All through my pregnancy everyone made comments about the lack of sleep I would soon be facing. It seemed the SUBJECT that was at the tip of every parents mind. GET READY everyone said, STORE UP NOW (as if you could), JUST YOU WAIT, YOU'LL NEVER SLEEP IN THIS TOWN AGAIN, etc. etc. Among all these voices of nudging me towards a life with a newborn, however, there was not a SINGLE PEEP about something else that had the potential to not only be difficult, but TERRIFYINGLY difficult. Not a single person mentioned breastfeeding.
I was on the phone with a pregnant friend about a week after I gave birth and she was asking HOW IS IT? She might as well have been asking "Now that you live on Mars, how's the scenery?" I thought I'd better let her know what I somehow missed on the newborn lecture, so I told her about how breastfeeding was BRINGING ME TO MY KNEES. She said, "Gosh, that's what so many of my friends have said, but can I ask you something? Do you have nipples?"
Yes, I have nipples. I know what she was thinking. I was thinking the same thing before birth: have nipples, will breastfeed. But at the point of the
phone call, my equipment was BEING RIPPED TO SHREDS and I was in AGONY.
And that was the EASY part.
The hard part (then) was getting my milk to come in, and not knowing that it really hadn't. Here I was CRYING OUT, white knuckled from the pain of Gus latching on, "feeding" my newborn. Only I wasn't. His diapers stayed dry and clean until a horrible pink orange stain appeared in his diaper. We frantically called the emergency pediatrician, because isn't it great to have a crisis on the weekend of Christmas when no one is available? Over the phone, he told us that Gus was probably so dehydrated his pee had
CRYSTALLIZED and we needed to start supplementing with formula NOW until my milk came in. Great. So not only was I in great physical pain, but my baby wasn't even benefiting. He was actually SUFFERING and I had to do that HORROR of HORRORS for anyone who believes in BREAST IS BEST and feed him FORMULA from A BOTTLE.
Yeah, that was a fun and totally a self-esteem building event.
After about two days of pumping and supplementing, my milk seemed to build and Gus went off the bottle. I had about ten days of getting better at breastfeeding. One boob didn't hurt, the other still did, but I could sometimes get him to latch on correctly. My milk seemed to flow and his diapers were running over! Things were moving forward! The villagers cheered! The kingdom lived happily ever after until...
Last
friday all hell broke loose. My milk levels suddenly dropped and Gus suddenly wouldn't latch on--at all. He'd try, get utterly insulted, flail around and then SCREAM HIS HEAD OFF. I kept stopping to calm him and then trying again to no avail. So what's a new mother with a history of dehydrating her newborn do? I PANICKED. I felt like a total failure as I made another bottle of formula and tried to soothe my hungry child. Once again, on a holiday weekend (thanks
MLK Day!) we couldn't get in person help. I talked to two lactation consultants over the phone. One said to get
a nipple shield and to call other lactation consultants. The other said she'd see us on Tuesday. So we got the nipple shield, which is annoying as hell, but Gus latched onto it. I just couldn't be sure he was getting enough milk. So for four days I pumped like mad to no avail, tried going without a bottle, only to give in and feel inadequate all over again.
It didn't help that the majority of people who I talked
to's biggest problem with breastfeeding was an overabundance of milk. If one more person says to me, "Oh I remember the pain. I had to go into the shower and just let the milk RUN," I'll maim myself. No offense to those who are well endowed milk wise, but right now you make me so jealous and filled with yearning, pain, and panic that talking to you is like being stamped with a big red badge that says NEVER GONNA HAPPEN.
The thing about having problems with breastfeeding is that it's not only a problem of the basic survival of your child, but that you get to experience the problem and the anxiety attached to it EVERY TWO HOURS. It's never just a single moment, it's a moment that just keeps coming and will keep coming. You want to talk desperate? You want to talk despair? BARGAINING? I have not reached
acceptance yet.
We met with the consultant this week (who was AWESOME) and who gave us a plan to adhere to for the time being. She also helped confirm a suspicion that Gus' sucking has gotten weaker. (You see, here is my point: WHO KNEW that babies could SUCK at sucking? Isn't that THEIR JOB?) So in addition to a plan for increasing milk supply and managing feedings, she gave us an
exercise to help him get back up on sucking.
What I don't understand through all this is why I spent 6 weeks in classes preparing for something that lasted just under 3 hours for me (the birth), while I had little to NO preparation for the potentially problematic and ONGOING experience of what came after. Sure, I took a breastfeeding class...when I was SEVEN MONTHS PREGNANT. What kind of DUMB ASS plan was that? Why educate women HOW to breastfeed with DOLLS when they haven't even experienced a
BRAXTON HICKS contraction, much less a new, helpless creature who is utterly dependant on you for nourishment at ALL TIMES? I barely remember any of it now as I weather the utter SHOCK of how hard it actually is for me. I feel a little bit like a bride who planned and planned for the wedding, but never prepared for the MARRIAGE.
Right now lack of sleep on its own seems UTTERLY QUAINT compared to the terror of my child being not able to feed. Well, at least there's one LESS thing to worry about. Sleep can take a backseat for the time being. After this, it will feel like EASY STREET.
Labels: baby, gus
