By Lindsey Borchard
Just like there are no two pregnancies alike or two babies alike, your breast-feeding story is your very own. You have your own triumphs and your own struggles. Breast feeding is an intimate journey that we women go through full of ups and downs, and whether or not we decide to share our stories, we all have experienced the same feelings one time or another. So as you read this I hope you don’t place judgments on my choices, because just like your story is yours, this one is mine.
At 8:51pm they placed my son on my chest for the first time. Just like that I became a mom. Over whelming feelings rushed through my body of what I just experienced. I was happy, tearful, shocked and overall exhausted. I just pushed an eight and half pound human out of my body, and little did I know the real work was just about to begin.
An hour after James came into this world I had to feed him. I lay there with my new child in my arms not knowing what to do. The first feed the nurses basically did everything for me because I was still recovering from the birth. I basically just laid there as they pulled and squeezed to get the milk out for my son. Now I know what cows feel like when they’re getting milked!
Over the next 24 hours I felt like I was getting the hang of it. I was able to get James to latch and he wasn’t crying so he must be getting milk, right? He dropped in weight but nobody was concerned because all babies drop a little of their birth weight. The following day was the same, only this time James was a little more alert. He went from feeding for 20 min on each side to about 10-15. Now looking back I should have fed him longer and more often. But I was a new mom, never breast fed before and doped up on Norco for the last 48 hours. So in the state I was in I felt I was doing all I could.
The next day we left the hospital and as much as I wanted to be home I was going to miss the 24-hour on call help. We walked out of the hospital and there we were, two parents driving away with our new baby not having a clue about anything.
The next seven days are a blur now so hopefully I can get the story right. Over the first day I was home I was so extremely tired and trying to feed as often as I could. It hurt, and I felt like he was getting nothing. It’s so hard to tell how much milk they are getting. But things were going ok. There was no cause for concern until the next day. James stopped peeing and hadn’t pooped since he was in the hospital. The nurse said if he still didn’t have any bowel movements within the next 12 hours we needed to go to urgent care. Great! My first week as a mom and we were already at urgent care!
The next morning we drove down to Urgent care, got him checked out and went to the lactation consultant. Turns out my milk never came or if it did it wasn’t much. I never felt the “let down” of milk, never felt the wave of milk come to my breasts. By the middle of the first week James had lost more then 11% of his birth weight. And I was pretty much starving him, which is why there were no bowel movements from him. I had a choice to make give him formula or have him hooked up to an IV. Some say I should have stuck it out, I should have tried and tried until I was blue in the face and maybe I should have. But I was tired, I had been to urgent care and the lactation doctor three times, I had been crying about this everyday since I got home and I wanted some part of this whole “mother” thing to get easier. So we came up with a plan and I started giving him formula and pumped what I could. Formula. Pump. Formula. Pump. That was my routine day in and day out. For every two bottles of formula I would make one bottle of breast milk. Talk about “let down”.
The doctors said to give it time and my milk might eventually come in. And so I waited. And waited. And waited. Nothing. So I kept pumping.
James started to eat more and gain weight so I was happy, over joyous to be exact but a big part of me was mad. Mad I couldn’t give my son what he needed from my own body, mad I had to pump and bottle feed, mad that it came so easy to some people. And then I had to mourn those moments with him when it was just him and I by ourselves. Peacefully taking each other in while I fed him.
All of this happened in his first two weeks of life. I continued to bottle feed and pump for the first month, but he was eating more in one sitting then I could produce in a day. So it was time to pack up the pump and realize I had done everything I could do. But did I??? That’s the question I keep asking myself. What if I tired harder those first few days, what if I pumped longer, what if I waited more. I’ll never know. All I know is that I have a healthy baby who loves to eat and cuddle and smile and so I feel I made the right choice for my baby and for my family. I’ll continue to try breast-feeding with each additional child we have and hopefully I’ll be able to last longer then I did with James. But if it doesn’t work out in the end I’m okay with formula as well too.
Breast feeding moms are GREAT warriors, fighting the good fight to give their child the very best food. BUT so are formula feeding moms. We all go through it in different ways. However what I don’t understand is the judgment that we get for formula feeding or the judgment you get for breast-feeding your child longer then a year, etc. I really hope ALL women can put aside judgment and their own beliefs and help their fellow mom out. Because really when you’re a new mom we really need each other to lean on, to vent to, to share our high moments and low moments and to be honest we really don’t have time for judgment.
During my whole experience of breast-feeding I loved wearing my Bravado nursing bras but I really didn’t have the chance to use any other ones I had reviewed before. Funny enough I am actually wearing my Bravado Original Nursing bra right now as I write this. I still LOVE it.
Even though this post isn’t exactly about lingerie I felt it was important to put my story out there because so many women have breast feeding issues and keep it all inside because they are afraid of what people or their peers might think. It’s SO important for moms and women to unite together and not be ashamed of what choices you make, especially when it comes to your family and YOUR body.
So take my hand and know you’re not alone. Feel free to post your stories here in the comments or even your favorite nursing tips or bras.
