I could be wrong, but I would say that majority of women who breastfeed would agree with me when I say that it is extremely difficult. While there are plenty of women out there that have no issues when it comes to breastfeeding and providing their baby with more that enough breast milk to keep them satisfied, I was not, and sometimes am still not, one of those women. This is my breastfeeding journey (so far).
If you’ve read my Labor and Delivery blog post, you know that I had Preeclampsia, had to induce, and almost 48 hours later ended up having a C-section followed by severe postpartum hemorrhaging. After about an hour of skin to skin and attempting to nurse Landen, I was wheeled into the emergency operating room to remove a softball sized blood clot that was preventing my uterus from closing. That early separation from my baby is what I believe started everything. We were reunited hours later and then moved into the mother-baby unit for the next 5 days.
Landen was born 2 weeks early at a teeny 5 lbs 8 oz. I was so determined and just knew that I wanted to breastfeed, but things got off to an unfortunate and rocky start. It is my belief that the nurses truly wanted my baby to stay above 5 pounds, so he would be able to go home with me. Because of this, they were quick to push formula on him and I, since I wasn’t producing anything yet. Sad to say that at that time I didn’t even know that donor breast milk could be an option, and even more sad that the hospital didn’t recommend or offer it to me. Looking back today, I am glad my baby was fed at the hospital instead of starving and losing a lot of weight (we left the hospital with a 5lbs 3oz baby), but I still wish they had offered donor milk over formula. So in between attempting to nurse on both sides for 15 minutes each and pumping for 15 minutes, he was given about 10ml of formula. This was taking place every two hours. On top of that, I was being checked constantly by nurses to make sure that I wasn’t still hemorrhaging. Checked vitals constantly. Extreme back pain from the epidural (scoliosis). Postpartum Headaches. Pain from my incision. Visitors that I certainly wasn’t up for, stopping in continuously. I won’t go on, but the time I spent in the hospital wasn’t fun. I was over the moon in love with my baby boy but things just weren’t going good for me. Childbirth is HARD y’all!
So Lactation visited me several times while we were there. They explained that one cause of my ZERO production, even with all the nursing and pumping, was due to the hemorrhaging. My body needed to heal itself before it would be able to provide. Next cause of my issues, PCOS. Yes, I know some women with PCOS have no issues with breastfeeding. Again, I was not one of those women. But I just felt like EVENTUALLY something would come out if I just kept trying. The day we were to be discharged, I finally was able to get some colostrum to give to Landen. How glorious those two tiny syringes seemed at the time, and they truly were! I was finally giving my baby the liquid gold!
After my first night at home, the next morning my boobs finally felt hot and hard. My milk came in! This was at 6 days postpartum. So that day was the first time that I was able to pump and get anything. It was so little, but it was something. We continued try to breastfeed, give a bottle of pumped milk (how little it may have been) then supplement with formula after. Every two hours.
Landen had issues latching, so we used a nipple shield at the hospital and at home. But I felt like it was such a pain to have to use it, I wanted badly to toss it. So I’d start with it, remove it halfway through and then try to put him back on. Sometimes he could get it, sometimes he couldn’t. He was still so tiny, and soooo sleepy. He would fall asleep constantly. I’ll just say that everything felt so very hard. My baby blues was kicking into high gear. I was still in pain from my C-section and trying to give up the medication they sent me home with. And the ready-to-feed formula bottles, while they were feeding my baby, made me so sad and depressed. I tried over and over again to not use the formula, but my baby was so hungry and breastfeeding for hours on end was not helping him. I felt like a failure, even though I was continuing to give it my all. I not once let myself skip a pumping session. I was getting burnt out.
I was doing all the tricks you hear to try to increase my supply. Which most the time in those first days may have been about 10ml (one third of an ounce) each pumping session. I took fenugreek. I ate the oatmeal, the Boobie Bars, the brownies, the Lactation Cookies... so many cookies. I drank the Ovaltine and the MilkFlow, the Body Armor drinks and the blue Gatorade. I power pumped. I massaged. I used the warming bead things that you put on your breasts. I felt like I tried everything, and saw very little difference.
