Who Doesn’t Love a Carnival?

Especially one about boobs.

Lotus over at Sarcastic Mom is holding a Breastfeeding Carnival. But really it’s just a “share the story of feeding your little one” Carnival. No one is excluded and this is really just meant to be an open forum about how and why moms choose one method of feeding over another, I think. No one is judging breast vs. bottle - we just want to share our experiences for posterity. And it gives me another entry to put in the Boobs category, which I love and want to use far more often.

So feeding….

I planned to breastfeed but I was very nervous about it. I knew better moms than me had serious trouble with it and ended up in tears or quitting or both. At the same time, I figured I could learn. I mean, if women weren’t able to figure this out, the human race would have died out thousands of years ago because Enfamil just hasn’t been around that long. I read books, I went to class, I eagerly devoured blogs written by new moms and just about had breast milk coming out my ears before I was even in my third trimester.

Bridget was born a very considerate four days early, happy and healthy with all her parts and faculties. Well, all the faculties a newborn is supposed to have, which aren’t many. I was lucky enough to have a magical candy and unicorns (thanks for that phrase, Statia) birth - labor coming on naturally and progressing quickly with no drama, and an anesthesiologist who was Johnny on the spot with the good drugs. I got to hold her immediately after her birth and we attempted to nurse right away. She wouldn’t latch.

Oh well, I thought. She’s tired. It’s been a long day for her. I did just eat very soon before she was born. Maybe she’s still full from breakfast. But all through the night, despite my best efforts and the best efforts of the very pro-breastfeeding nurses, she would not latch. One nurse thought the problem was my nipples. One thought it was Bridget. Since she was born late in the day on a Sunday, I didn’t get a chance with a lactation consultant until Monday afternoon. At that point, the girl hadn’t had a thing, and while she didn’t seem to care too much, it was troubling. So I accepted the notion that she needed something to wet her whistle, and we began the dance that carried on for several days. Step 1. Try to get the baby to nurse for about 10 minutes or until she got frustrated. Step 2. Give the baby a tiny bit of formula in a bottle to ward off dehydration. Step 3. Hook myself up to the massive milking machine for 10 minutes so that my supply would be there when Little Miss finally decided to motivate herself to eat.

After visits with three LCs and several nurses who themselves had breastfed, at discharge we were no closer to working out our problem. I had started to produce colostrum, which I would scrape off the sides of the cups of the breast pump and rub into Bridget’s mouth. Thus began my very stressful week. We did this dance every three hours and my stress level just increased every single time. I mean, I had one job in the world and that was to feed my baby. And I was failing miserably. We came home from the hospital on a Tuesday and Wednesday night around 11 p.m. the girl finally figured out how to latch on. After that, nursing was still a beating, sometimes taking an hour for her to remember how to do it. I began to cry a lot and dread nursing. Finally on Monday, I couldn’t take it anymore and I rudely called a Lactation Consultant that my nurse had recommended at 8:30 in the evening. I thought I was reaching her at her office but it turned out I had her home number. She was very sweet though, and was patient while I gathered my wits and stopped crying long enough to beg for her help. She made me an appointment for the next day, at which she got me and Bridget on the right track in about 15 seconds.

I can’t stress enough how much I owe to that woman. I was very close to giving up on breastfeeding and in 15 seconds, she turned us around. It wasn’t a magical switch - it took some practice but within a week or so, nursing became less of a hassle and something that I actually enjoyed. I didn’t dread it anymore. And I could get up in the night, nurse without waking up too much and get back to sleep relatively quickly. I never mastered the art of nursing while lying down, and I was also eager to get Bridget sleeping in her own bed, and then her own room so I made the trip down the hall a few times a night.

As she got a bit older and bigger, we had a few troubles again since I had only mastered the football hold, and as Bridget grew, this hold didn’t work very well for us anymore. Our LC came out one more time and taught me a few other holds and we were off to the races. I know that there are many sources - books and websites - that show you how to do these holds, but I don’t learn that way. I need someone to come show me how to do it, which she did and all was right in the world again.

Then came the real trouble. Bridget would only nurse for 5 to 10 minutes per feeding before getting distracted by the sun and the cat and the air and pondering the theory of relativity. And anyone who has ever nursed knows, you cannot force a baby to nurse. It takes far too much effort on their part - you can’t even trick them into it. She only gained 9 ounces between her 4-month and 6-month check ups. The doctor was slightly concerned. He asked me to start supplementing her with formula. The first bottle of formula I gave her she took standing up in my lap, which is definitely something she could not do while nursing. To make a long story short (too late!) we struggled to prepare a bottle, nurse, feed the bottle and also work in solids. I sought the help of the LC again but I could not feasibly work in pumping to the already busy feeding time. I started replacing one nursing session per day with a bottle. Then I stopped nursing during the day, giving only formula but continuing to nurse before bed and during the night. But eventually that took its toll on my supply and resulted in a frustrated baby right before bedtime. Finally at around 7 months, I had to give up nursing altogether.

I was sad to stop nursing and felt like I had failed somewhat. But I realistically know that the outcome was just a result of her personality more than anything I was doing or not doing. And if anyone was going to be upset or traumatized by weaning, I’m glad it was me and not her. I’m very lucky that Bridget is such an amiable, adaptable kid. She doesn’t get too upset when you change her life around and took the whole thing in stride.

I never thought I liked nursing too much until I stopped. It was a great bonding thing between just the two of us. Not that you can’t bond while bottle feeding, but since I was the only one who could feed her, we just had our own little world where she would look up at me, and put her hand on my breast. I missed that a lot. But I liked having my body back to myself, not having to worry anymore over what I ate or drank. I could also let someone else handle those middle of the night feedings. Only problem there was that once she started getting formula before bed, she stopped waking to be fed in the middle of the night. Convenient for Jake, no?

Anyway, that’s our story. A combo of nursing and formula feeding. It worked out for us and I don’t regret any of it. I’m glad I had the chance to nurse. If I ever have another baby, I will certainly nurse again. But if I can’t or the baby can’t or won’t, I won’t stress about using formula either. Nursing is great but having a happy and relaxed mom is more important, and if nursing is the cause of too much stress, it’s not worth it in my opinion. Don’t let the boob nazis tell you any differently!

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