During pregnancy I decided very early on to breastfeed, for the obvious and common reasons, it’s better for baby, better for mom and it’s free. I also thought it was a compliment to a natural delivery, and it’s what women are equipped to do. Years and years of growing breasts, and finally they would be put to good use, their intended use, despite the male belief that they were created for oogling and touching.
My mother took me to find a breast pump since I would return to work shortly after the birth and would need to pump. Little did I know then that in order to effectively feed enough breast milk by pumping while away from the baby it’s recommended that you pump around every three hours (yeah right!?!?!) Even as understanding as my boss has been about motherly duties that would never fly. So already, the demand is greater and cannot be sufficed in reality. They never tell you that part during the planning. I look at the breast pump box like a complete idiot, I had no idea what went where or how it would work or what made one pump different from another, or why on earth they would ask so much money for one… that’s so distant from now how fast I can hook up and let the machine get to nursing while I eat my meal, and check e-mails. I even recently thought of how I might do a little laundry while connected to my plastic nipple vampire. After the pump sat in the corner of my living room still in the box months later I decided it needed to be opened so I wouldn’t be experimenting with it with a screaming baby next to me. I hooked it up by looking at the pictures and tried it on. I turned the knob all the way up to super sucker level and thought ‘this isn’t so bad, is that all you got?’ That super sucker level now never gets to work its magic on my fevered nipples.
Once Max was born, as planned, he was placed in my arms immediately and I knew I was to begin letting him try to breastfeed (advice given through birth education classes). I really didn’t know how to initiate this so I looked at my midwife and asked if I could breastfeed him now. I guess I should have asked her how, for that’s what I really meant. She said “yeah, sure go ahead”. Nothing came of it. My birth educator might now say, that was my most important opportunity that was missed, and we didn’t get off to a good start. I wouldn’t be that hard on myself though. The ability to breastfeed is learned; the desire (for both baby and Mom) is instinctive. It’s no great surprise that without a lactation expert there when the umbilical cord had not even been cut to show us how to start the delicate art of breastfeeding during our most exhausting moments in both our lives he wouldn’t latch on and I wouldn’t feel comfortable showing him how. Maybe for some women this comes easier than it did for me. I never did get comfortable with a baby on my breast, I just got used to it.
When hours were passing during the beginning of little Max’s life, it seemed like every time he cried he was handed to me to try to feed. Talk about feeling used up! When we finally got what I thought was a decent latch, one that he didn’t break from, he nursed for a good 20 minutes or so. After he came off my breast I had a blood blister that had formed from his sucking. I remember it seemed that maybe a dozen different nurses passed through my room during our two day stay… each of them very skilled in breastfeeding and willing to share their wisdom. In my state of blissful new mommy joy I listened carefully and tried hard to follow instructions, and follow with patience. I had my first cry over the frustrations of breastfeeding while still in the hospital. I can’t even count how many I’ve had since then.
During our first night there after he began crying he was handed to me to breastfeed and he didn’t latch on. We began trying other things, changing his diaper, kissing and cuddling, etc. Some nurse came running in the room, at around 2 a.m., mind you, wanting to know if I was going to feed him. I explained to her that I had tried and he didn’t latch on. I didn’t explain that he had been on my nipples all day, but maybe I should have. She proceeded to tell me that my baby was hungry, and that she could tell by his cry. She gasped when I replied that I had tried to feed him and would continue trying. Standing in my room during her usual grave yard shift, rested, bright eyed and perked from coffee, she looked at me, who hadn’t slept in 3 days from labor and delivery and numb you know where from constant ice as to not feel the pain that I knew was surely there, and with her eyes said to me, ‘why not now you pitiful negligent mother?’ I immediately picked Max up and began trying again. Though she came across initially as someone that would do us no good, she did have some helpful wisdom on breastfeeding tips.
When the third day came around, still laying in the hospital bed in my hospital nursing gown I became very aware of the sudden gigantic sized swollen breasts that I couldn’t cover up when family and friends came to visit. Being a modest person, I admit I was embarrassed. And with the hormone changes and excitement of the new little one in your life, it seems like the body temperature stayed high, so wearing more wasn’t very practical… especially in July!