Those first couple of weeks home with Landen, we went to 3 Lactation Consultations. Each time we discussed what we were doing for feedings (breastfeed, bottle feed breast milk, bottle feed formula, pump, repeat). One of the ladies I met with made me feel really good during our conversation. She said I was doing 3x the work that a mom without issues would be doing. Not to pat my own back, but really it just justified all of the emotions I was feeling. I was really struggling emotionally. She said it is a fine line to whether or not I would want to make the decision to continue at the same pace I had been going. But it was my decision alone. I decided to continue doing everything the same. Two weeks at a time I would reevaluate and decide if I could keep going at that rate. Breastfeed, Bottlefeed, Pump, Repeat. My husband, who couldn’t really understand, continued to go back and forth between being super supportive one moment, to trying to convince me to just switch to formula the next. He was having a hard time with my constant tears and not being able to help. It also bothered him that I was obsessed with googling everything nonstop! (He sees the error of his ways now and is so proud of me for standing my ground.)
Lactation recommended just for a few days cut back to just breastfeeding twice a day to let him stay used to trying and pump the rest of the time just to give myself a little break. (I did do this for a few days so I could kind of get my bearings back.) After each discussion we would do a weight check on a special scale, breastfeed, and weigh again so we could see what he was getting. At our third appointment (3 weeks old), we found out that Landen was inefficient at transferring milk. There was no lip or tongue ties, but he just wasn’t very good at getting the milk out. After 30 minutes he had gotten right under an ounce. This discouraged me, but the consultant reassured me that “He’s just a little guy, he will get better at it.” So instead of only nursing him twice a day, I went back to trying to breastfeed all day long. I figured he wouldn’t get any better at it or more efficient if we weren't practicing all day. And from everything I read online, it was the best way to get my supply to increase.
We finally gave up the nipple shield, and I tried a different position (football hold) to help him attempt a deeper latch. This is when my nipples went through the “painful period.” While I had experienced some pain, it wasn’t until I had really set my mind to nursing constantly that they really started hurting. The biggest bother I had was vasospasms. A short while after nursing (and pumping), my nipples would start burning and would turn white. It was so uncomfortable and it would come and go out of nowhere. I had to wear nipple shells for about a week straight to keep anything from touching them. This eventually did stop, I would say it happened regularly until about 6 weeks, then slowly tapered off on the frequency that it happened. I was religious about keeping my nipples moisturized. I didn’t like the greasy feeling of lanolin that I tried, or the stain it left on one of my favorite nursing tank tops. I found that I really liked the Earth Mama Organic Nipple Butter.
Another thing that I began doing was combining my breastmilk with formula. This eliminated me having to make two bottles. I hated to waste any breastmilk if he didn't eat it all, since in the beginning because I got so little. This is why I had kept them separate for so long. Combining the two truly was a huge time saver and cut my daily bottle washing chores in half. One of my girlfriends really cheered me on and shared with me some tips and how things were going for her (exclusively pumping) and her son who is a couple months older. With her encouragement, I hit a huge turning point when I stopped looking at formula as something that was bad or poisonous and looked at it from the viewpoint of, my baby is fed and satisfied and not crying. This is nice! The amount of breastmilk I made was still behind what he needed. I would maybe pump close to an ounce when he was wanting 2. And when he started needing 3, I was only making 2. So we continued supplementing. I came to the realization that I was only able to provide what my body allowed and I would be glad that I could at least give him some breastmilk. We continued regular supplementing while my supply very slowly began to increase. Little by little, every few days, I would get a little more out when pumping. Eventually I was able to give more breastmilk than formula. Things were going better. At 8 weeks, I will say that we finally got the hang of breastfeeding. I was able to make it the whole first half of the day by breastfeeding only. He was satisfied by what he was getting. And what an amazing feeling that was! August 17th was the first time I was able to put two ounces in a bag to begin my freezer stash.
Slowly still, my supply continued to increase. It seems likes a lifetime ago that I was so sad and even depressed about my little one ounce pump sessions to get where I am today. But really, its only been 3.5 months. We went from so little, to now being able to satisfy my baby for much of the day. Like I've said times before, I am the kind of person that when I put my mind to accomplishing something, I get it done. This was the first time I wasn't sure that I would be able to. I was so close to giving up on multiple occasions, because breastfeeding (for some) is really truly that hard. I am very blessed in the sense that I was able to give up my full time job to stay at home. If returning to work was necessary, my story might have been a lot different. I know I would have tried my best to pump while at work and breastfeed anytime we were together, but I am not sure it would've worked in the long run. Mad props to all you Mama's that go back to work and still make it all work!
