Breastfeeding 101

Breastfeeding. In my opinion it is one of the greatest and most rewarding things a mother can do for her child.  I see it as an inherent right as a woman and a mother to have the ability to feed and nourish your child in the way that nature intended.  Not only does breast milk protect your baby,  it is easier to digest, fights disease, it's cheaper than formula, and it can be a joyful bonding experience.  There are also health benefits for the mother and nothing melts off the baby weight like breastfeeding.

So if nature intended women to breastfeed, why is it so damn hard?! All the mothers I have ever met have stories of how hard the first few weeks of breastfeeding were for them.  Nipple pain is almost like a hazing into motherhood. Since becoming a mother I have been asked "So how are your nipples?" more times than I can count. And I am no exception to this rule.  Breastfeeding has been a rocky road. 

The first week of Ellie's life, we discovered that she was tongue-tied which led her to latch incorrectly.  Not knowing what I was doing I let this go on too long and it caused her to give me abraded nipples (think raw, bloody stubs.  Ouch!)  After a visit to the lactation consultant, she advised us to pump for a week while my nipples healed so we could learn to re-latch her correctly. 

Then during week two, I somehow contracted a breast infection -likely due to the abraded nipples. My doctor wasn't sure if it was Mastitis, but put me on antibiotics anyhow because the infection caused my breasts to become really sore and tender thus making breastfeeding really painful. So again, I laid off the breastfeeding and pumped while my breasts healed.

And then in week three, just when it looked like my breast infection was clearing up, I developed a yeast infection.  It's a common side-effect of antibiotics because they wipe out all the good bacteria in your body leaving you vulnerable for yeast.  For anyone who has ever experienced it, yeast is extremely painful.  It is commonly described as "sharp razor-blade like pains shooting from your breasts". Somewhere in there I tried to breastfeed again and because I wasn't fully healed and because the baby's latch was so strong (she's like a vacuum cleaner) that it caused her to give me milk blisters on my nipples (Think a blister full of milk on the end of your nipple. Fun, right?). I ended up in urgent care which turned out to be a huge waste of time because they didn't do anything for me that my doctor wasn't already doing.  Another lovely side effect of the antibiotics, pain and stress is that my milk supply plummeted.  Like in half. So on top of it all, we have been having to supplement my milk supply with formula. Not cool.

It is now week four and we are still battling the yeast infection.  At one point it looked like it was going away thanks to a miracle ointment recommended by our lactation consultant (love that woman), but it is back with a vengeance. I am hesitant to re-latch her until everything is cleared up so we don't come across yet another latch issue.  It's really hard to tell when I am latching her wrong when I am already feeling pain.  I can't tell if it's pain associated with the infection or pain associated with a bad latch.  Le sigh. 

I really, really, really hope once I am able to heal she will "remember" the breast.  One of my biggest fears is that she's been bottle fed for so long, that she is getting lazy with the bottle, despite our best efforts to make her gape, etc. Because I have to pump very frequently in an attempt to rebuild my milk supply, that usually means that someone else has to hold her and feed her.  Pumping and feedings seem to coincide most of the time. So as you can imagine, it's really hard to do both at the same time. This was easier said that done when my mother was still staying with us but now that she is gone and Tom is back at work, it makes for some very long and challenging days.  I know, as everyone always says, "this too shall pass".  As my mom put it, I'm looking forward to the day when I can breastfeed her at Starbucks while sipping a latte.  Meaning that we've master the whole breastfeeding thing and I can do it anywhere at anytime.  It's been a long rocky road, but we're hanging in there, and we'll figure it out. It's worth it.