We were released from the hospital and at home during our first attempt to feed at home he latched on to one side and the other side began dripping, like the faucet was left on. I panicked at the thought that it would always be this way during his feedings. Well that didn’t last long, within days it became less and less that they leaked. It was if they had a mind of their own and got with the program, ‘only release when it’s the human nipple vampire or the plastic vampire, or at other unspeakable, private and inappropriate times’. I thought during the gigantic breast size 3 days that we would have no problem with milk production. I was full of it and even pumped and dumped to alleviate the pain and pressure. The fact that I dumped it blows my mind now. I should have frozen that liquid gold, but I thought it would always be that way. The only other time I dumped since then was after the most recent unfortunate D&C surgery because of the drugs they give to sedate you. My milk production quickly slowed down and it became very demanding three weeks later to pick up the pace and meet his huger demands. I told myself over and over I wouldn’t join the formula feeding mothers without a great fight. So in that commitment, I became very frustrated and saddened when most of my days involved feeding and pumping, feeding and pumping. It seemed easier to allow the human nipple vampire to take my mommy milk from a bottle, so I became very pump familiar very early on. That might be my birth educator’s opinion on my second greatest breastfeeding mistake. I read somewhere that your body knows the difference between the baby mouth and the plastic pump and produces more milk when the baby mouth is demanding the milk and less milk when the plastic pump demands it. But I was resentful towards him for the pain he was causing my nipples. And some might point the finger and say it was poor latch on. However his mouth was on good. All the right physical signs were there with his latch. I believe he sucked really, really hard, and I was really, really sensitive.
I also experienced the pleasure after two days post discharge from the hospital of a hefty fever from a clogged milk duct. That lasted for a couple days and Tylenol finally broke my fever. But that wasn’t a moment in life when you could do as you’d like when your sick, curl up in bed, sleep and have someone bring you soup. No, there were diapers to change and a hungry mouth to feed. But I got through it after my mid wife said what I dreaded hearing, ‘to get rid of it you must nurse, nurse, nurse, and do it like a cow, get on all fours and lay the baby flat to feed’. No lie, her exact words. And so we did.
I also experienced open friction sores from my pump rubbing my nipples too raw. I changed sizes on my pump hoping that would help, but no luck. So it became a regular thing to have nipple sores. I would just go with it and cleanse, medicate and keep Max off that side for a day. I even used lanolin cream while pumping to try to alleviate the friction. I did that for a long while. Pumping became a sticky mess. And lanolin cream doesn’t run cheap, so add in that expense. But when one breast went out of commission for a day from a sore the other had to be the sole feeder for hungry Max. And boy was he hungry! That was when I became forced to walk down the formula isle for the first time and consider my options. Either supplement with formula or feed the baby less. Neither was appealing, so I tried to pump more from the one breast. Then that side would get a sore. I went down the formula isle again. Sold! I cracked! I caved! I was defeated! I knew it was like someone trying heroin for the first time. I would always buy formula from that moment on. And the first formula bottle I put in his mouth, I had an overwhelming sense guilt come over me. Guilt because I couldn’t give him what was best. That’s all you want for your baby, the best. Life is hard enough, especially when you are growing. We forget as adults the pains of growing. It’s hard for us in other ways, responsibilities. But it’s far harder to be a child than an adult, according to my recollection. So he got formula, and though I got a break from the strain of not having enough food for him, I lost the battle of strictly breastfeeding for at least 6 months, my initial goal.
I continue today to pump several times a day still, I get an ounce here an ounce there. It’s pitiful really, but I am proud to still be trying. Most people cash out long before that. We’re hanging in there though. What ever my body makes still he gets, even if it’s the equivalent of one bottle a day of mommy milk. I give what I can. He still likes mommy milk. And now that breastfeeding takes the backseat to formula feeding, it’s a pleasure to put him on my breast for a moment and feel him close as he feeds on my measly ounce that it took all day to make. As for the vampire plastic pump, I can’t wait to retire it forever! But for now I carry it to work everyday I go in and come home with less and less as the weeks go by. I wish a man could experience this breastfeeding thing. It’s the most interesting journey where every emotion from one end of the spectrum to the other is experienced if you stay with it long enough, unless of course you’re a natural human cow and it comes easy.
If I had another child one day I would try even harder to breastfeed. I would take classes with La Leache League while pregnant. Read everything I could on breastfeeding while pregnant. Begin stimulating the milk before the baby comes. And when the baby comes I would keep strict rules for feeding, no pacifiers to confuse the sucking, let the breast be the first days pacifier. No visitors for several days until the baby has established breastfeeding. You get so caught up in the joy and excitement when the baby comes and don’t realize the opportunities for moments of instinctive bonding and behaviors goes undone. Those moments are lost forever. Maybe the secret to being able to give your baby the very best is in taking advantage of those first moments. The newborn is squeezed into a bright, loud, cold world. Very different from rhythmic heart beats and floating in warm fluid in the dark. Maybe for the first few days it should not be about pictures and cute clothes and being passed around and all the tests the doctors want. Maybe it should just be about baby and mommy, skin to skin and warm milk. I should never have taken him away from my chest during those first days except to change him. If I had the blessing of another baby in the future, our first couple of days together would be just that, a smoother transition, and getting to know one another first.
