Our Breastfeeding Journey, Part II

This is part II of our breastfeeding journey. See Part I here.

By the time we got home from the hospital with Kip, my goal was to still be a nursing mom. I assumed a wise breastfeeding mother or consultant would give us a trick and we'd be on our way. But I knew we needed help.

Kip's first day home I pumped and my parents, Mandy, or Dan bottled fed him. I was trying to do what all the books say to "avoid nipple confusion" and not feed him with a bottle if I had any hope of getting him to breastfeed with me later.

The next day a mom friend came over to try and help me. She gave me some tips but also couldn't tell why Kip wouldn't latch. And, it's not just that he didn't latch it's how angry he would get with every attempt. Not a hunger cry it was like a rage cry. He turns bright red and kicks and arches and pushes away and flails his arms. You can barely hold him when he is like that. He was a newborn but he is strong.

It was just so sad for me to see him so upset and have that negative experience associated with me. Since everyone else was bottle feeding him, all he knew of me was this frustrating experience and I hated that. He had no idea that milk was from me and that I was his mom and I carried him for nine months and gave him everything he needed. It was really hard for me to not have that bonding experience with him and feel like he didn't need me anymore.

We saw a lactation consultant two days after coming home and we told her everything that had happened at the hospital. She watched me as I attempted to breastfeed and she witnessed the rage crying when we tried to get Kip to latch. She gave me a few pointers but otherwise didn't see why he would be so upset. She said keep trying and speak to the pediatrician about a possible lip tie. We saw the pediatrician later that day and she said the lip tie was insignificant and shouldn't interfere with feeding. She too said "keep trying."

Meanwhile, I kept pumping and everyone else kept bottle feeding Kip.

I'm not sure if it was just nature or if it was because I was pumping so much so soon, but by day four my milk had come in and it came in a like a flood. I went from a solid B cup my entire life to a DD. Milk just poured out of me unassisted by anything. They didn't say any of this in any of the books I read and I was totally unprepared and caught off guard by it. I was painfully engorged, unable to even attempt breastfeeding with Kip because my milk would drop while I was trying to latch him and his kicking and flailing hurt like crazy with my sensitive ladies. We would both be covered in milk and crying by the end of it.

It was at this point that I "gave up" and made peace, as best I could, with not being a nursing mom. I wanted to feed my baby and I didn't care if it came from a bottle. I would just exclusively pump and we would exclusively bottle feed. He would still be getting the benefits of my milk and that's what mattered to me. That's what should matter. But I felt guilty and ashamed to tell other moms and sad because everyone kept pushing breastfeeding. And sad because it felt like a failure.

Although I accepted the pumping, I felt completely desperate and clueless about how to do it correctly. I had read and prepared for breastfeeding but knew next to nothing about pumping. And exclusively pumping is extremely different from pumping to go back to work. But, I had NO IDEA how to exclusively pump. So rather than sleeping in the wee hours of the morning, I would Google like crazy everything about pumping. I immediately became overwhelmed with it. Reading about pumping schedules, constantly washing bottles and pump parts, figuring out how to bag and freeze, knowing how much to feed Kip, washing more parts, learning the rules about milk storage, sanitizing parts, and spilling milk. Oh, did I say washing parts? Yeah, it's all consuming and never ending.

Add to all of that a newborn baby and all his needs. Add that to the baby blues and mourning the loss of my time with Dan and routine before Kip. I was a hot emotional mess that first week home.

I call the pump our "other baby" because in the beginning that is what it feels like. Some days, it still does. I have to pump eight times a day - on a specific schedule in order to establish a supply and to empty my painfully engorged ladies. The first week I found one helpful blog and then I reached out to a neighborhood mom group on Facebook asking for tips on exclusive breastfeeding. One mom pointed me to another private group on Facebook for exclusive pumpers. Once I got accepted into that group I started feeling a little more confident about what to do. All the women are super helpful with tips and support and FOR ONCE, I'm grateful for social media. If I had not found that group I would have inadvertently dried my supply before the end of the month, that's how clueless I am.

I learned a lot those first few weeks but made A LOT of mistakes too. I threw away valuable colostrum that I had pumped and frozen because I thought he was too old for it after the first week. UGH, such a terrible mistake. I used bad bags and spilled a ton of milk. I made all kinds of wrong decisions but oddly my supply kept increasing. Day after day it went from 1 oz per pump to 4 oz, 8 oz, and even up to 16 oz. My daily output could feed three babies. THREE!

Here is the issue with oversupply. We live in a small apartment with a small freezer. We don't have space for TWO 7 foot deep freezers, like some women have out in the suburbs. Whatever doesn't fit I can't keep. We had to throw out a ton of food in our freezer to make as much room as possible. We bought a mini freezer to squeeze into our tiny kitchen to help store some of the milk and we quickly filled that freezer near to capacity.

I donated over 250 ounces of milk to two local moms who needed milk. Mandy took over 300 ounces to store in her freezer. I had to reluctantly dump a bunch of milk because I had no where to put it. I feel terribly guilty about it but I had no where to put it and only the guarantee that I would have twice more that amount in 4 hours. And Dan and I are still debating about buying a mini deep freeze and putting it in our bedroom.

This was our refrigerator freezer two weeks ago, before I organized it:

This was after I organized it and bagged some to donate and some to give to Mandy to store:

This was after the donations were picked up and Mandy took her stash:

And this was today. Already refilled. All that plus the packed mini freezer.

I have no tips on how to increase supply. I'm consuming absolutely no supplements or foods that increase lactation. I have no idea how it happened to me or why. So many moms wish they had an oversupply but I'm here to tell you it sucks. The grass is always greener and this oversupply is a true curse to me. I have more stress over pumping and freezing than I do about Kippy and that's why it's like a second baby. It needs to be taken care of like a baby and it creates a mountain of work like a baby. Every day I want to quit but every day I convince myself not to. I promised myself I would do it three months and reevaluate then, with permission to quit and grace enough to let myself move on. We're only halfway there so far.

I'm up every night at 1 am and 5 am to pump, regardless of whether or not Kip sleeps through the night. I have to pump more times than Kip feeds in a day and I've had to lug my pump around if I will be out for more than three hours. I've cleaned my pump parts and bottles at least 1,000 times. My nipples are raw and my ladies are constantly engorged. I've had to let Kip cry for 15 mins straight because I was hooked to my pump when he needed me. Stress is supposed to reduce your supply. I seem to be an exception to that rule because I've gotten as high as 70 oz a day. And I can't just quit pumping or pump less without risking clogged ducts, infection, or completely drying up. It's a balance I don't understand and can't control.

I'm sharing all of this because I want to remember it and to hopefully some day look back and be grateful for the experience. It's a lesson in surrendering control, one I'm clearly learning every day. And I also want other people to know that the choice of whether or not to breastfeed is complicated and it's not as easy as simply choosing to or not. You might have to choose how and be willing to accept the challenges that choice might bring along with the emotions of losing what you thought you'd have. Be sensitive to that and know that each journey is different, so extend grace instead of judgement. FED is best. Period, always.