If you've been reading my blog for a while, you might remember the struggles I had breastfeeding Colin. Looking back, and with the new experiences I've had, I think I gave up too quickly on it the first time. I have absolutely nothing against moms who feed their babies formula, but I really wanted to nurse Colin, and I felt a lot of personal guilt when I decided to stop after just a few weeks.
When I found out we were expecting another baby, I was determined to give breastfeeding another chance. I tried not to invest too much of myself in it emotionally, but it was really important to me to at least give it my best effort. While I was in labor, I told my nurse about the desire to breastfeed and asked to hold my baby as soon as possible after the c-section so I could put him to the breast.
Best laid plans... am I right? When Reid was born, he aspirated fluid and was whisked away to the NICU. I don't think I've ever felt so hopeless. That sounds extreme, but so are the emotions a mother experiences after giving birth. A counselor even visited me during Reid's NICU stay to talk about the signs of postpartum depression. It was that bad.
But, the show must go on, right? Just because I was bedridden until I could get myself into a wheelchair and visit my baby, that didn't mean I had to give up on breastfeeding. It was one more bump in the road, but I wasn't ready to give up.
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| photo by Callie Cothern, my dear sister :) |
I waited patiently for my milk to come in, and pumped every couple hours, as instructed by the lactation consultants who visited me. My breasts were painfully swollen and engorged, but it's like they refused to let down for the pump. Every time I would get a little colostrum, I'd do a little happy dance, and I'd send it to the NICU to be given to Reid through a feeding tube. He was also supplemented with formula until finally, on day six, I was able to provide enough breast milk for a full feeding. That was the day we were discharged, and shortly before we left to go home, I got him to latch on for the first time. It was a great moment.
Once we were home, I had no idea what to expect. He had been fed through a tube and then a bottle. Would he have trouble latching? Would I continue to make enough milk? What would happen when I went back to work and he went to daycare? I tried to put my fears aside and just roll with it. And suddenly, everything just clicked. Despite our struggles in the beginning, Reid has always latched on beautifully, and pumping has gone well for me, too. He hasn't had formula since coming home from the hospital, and he's still gaining weight like a champ. He drinks his bottles at daycare and nurses in the evenings when we're together. The last couple nights, he has "cluster fed" leading up to bedtime and then slept a nice, long stretch, only waking once to eat around 3 am. He is my angel baby, and I am so very thankful things are working out so far! Being a nursing mother who works full time outside the home has presented its share of challenges, but it has been worth it.
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| a pretty typical evening at our house |
If you have any questions for me on this subject, or would like to hear more about any particular aspect; pumping at work, nursing in public, Colin's reaction to a breastfed sibling, or anything else you can think of, please let me know and I'd be happy to address it in the next post. Thank you all for the encouragement and support I've received throughout this journey!
More to come.
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