Mine and my husbands favorite sign on our sons bassinet in the hospital said "I eat at moms." Yes he does, with a lot of hard work.
I had it in my head that I was going to breast feed my son no matter how hard it was before I even had him. I was told it was going to be hard but I didn't realize how hard.
Why was I so set on it...the benefits to him and the benefits for me. For him it helps with fighting diseases, and it being easier for him to digest. Along with countless other reasons. For me well it burns calories, and they said it helps with postpartum depression (something I was worried about) and then the biggest one the money savings.
As soon as we got into the recovery room. The nurse helped me get him latched on to eat. He ate on both sides for a total of 45 minuets. I was excited that wasn't so bad. He had a good latch. He was sucking good. Once we got to the room we had a paper to fill out for every time he ate, peed, and pooped to help us keep track. The nurses also came in every few hours to make sure he was eating. This is when the that was easy started to go out the window.
If you didn't read any of my previous posts, I was on magnesium sulfate and couldn't get out of bed. It also made me feel awful and all I wanted was to sleep. The first time we had to feed him in our room one of the nurses came in to help us because we couldn't get him to wake up. He only ate for about two minuets on each side. We kept trying every few hours. Not much luck.
Once visitors left and we could get some sleep our nurse told us that they would take him in the middle of the night to check him over and give him a bath and when he came back I needed to feed him. I was so tired and out of it from the medicine I never heard them bring him back and neither did my husband. They didn't wake us up either. In the morning when the nurse came in she woke us up and asked if we fed him when they brought him back. When we said no we didn't realize he had been brought back, she got very upset and was like we need you to feed him now. I felt about one inch tall how could I not have known, was he starving, don't babies cry when they want to eat (we learned later crying was a sign after many others that they are hungry and you shouldn't wait for that), why didn't they wake us up, and well I'm the worst mother ever.
We tried to feed him then with her help but again I couldn't get him to stay on and once we did we couldn't get him to continue to eat for longer than a minuet. Once the nurse left as it was close to shift change I cried. I felt terrible and was so worried I would never get it and it was important to me that I breast fed him. We kept trying. We had every nurse that we had help us. I never thought I would have had my boobs squeezed so much by so many different people. We still were not having much luck so they brought in a pump to have me pump after he got done "eating". I did get some milk from pumping and he was fed that by a syringe with a gloved finger in his mouth to make sure he was sucking. My husband was the one to do that. They wanted me to pump for 5 minuets on each side after I got done feeding him to help bring in my milk.
After day two in the hospital we were told that we might have to supplement feed him as he was losing too much weight. Again the tears came after the nurses left. We kept trying every hour during the day when we didn't have visitors but if he cried sooner we tried to feed him. By day three I hurt so bad. It hurt to have him eat. I wanted to give up. We had been told that babies that young cry when they are hungry, and not really for other reasons. That night I had my first taste of cluster feeding. He cried all night if he wasn't sucking on a boob. I was sitting in the hospital bed crying for hours. It got to the point where my husband wanted to give up and just give him a bottle or let the nurse take him to the nursery. I hung in there although honestly I'm not sure how. I kept crying. In the morning (which was day four so we should be going home) the hospital pediatrician came in and asked how the night went. My husband had gone to get food so it was just me and I started crying I lost it right there in front of the doctor. I told him all he did was cry all night unless he was attached to my boob. That he hadn't pooped and we thought that was why he was crying but the other nurses told us no. The doctor told me they would give him something to help him poop and that they weren't worried because he has already had bowel movements. He did say he was a little worried about his weight lose but that he wasn't that far out of the normal range. I think because I was crying and scared and he could tell over all nervous he wanted to keep us another day. He asked if I objected to that and I said no. I was so scared I was going to starve my baby. It was approved by all the doctors and another day we stayed. Still struggling. They let us go home the next day not too worried about the baby's weight but also with the understanding that we were going to be seeing his pediatrician the following day.
I'm not going to lie, his pediatrician made me cry. She told me not to pump and not to listen to anything the doctors at the hospital told me. She said to feed him every hour based on his start time and to have him eat for ten minuets on each side. I was thinking no way can I do this. She also wanted to see us again in two days to make sure he started gaining weight and told us if not we would have to supplement. I cried the whole way home telling my husband we should just give up clearly I'm not cut out for this and I'm never going to get it if everyone keeps telling me something different. This is when he said did any of your friends breast feed, talk to them. Surprisingly that night I got a text from a friend in Florida asking how the breast feeding was going. I cried texting her. I was ashamed I didn't want people to know how hard it was. That it wasn't it working for me. This is when I learned to talk to my friends and not the doctors. I learned I was not the only one who struggles with breast feeding, that is not as natural as you would think for some women, and that it was a lot harder than most people will let you know at first. She told me to do the every hour thing too and said it's going to suck, you're going to be so tired but if you do it for a bit your milk will come in faster. She also reminded me that I needed to do what was best for us. I did the every hour thing. I pumped I kept feeding him. At night when he wanted to just comfort suck I let him as she said that would help bring it in faster too. By the time we went back to the doctor he was past his birth weigh he had gained weight! I wanted to cry I was so happy. Maybe I can do it. The doctor still wanted to see us back in a week to make sure he stayed on the right track. He did and I thought I finally got this. Little did I know I was going to have more hurdles.
A few weeks later he was entering a growth spurt and wanted to cluster feed. It was hard. He cried all the time when I wasn't feeding him. I was sore. I didn't understand why it was happening. This time I reached out to my friend and another friend who had been giving me pointers. I was told their tricks and really to let him do it as that's how my body would know he needed more milk. They also told me to hang in there because it only lasts a short while. I got lucky it only lasted about two days and I made it through it.
Now my biggest fear is that I have gone back to work and my milk is going to dry up, even though I am pumping. I had two great chats with two wonderful ladies about this tonight and they both have me some pointers and told me not to worry to stick with it and keep feeding him and pumping. I am going to increase my water intake, make sure I continue to improve my diet, and try not to stress too much. I also have a ton of other plans if it seems to be slowing down. I have many more people to reach out to for advice also.
