Before I had John Charles, I had two friends who talked to me about their experiences with breastfeeding. They both said it was extremely difficult, and it would not come naturally at all. Breastfeeding, the only way of feeding a baby up until the last century, is not a natural concept. I couldn't wrap my head around that idea, until I actually experienced it first-hand. My mom and I went to a breastfeeding class about a month before my due date, so the concepts they went over in the class were fresh in my mind in the days leading up to his birth. I was determined to have the hour of skin-to-skin time uninterrupted by visitors because I was told that time is so critical to getting a good start with breastfeeding. Everywhere I turned, I kept reading and hearing that breastfeeding as soon after birth as possible is the best way to get started. So that's exactly what we planned to do!
I was quite determined to breastfeed, partly because of the health benefits to myself and the high cost of formula, whereas breastfeeding is free. However, the most important reason I wanted to breastfeed was because I truly felt that breastfeeding was the absolute best way to nourish my child. God created breastfeeding and I needed to do the best for my child. Granted, I had a full-term, healthy baby with no complications. I do realize some situations are different than mine and some people choose not to breastfeed. That's a personal decision, and I don't judge anyone for their choice, but I felt breastfeeding was the path we needed to take, and I have decided to write about it, in case anyone ever wanted encouragement on an extremely lonely and difficult road.
After John Charles was born, he was immediately placed on my chest and cleaned off. As soon as he was mostly clean, the nurse said I could begin trying to feed him. After a couple of minutes of absolutely no success, the nurse turned around to her cart and started pulling something out, saying something about how we can use this and it should help him figure it out. I turned and asked what she was referring to. She turned around and had a container of formula and said she was going to apply to me, so that John Charles would smell it and then be more apt to eat! I honestly have no idea what my facial expression looked like (and now I feel bad if I looked horrified), but I told her in no uncertain terms that I was not giving my 10 minute old newborn formula! We hadn't really even had a chance to get it figured out yet. I can easily see how someone might give in to the nurse, because she acted like it was standard procedure (and it might be) until I pushed back. We kept trying to nurse, but he really didn't seem interested, so after a little bit, we gave up and I just spent time enjoying looking at our new son.
While we were in the hospital that first day, the nurses would roll John Charles into my room every so often and have me try and nurse him. It didn't seem like we were getting anywhere at all. My breasts felt like balloons, which I'm guessing was the start of my body beginning the process of making milk. It was not comfortable at all either! I felt pain at each feeding, which I was told was normal. John Charles was so sleepy and not at all interested in eating most of the time. Sometimes he would attempt to eat a little and then fall asleep within a couple of minutes. Sweet Brandon tried his best to help me. But remember, he didn't go to the breastfeeding class, so he was having to rely on me or the nurse for guidance. I had a friend say the breastfeeding class was a bit graphic, so I shouldn't take my husband. I wish I would have taken him and just let him listen to most of it because there was so much information he had no clue about.
That evening, at shift change, we met the night nursery nurse. When she rolled him into my room, I asked for a little help and she was able to provide me with some guidance and told us some specifics about what we needed to be striving for during each feeding. For instance, I needed to nurse on each side for five-ten minutes and the breast can fill back up after two hours. I honestly don't remember if I had been told that before or not, but we started trying to make sure he was eating for at least five minutes on a side. I counted the time only when he was eating, not the time from when we started and then just stopped five minutes later. I did know his stomach was very small, so he really didn't need a large volume of colostrum. I was woken up during the night but I really don't remember how often I was feeding him. I wasn't paying attention to the time at all at that point. I guess the nurses were?
The next day continued on in the same manner. I tried to nurse but I just didn't feel like I was having much success. I started asking for the nurse's help at pretty much every session, so that was helpful. They gave me a nipple shield at some point to try and I think that helped a little bit. The nurse mentioned at some point that morning that I should supplement with formula, since he was a little jaundiced. I said I was not interested in giving formula, since he was still so young. After that conversation, at each feeding, I began trying to squeeze out colostrum and get the drops into his mouth. We know he was eating something, because I was getting it into his mouth and he would swallow it. I don't know if that causes issues with babies becoming lazy, but I was beginning to get worried if he didn't start eating from me, I'd be almost forced to give him formula.
