Comments on: Thrush and what to do about it

By: Pumping while nursing, it can be done (with giveaway!)

Pumping while nursing, it can be done (with giveaway!) — Tue, 14 May 2013 02:41:41 +0000

[...] Why was this so difficult? To add to the experience, we (both myself and the baby) developed a raging case of thrush. There were clogged milk ducts, which then led to me waking in the middle of the night with a fever [...]

By: Meredith

Meredith — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 23:09:32 +0000

My daughter who is almost 4 months now had horrible thrush for 3 1/2 months. We tried everything, nystatin, grapefruit seed oil, sterilizing everything and no cure. I had to stop breastfeeding and strictly pump due to the pain…then she went to daycare at 3 months and a week or so…the lady there was like whoa bad thrush!! ( she then had it on her butt too) she’s like oh just rub her mouth with a wet cloth after she eats. Miracles did happen and it was gone shortly after!!!

By: Liz

Liz — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 16:36:24 +0000

Wow. Reading these comments make me realize that the pain I currently feel while nursing is more just the fact that my newborn nurses constantly and is not thrush. Thanks!

By: RookieMom Heather

RookieMom Heather — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 19:23:44 +0000

@Kezia, I’d love to hear all the remedies in your bag (or box) of tricks that you tried.

Some of you are amazing me at your tenacity.

@Nicole T, I’m impressed that you figured out that it was your husband passing it around. Mysterious little buggers, these yeasties!!

By: RookieMom Heather

RookieMom Heather — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 19:21:55 +0000

Thanks @Tinabot for the new ideas.

I also appreciate hearing that I’m not the only one with “burning hellfire”

By: Tinabot

Tinabot — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 16:26:44 +0000

My daughter ended up with thrush (courtesy of my MIL’s fingers in her mouth), which naturally meant that I got it too. She (and I) struggled with it for a month straight. She even got a yeast infection in her diaper rash. The first set of prescriptions from the doctor didn’t work. At all. For either of us. She was too little to eat yogurt, and me eating it didn’t help her, so she kept re-infecting me.
Things I learned? Even if you get an anti-fungal pill, skip the gentian violet – get the nystatin from the doctors in addition to your pill. Not the liquidy drops, but the stuff that is much like vaseline. Use it on both of you immediately after every feeding, regardless of which of you is showing symptoms. And you might feel mean for doing it, but I found that using one of the finger tip baby toothbrushes to rub it into my little one’s mouth to apply it is what finally did the trick to help us both get rid of it.

By: Nicole T

Nicole T — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 21:03:40 +0000

Heather – know that reading/hearing people talk about it is helpful. When I was suffering through it, it seemed like I was the only one who had heard of this complication of lactation. Even my doctor seemed surprised! One more internet hit about it makes all the difference to someone feeling horribly alone and in pain from thrush!

By: Stephanie

Stephanie — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 19:31:14 +0000

Okay, you might not like talking about boobs, but from someone who had a hell of a time nursing because my boobs like to make plugged ducts for funsies, I feel your pain. I ended up having to stop nursing on one side not only because of pain, but because everything on that side freaked out and shut down from what might have been thrush, or might not have been…as they said thrush is hard to diagnose and they thought I had it but then they ended up deciding it was mastitis right behind my nipple (also hard to diagnose because I don’t get flu like symptoms) AND thrush AND blebs. Sooo, the burning hellfire could be from thrush and lots of other things, maybe that is why it didn’t go away in six weeks. Mine took about two months to disappear.

By: RookieMom Heather

RookieMom Heather — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 02:23:49 +0000

I really appreciate these comments, ladies. This post was hard to write (not has hard as thrush!) because I like to keep things positive and never talk about BOOBS.

But if I can help anyone at all, even just with moral support, it will have been worth it.

By: alison

alison — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 18:28:44 +0000

Thank you for this. While my BF’ing has concluded, I dealt with ongoing pain for … way too long. I’m quite certain it was never as bad as ‘real’ Thrush (thankfully), but no one could figure it out. These articles HELP. (PS: the one thing that my doc did suggest which has helped (and I still take) are over-the-counter Acidophilus and Probiotic Complex pills from Trader Joe’s. A preventative / proactive measure for breastfeeding women who have a propensity for all sorts of yeast infections often. Like me!)

By: Hillary

Hillary — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 17:59:35 +0000

I’ve never had ductal thrush but I’ve had oral thrush.
It was like chewing glass for 3 weeks straight. Couldn’t eat, could barely drink. PAIN PAIN PAIN—would rather endure another 42-hour labor/delivery then get oral thrush again…sweet jesus.
Hugs

By: Nicole T

Nicole T — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 13:15:11 +0000

I describe ductal thrush like STABBING KNIVES OF FIRE. Sound about right?

I’ve had thrush. THREE TIMES. I know your pain.

The first time was the first week of nursing. So I couldn’t tell right away that it wasn’t standard issue “new to nursing this sucks”. I wanted to rip my “ta-ta”s off.

Then it recurred at around 3 months, after baby was treated with antibiotics. Baby and I were purple for about a week solid. We did EVERYTHING on every source I could find EVAR to treat it – eating TONS of yogurt, wash everything in HOT water with BLEACH and dry in dryer as hot as possible, sunning diapers/bras, vinegar/gentian violet/antifungal cream on the ta-tas and baby’s bath/butt (at different times of day), etc., etc., etc. It was so involved. I get exhausted just thinking about it.

Then it recurred again, about two weeks later. We had to do all of that stuff… AGAIN … but for all three people in the household – we realized my husband had it on his hands from spit up, so he was passing it around to both of us, then we were passing it back and forth. YOGURT FOR EVERYONE!