So, the delivery is the easy part. It's everything that comes after that's hard.
Seems like pushing an 8 pound kid out of your vagina would be the hardest part, but no such luck. The next couple of days after were basically easy too. Day 3, or Going Home Day, began the challenge.
First of all, for hours and hours after they are born, most babies have no interest in eating. They only have an interest in sleeping, which is good because they are putting themselves in some sort of sleep coma that helps their swelling go down and their alien shaped heads get back to normal. Maggie didn't actually nurse until about 3am the night after she was born. That started it.
I was, and am, very committed to breast feeding. Even through the early days when my nipples looked like beef jerky because Maggie wasn't latching well. I knew that that was part of the drill until both of us got accustomed and acquainted with nursing.
We had her home for a single day when we had to bring her back to the hospital. We tested her bilirubin levels and they were high. Not high enough to cause brain damage, but the doctors didn't want them to get any higher. And - get this - breast fed babies have a more difficult time removing bilirubin from their blood than formula fed babies.
So, for nearly 3 days, my tiny baby had to be separated from me for hours and hours - basically except for feedings - and put into an incubator with blue light to reduce her bili levels. It was very stressful and emotionally draining. It's very hard to see such a tiny person stuck in this plastic box for so long. Especially when that tiny person is your baby. Every day, they had to poke her heel and test her levels and when we admitted into the room, they actually had to draw blood from her tiny arm. It was so hard. Lots of tears were shed those days, all by me. It's really unfair to put an emotionally and hormonally unstable new mother in that situation.
Luckily, after a couple of days, we were able to come home. She was still yellow, but her levels had gone down and the rebound would be easily combatted by her body.
So, we had a second homecoming.
I had continued to breast feed her all throughout this ordeal and into the following week. My mom (Mimi) came Monday and stayed until Thursday. During these few days, Maggie was crying alot, unsatisfied and gassy. I read an article about lactose overload. It made perfect sense to me, that a baby could get only large amounts of foremilk, and not enough hindmilk, which would cause an excessive amount of gas because of the low amounts of fats in the foremilk. I knew this had to be happening to Maggie. So, I tried to slow down and not stress about switching breasts during feedings. It seemed to work.
Breast feeding is a guessing game. I read an entire book and took a class. I also met with a lactation consultant. Nothing really prepared me for the challenges of nursing. No one really tells you how hard it is until you run into problems, then they tell you that while babies have the natural instinct to suck, not all babies know how. And, not all breasts are the same. So, each baby has to get to know its own set, if you know what I mean. When you start having problems is when they tell you that the time it takes to get good at nursing can take days, weeks or months. Or, never.
I was really having a problem with the uncertainty of it. I couldn't tell if she was getting enough. It certainly didn't seem like it. She was always hungry. She cried alot. I was having so much anxiety. I started to dislike breast feeding because of the anxiety it was causing. I was crying at nearly every feeding out of frustration and pain. It was the end of the second week of her life, and she still couldn't latch effectively. Then, late that Friday night, I got sick. I got sick with a stomach virus.
Thankfully, the day before Maggie was born, Mike and I bought a breast pump. I had only used it once before that day, but I was really glad we had it at that point, so that I could pump and stay quarantined away from the rest of the family. Those couple of days pumping and feeding were wonderful. I could literally see how much milk she was getting.
When I felt better, I let her nurse again, and those same feelings of anxiety and fear came back again. I made a decision and talked to her pediatrician about it the next day. I decided to exclusively pump and feed her.
That helped ease my anxiety for a while, but in the beginning, I was pumping over 3 oz per session. And, gradually, it turned into less and less. So much less that, even with her occasionally nursing to try to stimulate my milk, we started supplementing with formula.
I felt - and still feel, sometimes - like a failure. I keep hearing about people who have flawless nursing experiences and wonder if they were truly flawless or, do they just leave out all the difficult, frustrating and hopeless parts??
As of today, I am still pumping every 2 or 3 hours and only getting about an ounce, sometimes a little more each time. So, it will take about 3-4 pumping sessions to make one bottle of breast milk for her. That's not enough.
I know that our bodies are supposed to be these amazing tools and that our bodies "know" when our milk should increase....but HOW? How long does it take for the body to make more? My body is progressively making less. I will continue to give her whatever my body makes for as long as my body makes it. It just seems like I'm going in a different direction than biology here. All the literature I've read tell me that as long as I keep pumping at a regular 2-3 hour interval schedule, that my milk supply should maintain. I have not found that to be true with me. Very frustrating and discouraging.
Despite all of the nursing troubles, life with Maggie has been pretty amazing. Her and I just hang out together all day and I get to notice all of the things that change about her every day. Like her eyelashes growing. And her head getting bigger. Her sounds. She's grown so much. She's getting baths and can almost fit into clothes that aren't newborn sizes. I've taken about 400 pictures of her.
This past Thursday, for Thanksgiving, my mom, Mema, brother and sister-in-law all came and we had lunch together. Maggie got to meet another great grandmother. We had 4 generations here that day. No photographic evidence. We are waiting til Christmas and getting dressed up before we take pictures.
I'm up way too late. Time to get my beauty/momma sleep.
Here's some pictures of my sweet baby girl.
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