Biting while nursing

posey1005

Hi ladies, My son recently started teething and has cut his bottom front two teeth. I started giving him teething rings to help and he tries to get whatever he can in his mouth. Now when nursing he's started to bite me. He uses a lot of pressure and it can be pretty painful. Usually it is at the end of the feeding so I try to take him off. Sometimes if I try to unlatch though he'll bite. I could probably handle the occasional bite, but I'm most bummed that I've had to cut comfort feedings out and when he nurses I'm on edge the whole time when I usually enjoy bonding and find it relaxing. I want to get past this but I'm worried he's still too young to understand "no."  After a bite I will also pull him off and end the feeding, hopefully to teach him not to do it, but he doesn't seem to understand. Has anyone else experienced this at a young age? Is there anything else I could try? My son also doesn't take a bottle, but as mentioned above, I enjoy nursing anyway so really looking for a solution.

midge519

My daughter did this and I would disconnect her and say "We don't bite mommy. That's not nice" firmly.  A few minutes later I'd reconnect her and try again. She did it twice before realizing it wasn't ok. She was about 5-5.5 months when it happened. 

posey1005

Thanks, @midge519. I have been saying "no" and ending the feeding. He's doing it less frequently, but I think also in part because I am being more vigilant and watching cues to be sure he is hungry and focused on nursing. I think we'll get over this bump soon. 

capricelili

Same here, I say "no we don't hurt mommy. Biting hurts". Pull him off and set him aside, he might get upset he's been pulled off, then wait and try again if he's still hungry. He still has done it a couple times when sleep feeding if I'm not vigilant, it's hard to correct him then because he's practically asleep. The actual biting phase before he stopped doing it on purpose lasted a couple weeks and I was on edge the whole time. I try to keep my attention on him now just in case, but I'm not as scared any more. Good luck it will get better and you'd be surprised how much they understand now.