That afternoon or the following morning (it all runs together), when the pediatrician on-call came in to talk to us, she said they were a little concerned about his weight because he had lost ten ounces (almost 8% of his birth weight). Apparently 10% is where they start getting very concerned. I told her I was not interested in formula and wanted to discuss ways to make sure breastfeeding would work better. I asked if she felt like it was okay for us to wait a few more days until our appointment with pediatrician. I asked her opinion about me going home and using my breast pump every two hours until our doctor appointment and feeding him the milk I pumped. She said as long as he was getting 20-30 ccs of breast milk every 3 hours, that would be perfectly fine, but if not, I needed to begin supplementing with formula, at least temporarily, so that we didn't get readmitted to the hospital for complications due to him not eating enough. I asked about using breast milk from a friend to supplement, instead of formula. I had three different friends who were all pumping and I thought asking for an ounce or two wouldn't be a huge request, if that's what we needed to do. She said if I was comfortable using their milk, that would be fine. I just needed to make sure they were not smoking or drinking and had good eating habits. I think she was a bit surprised about that question, but I was determined for him to have only breast milk and was willing to be vulnerable and ask for help, if that was required.
As soon as we were discharged, we went home and while my mom was getting us lunch, I began pulling out the breast pump pieces and sterilizing them. I read through the instructions and got everything hooked up and ready to go. I pumped and pumped and pumped, every two hours for the next 44 hours until his appointment. At first, I was getting drops at a time and was barely getting 10 ccs at a time--total! We were feeding him when I pumped (every two hours), so that the milk was fresh. We were trying to get liquid in his as fast as I could make it. When I would dump the milk from the pump bottle into his bottle, I would try not to waste a single drop! I realized why it was called liquid gold. It's not just the color, although it was a somewhat gold color! After a few pumping sessions, I was producing the correct amount for what the pediatrician had told me I needed to be getting in him as a minimum.
I didn't realize how exhausting pumping every two hours would be at first. It was not fun having to wake up every two hours and go pump. At 3:00 AM, I wasn't feeding my child and staring at his sweet, new face. I was looking at this black box with tubes coming from it instead. Brandon and I were both up every two hours, since he was giving him a bottle of what I pumped.
After about 24 hours, I was producing 2-3 ounces at each pumping session, and I would feel so accomplished after each session. I wanted to post pictures of the milk I was producing and show the entire world my success! I chose to send pictures to my mom instead. I even began producing more milk than he wanted to eat, which was so exciting to me!!
At the pediatrician's appointment, she said he looked great and had gained back four of the ten ounces he had lost! Four ounces in just 48 hours! I felt like I was on top of the world. I explained what we had been doing and she said we could begin to stretch it to three hours now, even four hours at night. Brandon and I were so relieved. I began pumping every three-four hours (sometimes more frequently) and I was getting a little over 20 ounces a day. He wasn't eating everything I was pumping, so I began freezing some milk once he was a little over a week old.
After another week or two, I was producing close to 50 oz a day. I was thrilled to have the extra milk, since I was exclusively pumping. I exclusively pumped for almost a solid month before we were able to transition off of bottles. We transitioned by using a nipple shield and then we slowly worked until we weren't using that at all after another two weeks. It was difficult to transition to exclusively breastfeeding, because I still had to pump at least twice a day for a little bit because I had so much extra milk! I was able to get down to just pumping every day or so after a few more weeks. Once I returned to work, it wasn't an issue, because I pumped at work everyday, so I was able to deal with the oversupply each workday.
I'm currently six months into my breastfeeding journey. I'm so thankful I chose to persevere through the extremely trying first two months of our journey because now it is so much easier! I have a goal of breastfeeding John Charles until he is two years old. I know some people think that is completely gross, but that's a decision that I feel will benefit my child immensely! I'm now 25% of the way through our breastfeeding journey, and I wouldn't trade it for anything!! If you are struggling with trying to breastfeed, I certainly don't mind answer questions as best I can. More than anything, if you are struggling to breastfeed, you need people in your life to encourage you. It definitely didn't come "naturally" to me at all, and it helped tremendously to have my mom, aunt, Grandmother, and various friends there to offer support and encouragement, especially in the early months when I was struggling with little sleep and not sure what to do.
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