Off
the top (ha!), I will say, that I’m not here to judge. Every mama does what is best for her and her
baby when it comes to filling that baby’s belly so he or she can grow strong
and healthy. And I empathize with that
paralyzing feeling of guilt that you are possibly making the wrong decision,
regardless of what that is. And it’s a
pretty awful way to start out mamahood, second guessing your choice of milk and
worrying about it. But I’m not writing
about that (today). Instead, I’m going
to tell you about my battle with my boobs.
Stories
about breastfeeding are much like birth stories. You generally only hear the horrible ones
along the lines of “my baby wouldn’t latch properly and screamed at me and I
nursed until my nipples were cracked and bleeding”. And when I was pregnant for the first time, I
heard a lot of those stories, often accompanied by some small piece of
ridiculous advice or presumption such as: you should vigorously rub your
nipples with a washcloth to get them ready; you have darker pigmentation so it
won’t bother you. Well, the first is a
bad idea simply because vigorous nipple stimulation releases oxytocin which can
start labour. And the second bit, is
based on science but I am here to tell you did not ring true.
Throughout
my pregnancy with R, I kept waiting for the giant pregnancy boobs. I bought a soft bra in a bigger size to grow
into; I wore tight t-shirts and asked my partner if my boobs looked
bigger. I did not. They did not.
This was a true physiological sign that something was going to go amiss
with breastfeeding. No one caught it.
The
fact that I was ripped off the gigantic pregnancy boobs was actually not the
first sign that breastfeeding, or rather milk supply, was going to be a
problem. The first sign would have been
that I have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome).
But neither my GP, who is awesome, nor my midwife, who is awesome, nor
my naturopath recognized this potential barrier. None of them caught the lack of big boobs as
a sign, and certainly none of them mentioned that my bottoming out iron was
going to be a problem for milk supply.
(Low iron had other concerns that were addressed).
Shortly
after her birth, R latched with no problems.
She pretty much stayed there for the better part of six months. I kid you not. The first 48 hours, she nursed in my arms
contentedly sucking up all the immune system building colostrum I could give
her. We nursed sitting up and lying
down. But her third night, she got
hungry. And then she got angry. And Mark and I felt hopeless. R latched and wouldn’t let go, she sucked
away for about twelve hours straight until our midwife came for a home visit
and squeezed my breast and re-positioned her and counted wet diapers. I was reassured that my milk would come in
soon and that my baby was getting what she needed. I found that very hard to believe given the
yells that would come forth when the milk did not. I cried.
Mark held me. He couldn’t hold R
because she would just get angrier and then be harder to settle down. My parents wanted to visit again and when
they did my mother got angry with me for something and my father made me feel
guilty about it. So, yeah, not helpful. Mark’s older kids were with us that night and
feeling displaced so he had to spend time with them and all I could do was lie
on our bed, tears streaming down my face as I desperately massaged my breasts
and murmured to my baby girl. This would become an all too familiar
routine. That night, the fourth night,
my milk came in. I knew it came in,
because I woke up to R gulping away. I
was flooded with relief and spent the night staring at my beautiful baby girl
who drank with wide eyes looking up at me.
But
R and I would have a tougher than expected breastfeeding road. She was a lazy nurser. I say that with love, affection, and humour
(now. Not so funny then). She would nurse for less than ten minutes and
fall asleep. When she woke up, she’d do the same thing on the other side. I tried rubbing her head and her feet. At some point, more desperate measures were
recommended in order to ensure she was taking in enough milk, and I had to rub
her with a cool, wet washcloth. She didn’t
like that. My nipples cracked. My nipples bled. My nipples healed. I called La Leche League for advice, grateful
that I had had the foresight to attend a meeting while pregnant so I at least
knew the lovely woman I was speaking to.
I called my midwife who came to visit.
R was gaining weight slowly but steadily and she was a long baby so she
looked like a scrawny monkey. Gradually
her cheeks got fuller and her body a little plumper.
But
at just over three months old, she hit the expected growth spurt and became
angry baby again. She was attached to my
nipple all the time. All.The.Time. Mark and I were already used to the fact that
she was in my arms all the time and that wasn’t really a problem for me. I was on maternity leave and she was my only
baby. But at three months it was
different, and when I went to pump milk to give Mark a chance to feed our baby,
I ended up with plugged ducts and full blown mastitis.
Mastitis
is a breast infection. It is
horrifyingly painful to nurse through it and worse to not nurse through
it. Your skin burns and swells on your
breasts. Touch is excruciating. Cold shivers and hot flashes set in as does a
fever, the shakes, and fatigue. This is
not the medical textbook definition I’m providing you with, it is what I experienced. All while my baby would struggle against my
breasts, flailing in my arms, and not settle no matter what I did, forcing me
to change position, walk around, and cry – a lot. I spent several days completely topless with
her in the baby wrap trying to nurse upright from a rocking chair. I sought the attention of a very sensitive
massage therapist who managed to help ease some of the pressure and start the
fluids moving and draining.
When
I recovered from that I realized that I had very little milk coming in at one
time. After months of only nursing for
five to ten minutes at a time, my body was only producing enough milk for five
to ten minute spurts. Except now R was
starving and wanted to nurse much longer.
This was compounded by the low iron, the hormone imbalances from my
PCOS;and the three month postpartum hormone (mal)adjustments and so I ended up
on a prescription for Domperidone that I took for over a year because every
time I tried to wean myself off of it, my milk supply would go down. Now, I have no scientific proof, but I am
pretty sure that my horrifying weight gain once I went on the ‘scrip can be
mostly attributed to it.
Before
I started the prescription, which was offered various suggestions on how to
increase my supply. Primarily, to lie
down skin-to-skin with my little girl, increase my fluid intake, and decrease
my non-mama duties. I took this advice
happily. I tried breast massage before
every nursing session and hand pumping as my daughter nursed. I was advised to
drink fenugreek tea. It started leaking
out of my pores and I reeked. I mean, I
sincerely stunk. I couldn’t cope with
it. It was bad enough to be going
through massive hormone upheaval, to feel desperate to feed my child, but to
smell awful too – and my partner could not disagree – was horrifying to
me. At the time, midwives in Ontario could
not write a prescription for Domperidone, and the Jack Newman clinic was too
far away for me to reasonably get there, so I consulted my GP who provided me
with a prescription but not a ton of advice on consequences and how to build up
and wean off the pills.
The
time that passed between getting the Domperidone and my milk supply increasing
seemed like months. I couldn’t go
anywhere or be near anyone. I felt like I was failing my child. I felt that somehow because I wasn’t
producing enough milk for her; I wasn’t being a good enough mama. I missed my cousin’s wedding because I just couldn’t
bear to be around people while my child cried and wanted to nurse. People like my parents who would have wanted to
hold her and “comfort” her resulting in a more irate and now frightened baby as
evidenced by every single visit when they would take her out of my arms and
walk away and she would scream.
R
and I went on to have a very successful breastfeeding relationship. One might venture to say, an overly
successful one as when I wanted to wean her, I couldn’t. And when we did, at 2.5years old it was
because I was crying with pain from sensitive nipples as I was pregnant with
L. R wasn’t getting any milk anymore at
that point, it was just comfort. And I
wanted to at least preserve some of the good memories of breastfeeding. We did.
I have a lot of good memories and I have a strong, beautiful, smart six
year old girl who still sleeps with the soft pillow I used to tuck under my
head when lying down to nurse her. It
was a long trip, both ways, but well worth it.
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