Why I Won't Ever Pay A Stranger $300 To Uselessly Squeeze My Boobs Again
Since having Inez, there have been a few major times I've had to just trust myself all the way - one of the biggest being BREASTFEEDING. A friend of my mom's said of breastfeeding, "it's the most unnatural, natural thing in the world." What a perfect description of something that was so challenging for me and countless other women.
When we were in the hospital (a place I never wanted to be in the first place), recovering from my C-section (the way I did not want to have a baby) - our breastfeeding challenges began. Probably due in part to the fact that I was puking my entire section and well beyond its completion and couldn't have true skin-to-skin with my girl and then also probably due to the following miserable days of jaundice and having to keep her on a light bed all day (taking her off only for 15-20 minutes at a time to feed & change her).
We hired a lactation consultant to come to the house (the level of pure unadulterated loathing I have for the kindly lactation consultants who attempted to "help" me both in the hospital and at home is probably something I'll see a counselor for someday). Her $300 input was useless... "Let's use a stool..." "Perfect, let's hand express..." (wtf hand expression?) "Don't ever let her get too mad... if she starts to get frustrated at all, just stop." "Only peaceful loving kindness at the breast..." "Make her come to you... Hold her head... there..." "Let's get another pillow over here!"
OH MY GOD the PILLOWS. I swear - the pillows were always my crying trigger. I thought, if someone puts one more goshdamn pillow around me I will scream. I would look at the insane set up around me and see Angel holding one boob and the boppy and the support pillows and the lactation consultant squeezing the other and Nez would be screaming and I am thinking, "Yes - this is realistic. Every time my baby needs to eat I will just quickly pull 14 pillows, a boppy, and two humans out of my butt and make it all happen. THEN my daughter will stop screaming and we'll have beautiful moments of "peaceful loving kindness" at the breast. GAGME.
I was so confused as to how in the hospital, my sister-in-law Kara had gotten Nezzy to latch onto me and get some some colostrum and then somehow within a couple short days we regressed to the point of me then pumping and feeding her with a freaking syringe. It all felt foreign and sad on top of all the sad things I hadn't yet had the time or energy to even begin to process.
I quit the expensive sessions with the lactation consultant and just started trying to use common sense. I tried every single day to get her on. She screamed every time and I would end up pumping. I lived in a weird double feelings world where I was grateful I was producing so much milk and able to feed her without supplementing, while also being devastated and frankly, angry that she wouldn't take it from me. It felt so counter productive in the middle of the night - waking up to pump while I watched Angel have that time to snuggle her and feed her with a bottle.
I did tons of research on bottle nipples and pacifiers that would encourage breastfeeding and was able to find some that I believe helped (see links). My mom suggested FaceTiming with her sister (my aunt) in Kansas City who is a social worker/LaLeche League guru/mama of three now older kids/wonder woman. She would get home from work at 1am and FaceTime us at 11pm our time to just see what Nez was doing when she tried.
I wanted so badly to know the quick answer of will she or won't she (breastfeed). If I knew eventually she would and I just had to keep trying every day for however long, that I would. If I knew no matter what I tried she wasn't going to do this because of XYZ - ok, let me cut my losses. We were already tongue and lip tie snips + hundreds of dollars + countless bottles + many crying nights into this process and there were times I didn't know how much more I could take. People would suggest the "hunger games" method of just seeing if she would get so hungry that she'd finally do it, but I never felt like that was the right option.
I will say I felt good about when to say no and yes to trying. My mom and Angel would say, "ok maybe try now?" and I would check in with myself to see if I could handle being rejected. So I didn't always try right then. Most times, I would wait until everyone went to bed and Angel was in the shower so it was just the two of us.
After the FaceTime sessions with Aunt Jenn showing me how to comfortably hold my own boobs the way they should be held and then my mom suggesting - hey - maybe Nez just doesn't want to be held and forced the way everyone has said? Maybe she just wants to be laid out like a freakin' pizza pie in front of you? Finally, she nursed.
Nearly everyone in my family was taken down with the stomach flu the morning after Christmas. I was pumping in the middle of the night and had to rip the pumps off and run (dripping with milk) to get sick from both ends. The next 48 hours were a blur but I will forever remember the 26th as being one of the worst days of my life (I've never been that sick) and the 27th as being one of the best. SHE FINALLY STARTED NURSING. Seven weeks old.
It was not easy after that. I still had to work at it. My best friend Lydia came to down a few days later and I still didn't know how to nurse in public etc... And we were getting ready to go back home to New York and while I was thrilled to not be dragging my pump with us, I was also terrified of how to nurse her since she would only do it on a boppy in front of me while not being touched. HIGH. MAINTENANCE.
We have worked more and more at this relationship. She still won't nurse under a blanket, so I have had to figure out ways to not flash the world while also feeding my kid. She now touches me and I can touch her and it feels like the wonder of it all is not lost on me. I'm terrified for her to have a bottle again because I don't know what the heck she'd do after that, but I don't really need to cross that bridge yet, if ever.