My supply still seems to tank in the afternoons so we breastfeed until around 5pm and after that Landen gets bottles of pumped breastmilk the remainder of the day. He still eats every 2 to 3 hours during the day. Before bed I feel like he fuels up to sleep good, eating a bottle at 6:30-7, 8ish, and last one around 9 is combined with two ounces of formula. This seems a little frequent compared to others, but really it’s not about what others are doing, it’s what works for us. I’m only pumping twice a day now, which is what gives us our bottles and freezer stash. I pump before going to bed, and I pump around 5am. I decided that 5:30/6am feeding would be a bottle, because when I would/do breastfeed, sleepiness prevents him from getting enough to keep him satisfied long enough for me to go back to sleep. Also, at that pump session I am able to get way more that he would eat. Hello freezer stash! This twenty minute pump session now gets me between 6-8oz. Now this isn’t a 100% way I always do things. Sometimes I’m super sleepy so I just pull him in bed and breastfeed instead. Which means we will be awake again quicker because he doesn’t eat as much. Sometimes he wakes up before my pump session, so I’ll bottle feed and pump after.
Clearly my right boob is the slacker boob, haha!
Landen's last bottle before bed is always two ounces of formula + one/1.5 ounces of breastmilk. He’s sleeping though the night almost every night, so I have no desire to drop that little bit of formula he gets once a day now. It helps him and myself both sleep. And formula ISN’T bad! That’s what I had to learn to understand. Breastmilk is of course the best, but formula is not going to hurt my baby.
Current supplements I am using to help supply are from Milky Mama. I am using their Lady Leche and Dairy Dutchess Herbal Supplements, every couple of days. And I occasionally still drink an Upspring MilkFlow supplement. I’ve stopped using the cookies and brownies because I’m not sure if they helped, but they certainly did not help with weight loss. Scale actually started to go back in the wrong direction for a while. Lastly, I drink as much water as I can possibly stand.
While I know 3.5 months in, my breastfeeding journey is still only in the beginning stages. I’ve been lucky so far to not have any clogged ducts, thrush or mastitis. We still have a teething battle ahead of us, nursing strikes, his first stuffy nose and many more battles ahead. But I am so glad so say that we won the battle of getting breastfeeding established. I've continued to set small goals for myself as things go, 1 day at time, 2 weeks at a time, then one month at a time. My current goal is 6 months, with hopes we may continue longer. My little ~80 ounce freezer stash may not look like much to some, but for someone who struggled with supply issues and fought so hard for every single ounce, it seems like an amazing feat. I am proud of myself for sticking with it because it is something that means so much to me. While for me getting pregnant was hard, being pregnant was hard, childbirth was hard, becoming a mama is hard...Breastfeeding has also been hard! But I am so grateful for all of it.
Uncrustables Boxes, because they are a good size and because Mama needs a snack during those late night/early morning pumping sessions.
I really hope that this has encouraged other mama's that may be struggling with their own breastfeeding battle to not give up. I know I would have had much sadness and regret if I had decided I couldn't push through as I did. Don't let yourself give up unless you know you are 100% ready to do so. Take it 2 weeks at a time. I really feel that every two weeks, things got a little better. But this will be HARD WORK! And I know it is. Just tell yourself that every time you pump after breastfeeding, your are telling your body that more is needed. And if you come to the decision that you cannot do it any longer, and you are just mentally ready to switch to formula to feel like you can breath again, that is okay too! Formula feeds millions of babies all over the world! There is such a stigma about Breastfeeding vs Formula that it almost seems like a woman should feel guilty if she doesn't breastfeed. Which is so not the case! But one more time, breastfeeding is hard. If you are able to do so, that's great. If you are not or choose not to, that's great too. Because there is no trophy for breastfeeding or bottle-feeding. There is no trophy if you cloth diaper. There is no trophy if you go back to work, or if you stay home. A Facebook post I recently read shared this little fun fact of "There is no trophy" and it is the God's honest TRUTH! Do not forget it, and remind yourself again and again.
For me, I chose to breastfeed and I am so glad that with consistency and determination we have made it work so far. I know my experience may not be the way it works out for everyone, but I believe that for most if you just keep on working hard at it and push through, give yourself grace where it is needed, you will eventually (hopefully) increase your milk production enough to satisfy your baby and even start your own little freezer stash.
For me, I chose to breastfeed and I am so glad that with consistency and determination we have made it work so far. I know my experience may not be the way it works out for everyone, but I believe that for most if you just keep on working hard at it and push through, give yourself grace where it is needed, you will eventually (hopefully) increase your milk production enough to satisfy your baby and even start your own little freezer stash.
