Ouchy!!

evertz

Well, I got my first plugged milk duct yesterday. Holy geez it hurt!

It started off with me noticing that part of my breast still felt full and hard after breastfeeding. I didn't think much of it because I'm a FTM and didn't know to look out for that as a warning sign.

Later that night I went to a movie with some girlfriends and noticed my breast was getting very engorged, swollen, and painful. I thought it was strange since I had just fed LO on that breast before I left for the theater. When I got home DH was in the middle of feeding LO from a bottle, which sucked because I was hoping to BF. So I ended up pumping. I only got 1.5 oz from the swollen, engorged breast. I got 6 oz from the other... I definitely knew something was wrong at that point. Not to mention it had gotten SO painful.

I was worried about mastitis but when I had done some google searching I came to the conclusion that it was a plugged duct. Obviously, my pump wasn't strong enough to unplug it so I was going to have to try and have baby do it. After some massage, I did a cold compress and then a hot compress and then put baby on the breast. WORST PAIN EVER! I can't even describe how badly it hurt as soon as baby started sucking. But thankfully he was able to unplug the duct and get the milk flowing - what a relief!! After he was done feeding I managed to hand express the rest of the milk from the plugged up area.

It's still a little sore today, I imagine from all the aggressive massaging I did to get the milk out, but I'm SO thankful LO was able to get it unplugged right away and I'm not still dealing with it today. And now I know the early signs to watch out for and I'll make sure to do the massage + hot/cold compress before it reaches critical mass. 

katie6/26/04

If you find it happening often you may want to start taking Lecithin capsules everyday as a preventative.  I got them a lot with DS and it helped decrease them.  I noticed one starting with DD and started taking it again right away because they are not fun.

kgs0505

massage during pumping too, it helps. i've gotten a couple plugged ducts. after the first one, it's easier to recognize. i always do a quick massage to check the ducts as i pump to make sure they aren't feeling too full. it helps a lot.