Or Why I Can't Sleep. Or Why I Have No Time. Or Breastfeeding Kinda Sucks. Or This is Bullsh*t. Yeah, I could come up with quite a few titles for this post. Because after a busy night-one busy night- at work, my supply dropped back down again. So I am back to pumping every 3 hours around the clock. Again. And after just a few days of being back at it, I feel like a zombie. But what sucks is that I'll work and work at getting my supply back up, then go to work one night and it will be guarunteed to go back down. I am constantly attached to a breastpump, and I fricken hate it. But just when I am about to say "screw it" and give up, I have one of those warm fuzzy nursing moments with Zach, and I instantly know I won't be giving it up anytime soon. Because every drop of my milk he gets is my way of giving myself over to him.
One of my fave OB nurses from work put it into perspective for me. She knows all I have tried to be able to exclusively breastfeed Zach. (I mean, c'mon, who buys a $2000 pump??????) So when I was feeling down about it and cursing the lactation consultant who first had me give him damned formula in the hospital, she cleared my head by telling me that they were secretly talking about keeping Zach in the hospital. In fact, if he would have lost 2 more ounces of his birth weight, he wouldn't have come home with me. And that was with him getting formula. I can only imagine what would have happened if he would have just been nursing and getting colostrum those first few days. I didn't know any of this until she told me. And then she reminded me that I have been at least 50% of his food source for 4 months, which is a lot more than a lot of babies get, and that I managed to do that with a preemie who couldn't latch. And during the emotional aftermath of my pregnancy, which was enough to dry up the fricken Atlantic. So yeah, she picked me up a bit.
So no, I won't give up. But it still sucks.
I agree. I can't stand the pump. I would much prefer to just nurse him. Sometimes I regret going back to work because this is what it has come down to - me sitting in a closet twice a day, strapped to a machine hidden in a bag so my baby can get his nutrients and anti-bodies while someone else feeds him. The worst part is, after pumping, I still have a 45-50 drive to day care to see him. So yeah- I totally agree. I won't give up either for similar reasons, but pumping absolutely, positively sucks.
ReplyDeleteAmen, Sister! Why is it that noone talks about THIS part of brastfeeding??? Maybe it's because few moms would do it if they knew about this part beforehand. One thing' for sur---our babies are lucky! They both have tough mamas who'll stick it out!
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