Hiya...
Good luck trying to get an answer out of any health care professional on this one - when I first asked about 3 yrs ago everyone either didn't know or wouldn't commit! My main concern was ketones, but eventually I spoke to a chemist who assured me that although the ketones probably would pass into the milk, they wouldn't harm baby. Hmm. There were times I expressed & dumped if I'm honest!
On the plus side, if your sugar levels are just a bit high& you haven't got ketones in theory breast feeding should be fine for baby (breast milk tastes horribly sweet at the best of times lol!) and will help you get the sugar levels down. (albeit it's a blooming nightmare trying to predict exactly the effect I'll admit!). As for any excess sugar in the milk, I'd guess if the milk is more sugary maybe baby will do their great thing of taking what they need & then not bothering with the rest of the feed that time?
I don't think the odd slightly sweeter feed would be a problem though.
🙂
Baby number 1 I really struggled to breastfeed (he was early, I had severe PE, the ketones, he wouldn't suckle, etc etc etc) but we muddled along combined feeding for a bit. I think I took the advice about eating whilst feeding too closely - I think it really depends on person to person how much your sugar levels will drop (& on how effectively baby feeds too). Baby number two was a much better feeder but even then I didn't really need to bother with extra carbs whilst feeding, and as a result my overall BG levels were much more stable. Maybe worth a try?
It's really hard getting everything balanced in the early days (sleep deprivation doesn't help either!) so you have my sincere sympathy!
Whatever you feel, please don't beat yourself up if you get to a point where it all just gets too much & you want to go on to bottles - no one who has not had to juggle breastfeeding, diabetes control (enough on it's own!) and a new baby can possibly understand how hard it can be & might not understand if they are accidentally making you feel pressured to persevere when maybe it's not the best thing for both of you at that stage. We never really got 100% fully breast feeding with either baby, although baby number 2 had much more breast milk, but they are both feisty, happy lovely babys. (Sorry this is a bit off topic, but I ended up with PND first time round, a lot to do with feeling like a failure re the whole natural birth / breast feeding fascism that's out there & I'd hate anyone else to feel like that!).
Fingers crossed things fall into place for you soon, and you feel more in control, but either way take care of yourself & be gentle on yourself too!
🙂