So not releasing breastfeeding worked for me, but I would never tell someone to try something for so long if it's making the quality of life miserable. My best friend tried to nurse and after weeks in the NICU, surgeries on her newborn, and two rounds of mastitis and getting terribly sick from it/all the pain, etc... she guiltily decided nursing wasn't the best idea for her. GUILTILY. Why in the world we live in a society where a mom could ever feel guilty for literally trying their hardest and working through physical and emotional pain in order to give their baby their best is something I will never understand.
That said, I don't believe in the "we're all doing our best" mantra I hear moms say because I don't believe everyone IS doing their best. I think we can feel tired and like we're giving a lot without giving our BEST. I think everyone has different versions of what best means and some of that is not up for debate, while other parts very obviously are. For me, I believe my best is when I can feel 110% confident and 0% defensive. It's a check that I have with myself, with my husband, and with the closest people I've asked to be apart of my mothering journey.
I knew I couldn't release breastfeeding. My best friend knew she had to. We are incredibly like minded moms and have encouraged and cried through many of the decisions we've made as wives and now mothers. I say this to encourage you to CHECK IN - with yourself AND with people you trust. It's the difference between a happy and confident parenting journey and one wrought with emotional hardships and exhaustion.
Know when you need to keep going, and know when you need to release.
I quit the expensive sessions with the lactation consultant and just started trying to use common sense. I tried every single day to get her on. She screamed every time and I would end up pumping. I lived in a weird double feelings world where I was grateful I was producing so much milk and able to feed her without supplementing, while also being devastated and frankly, angry that she wouldn't take it from me. It felt so counter productive in the middle of the night - waking up to pump while I watched Angel have that time to snuggle her and feed her with a bottle.
I did tons of research on bottle nipples and pacifiers that would encourage breastfeeding and was able to find some that I believe helped (see links). My mom suggested FaceTiming with her sister (my aunt) in Kansas City who is a social worker/LaLeche League guru/mama of three now older kids/wonder woman. She would get home from work at 1am and FaceTime us at 11pm our time to just see what Nez was doing when she tried.
I wanted so badly to know the quick answer of will she or won't she (breastfeed). If I knew eventually she would and I just had to keep trying every day for however long, that I would. If I knew no matter what I tried she wasn't going to do this because of XYZ - ok, let me cut my losses. We were already tongue and lip tie snips + hundreds of dollars + countless bottles + many crying nights into this process and there were times I didn't know how much more I could take. People would suggest the "hunger games" method of just seeing if she would get so hungry that she'd finally do it, but I never felt like that was the right option.
I will say I felt good about when to say no and yes to trying. My mom and Angel would say, "ok maybe try now?" and I would check in with myself to see if I could handle being rejected. So I didn't always try right then. Most times, I would wait until everyone went to bed and Angel was in the shower so it was just the two of us.
After the FaceTime sessions with Aunt Jenn showing me how to comfortably hold my own boobs the way they should be held and then my mom suggesting - hey - maybe Nez just doesn't want to be held and forced the way everyone has said? Maybe she just wants to be laid out like a freakin' pizza pie in front of you? Finally, she nursed.
Nearly everyone in my family was taken down with the stomach flu the morning after Christmas. I was pumping in the middle of the night and had to rip the pumps off and run (dripping with milk) to get sick from both ends. The next 48 hours were a blur but I will forever remember the 26th as being one of the worst days of my life (I've never been that sick) and the 27th as being one of the best. SHE FINALLY STARTED NURSING. Seven weeks old.
It was not easy after that. I still had to work at it. My best friend Lydia came to down a few days later and I still didn't know how to nurse in public etc... And we were getting ready to go back home to New York and while I was thrilled to not be dragging my pump with us, I was also terrified of how to nurse her since she would only do it on a boppy in front of me while not being touched. HIGH. MAINTENANCE.
We have worked more and more at this relationship. She still won't nurse under a blanket, so I have had to figure out ways to not flash the world while also feeding my kid. She now touches me and I can touch her and it feels like the wonder of it all is not lost on me. I'm terrified for her to have a bottle again because I don't know what the heck she'd do after that, but I don't really need to cross that bridge yet, if ever.
So not releasing breastfeeding worked for me, but I would never tell someone to try something for so long if it's making the quality of life miserable. My best friend tried to nurse and after weeks in the NICU, surgeries on her newborn, and two rounds of mastitis and getting terribly sick from it/all the pain, etc... she guiltily decided nursing wasn't the best idea for her. GUILTILY. Why in the world we live in a society where a mom could ever feel guilty for literally trying their hardest and working through physical and emotional pain in order to give their baby their best is something I will never understand.
That said, I don't believe in the "we're all doing our best" mantra I hear moms say because I don't believe everyone IS doing their best. I think we can feel tired and like we're giving a lot without giving our BEST. I think everyone has different versions of what best means and some of that is not up for debate, while other parts very obviously are. For me, I believe my best is when I can feel 110% confident and 0% defensive. It's a check that I have with myself, with my husband, and with the closest people I've asked to be apart of my mothering journey.
I knew I couldn't release breastfeeding. My best friend knew she had to. We are incredibly like minded moms and have encouraged and cried through many of the decisions we've made as wives and now mothers. I say this to encourage you to CHECK IN - with yourself AND with people you trust. It's the difference between a happy and confident parenting journey and one wrought with emotional hardships and exhaustion.
Know when you need to keep going, and know when you need to release.
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