Thriving

My name is Andrea, and I am a Brestfeeding Mother! Woot!

So simple, so natural, yet so much work.

We took Zach to be weighed. Last week, our lactation consultant was concerned that he was not back up to his birth weight by 2 weeks of age. He was close, at 7 lbs. 2 oz., but still not quite there. She wanted me to bring him back in a week. Mind you, I have been worried. As long as he didn't gain as much weight as they wanted, they continued to have me supplement his feedings with some formula. So I have been taking that nasty fenugreek, pumping, nursing, bottle-feeding. It is so damned time consuming that I was about to give up. How much easier would it be to just mix a bottle of formula? And since he isn't getting everything from me, this has affected my milk supply, so the grueling routine has had to continue to keep the milk going.

But....

Today, my baby boy weighed in at 7 lbs., 14.5 oz. He has gained almost a pound this past week. Of course, everyone who sees him comments on how they cannot believe he weighs that much, as he is still so scrawny-looking. We have virtually no clothes that are small enough to fit him, barring 2 preemie-sized outfits. But now that he is almost 8 pounds? Wow! Of course he is still an average size for a newborn and he is almost a month old. I guess the poor kid got it from us: neither John or I are very tall people. And John pointed out today that my true due date is a week away, so the kid should still be in there. But anyhow, with this weight gain comes the instructions that I can back off of the formula. She told me today that if I still need to supplement, it is okay to do so with pumped breastmilk instead.

This may seem simple to some. But I have managed to keep this up for weeks. I didn't breastfeed Evan, and I always felt guilty about that. Not to mention, Evan had to have that stinky, expensive hypoallergenic formula--Nutramigen. And he would puke everything he ate, so we would have to feed him more to counteract what didn't stay down. This meant that we spent about $500 a month just on formula. I truly wanted to avoid the health implications and the expense with Zach. So far, so good, and I am thrilled and feeling rather proud of myself at the moment!