Mastitis

All of last week I was sick due to mastitis. It started off last Sunday; I had a headache I couldn't get rid of. I kept drinking lots of water because I was worried I was dehydrated. On Monday, the headaches continued. Monday night I started feeling achy, and by bed time I was so cold I was shivering. Robbie wasn't cold at all so I knew I was getting sick. I was so cold that I didn't want to pull off the covers and undo my shirt to nurse Mattimeo. It was really hard to force myself to get even more cold, but I knew that I needed to take care of him. So nursed him several times through the night, shivering uncontrollably. Eventually those shivers turned to sweat, and by morning I woke up as wet as though I had spent the night outside in a rainstorm. I was hot and ached all over. Robbie took my temperature to find it was up to 101.5. He was supposed to leave for some dental work early in the morning, but had me call the midwives first. They told me to come in as soon as I could so they could have a look at me. So Robbie ended up missing his appointment to take me (I couldn't just get a ride because I don't know how to instal the car seat into other people's cars yet and I was feeling too sick to read the instruction manual and fuss in the back seat of someone elses car trying to figure it out).

The midwife asked me a bunch of questions and poked around my back and belly to make sure I didn't have kidney or bladder infections. Since my only symptom was fever and achiness, she assumed it was birth related and not the flu. Then she decided to check my breasts to see how they were looking. Mattimeo has been an excellent nurser, and has been really good to my nipples. I haven't had any cracks or irritation, so I was sure there was nothing wrong with them. But when the midwife took a look, she spotted a little redness on my right breast and felt that it was a little hard under the skin. Thus, she diagnosed me with mastitis, otherwise known as a breast infection. She said that fortunately, it was only in the very early stages. Because of this, I could risk treating it herbally and not use antibiotics. But there was a chance that the natural remedies wouldn't work and I would get really sick and terribly uncomfortable. Mastitis can quickly lead to intense breast pain and fevers of at least 105. I decided to take my chances treating it naturally, since I didn't want to deal with the alternative, which was antibiotics. She said the antibiotics would diminish my symptoms almost immediately, but there was a high risk of getting a yeast infection which could transfer into my breast milk and the baby's mouth. Then we would have a big problem of trying to get yeast out of both me and the baby, which would be difficult since we would continue to pass it back and forth to each other. The natural alternative was to stay in bed for 24 hours and do nothing but sleep and nurse the baby. I was to take echinacea (which boosts the immune system) and have Mattimeo nurse as much as possible to keep the infected breast empty and keep the flow of milk moving. So that's how I spent all of Tuesday and Wednesday. Poor Mattimeo was so bloated from eating so much, but he was such a good boy and kept eating. He helped his mommy get better, plus was a great snuggler and napped with me between feedings. We had picked up the antibiotics just in case things got worse, but by Wednesday morning I was feeling a lot better. Thursday, the fever was completely gone. I still have a little redness on my breast, but it is not sore or hard anymore, and sometimes the redness takes a couple weeks to go away. I have been careful all weekend to take it easy, since it is likely the cause of my mastitis was doing too much activity (since I had not problems with nursing or any nipple damage). I am really fortunate that it did not get any worse than it did; taking care of a newborn while sick is really hard work. I am glad that my mom and Robbie were so helpful so that I could stay in bed those first couple of days.

For those of you who don't really know much about mastitis, here is some information that you should read that I took from "The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding" written by La Leche League International:

Maybe you discover a warm, red, sensitive area on one breast (almost never both unless both haven't had milk removed in a while). Maybe you're running a slight fever, or your're beginning to feel flu-like aches and chills. These are all signs of mastitis. About a third of nursing mothers experience mastitis at some point, usually in the first few months. It can come and go like a whirlwind, sometimes lasting only a few hours. Other times it can hang on for the better part of a week.

 Mastitis isn't necessarily an infection. The suffix -itis just means "inflammation," the process in which protective substances in your body rush to wherever infection is threatening, trying to head it off before it starts or end it before it gets too bad. That physiological process can cause pain, redness, fever, and chills. If there is no infection, and antibiotic won't fix it. Sometimes, however, there is an infection. Infection-based mastitis that doesn't clear with some straightforward breast care tends to clear within a day of starting the right antibiotic, which is usually begun a day or two after symptoms begin. Non-infection-based mastitis usually clears on its own in two to four days. Do the math, and you can see that a lot of mastitis gets "cured" by antibiotics that didn't do anything. But there's no easy way to tell which type you have.

 Typical causes of mastitis are nipple damage that lets bacteria in, milk that isn't removed regularly and well, and a body that's just generally run-down. That usually translates to nipple trauma from a baby who isn't latching well, infrequent or inefficient breast emptying, something that routinely presses on certain milk ducts (such as a poorly fitting or underwire bra, or a backpack), or trying to do too much on too little sleep with too little food ("holiday mastitis" is common). 

The book goes on to describe how to treat mastitis...first with "Empty Breast, Lots of Rest" which is the treatment I used, followed by antibiotics if a natural treatment doesn't work. It also talks about different types of breast massages you can try and when to use hot/cold packs to ease discomfort; both of which I found helpful while I was sick. If you are going to have one book while you are breastfeeding, it should really be this one...it is just full of helpful information.