience is cracked nipples.
“For this, we recommend them to use nipple cream or caps that provide protection and care for the mothers,” she says.
Bhattarai, looking for answers, sought help from midwives in Australia who told her to stop breastfeeding her son as soon as he started to bite.
“I tried using a nipple shield too, but the baby did not like it. The attachment to my nipples was very painful and I even got blisters. I used my pinky finger to stop him from biting (suggested by the midwife).”
She also started to use lanolin cream which helped her too. Not wanting her sister-in-law to face the same issues, she recommended the nipple shield to her.
“That helped her and her child,” says Bhattarai.
Kshetri tried a different technique by resting her hand on her baby’s head during breastfeeding. Her approach involved gently pulling the baby’s hair when biting occurred, prompting the baby to stop.
“This worked for me,” she says.
With eight years of experience and working closely with new mothers, nurse Sanju Karki suggests that if biting and pulling become serious concerns for mothers, they can opt for alternative feeding ways.
“After six months, the mothers can use breast pumps and try bottle feeding instead. They can also choose to give them infant cereals, lito, mushed rice, together with the milk to decrease the direct feeding time.”
As breastfeeding is recommended exclusively for all babies for the first six months, Karki says, mothers should not have that serious of an issue breastfeeding directly.
Kshetri has now started including three solid meals and breastfeeding in between meals and before sleeping to ease the pull and decrease the effects.
How serious can the emotional distress get?
Acknowledging that some mothers can find it challenging to separate from their child(ren), Karki says they may experience emotional moments and hesitations due to social obligations, making it difficult for mothers not to breastfeed their child. She also adds how it is hard to dismiss the pain and the impacts that mothers are experiencing.
“Problems can get more serious and include issues like separation anxiety and postpartum depression, However, they have put their well-being first too,” says Karki.
While Kshetri has not acquired professional help, Bhattarai has. The advice given to her by the midwife has been helpful, she says.
“Midwives in Australia consider the mental health of both the mothers and daughters. I also researched a lot on my own,” says Bhattarai.
According to Dr Sneha Agrawal Chaudhary, a practising psychologist at the Norvic International Hospital, “First and foremost, breastfeeding is entirely the mother’s choice, and there are alternative options that mothers should also consider. Moreover, any anxious feelings experienced by a mother at any time do not necessarily indicate post-partum depression.”
Chaudhary says that when a nipple bite occurs, mothers can feel irritated. But that could be just a trigger point for the [post-partum] anxiety or depression that was not resolved, rather than biting causing the whole issue.
Like Karki, Chaudhary also recommends choosing whether to breastfeed or not and trying alternative ways to feed the child if it is causing more harm. For new mothers who wish to breastfeed, she recommends keeping the baby closer to the breast and providing them with a larger area to suck on, rather than pulling them back or retracting.
But there has been no correlation or causation between breastfeeding or biting and anxiety or (post-partum) depression so far, she stresses. In retrospect, she suggests, that using words like depressed or anxiety has been the norm somehow.
“They are very big words, and they have the gravitas but we are now using it commonly. So, it might not always reflect what one feels,” says Chaudhary.
With her decade of professional experience, she says, “We do get cases of postpartum depression or anxiety. And at that time, breastfeeding is a part of it. But with new parents, they are tired and sleep-deprived. And to breastfeed a child, you need energy to do it. So, when tired, breastfeeding could be an add-on factor for how mothers feel.”
Today, people, especially in urban areas, are hyper-aware of their physical and mental health, while others may hesitate to seek help. Additionally, in Nepal, there is still a significant amount of stigma and reluctance surrounding seeking mental health assistance. This leads to mothers or parents lacking proper diagnosis and support, she adds.
“When breastfeeding bigger kids, biting is more normal. I breastfed my child for more than two years too. But one can use a nipple shield or apply cream and moisturise every time,” says Chaudhary.
On seeking professional help Chaudhary suggests that new parents seek help whenever they feel necessary, more so if they are living nuclear.
“Because there are only two people, it is more important that you take care of your mental health in every way rather than suffering in silence. Partners should communicate and share their emotions and feelings, to ease some of those feelings away and share the joy of parenthood. Families, though virtual, can also lend an ear and console them when needed.”
But self-care is above all, especially for new mothers, in this case, she says.
