What an adventure!

Breastfeeding was very hard for Noah and I. Breastfeeding is hard for all women I believe; you really have to stick to it. We tried everything; the plain breast, the shield, an eye dropper of formula to trick him (at hospital) and eye dropper of colostrum (at home). Nothing seemed to be working; we just couldn’t get the hang of it. Noah was born at 6:33pm and around 10pm I was finally allowed to try breast feeding him. I had a c-section and was able to hold him but only for like 15 minutes or so before they took him away to put him under the lights. The nurse on staff, not very nice I should add helped me a little bit throughout the night with it but he really didn’t eat anything for the first night. The nurse said that was okay at the time. Come morning though about 12 hours later, Noah still was not nursing so they had me supplementing with formula. At this point I was so bummed and discouraged. Everything in me wanted to breast feed my baby so I was determined to keep trying. The nurses that I had throughout my hospital stay gave me a different technique every single time. There was so consistency!! You would think that they would have some kind of the same plan. I mean one nurse would just shove Noah onto my boob and he would latch for 2 seconds before stopping and screaming. In those 2 seconds the nurse left the room thinking that he was eating and fine. But he wasn’t! Another nurse tried having me trick him with a little bit of formula on my breast to see if that would help. And the whole time they had me using the shield which I absolutely hated!! It just seemed like no one was on the same page and we were getting nowhere! Noah was losing weight like crazy so that me supplementing with formula in a bottle. He weighed 7lbs 14oz at birth and by the time we went home he was 7lbs 2oz. The lactation consultant was helpful but still had me supplement.

When we finally went home on Saturday, things didn’t get any better. My husband and I tried so hard to get him to eat and latch on. We were both a wreck! We had to go to the pediatrician on Monday to check on his weight (7lbs .5oz) and our doctor that day told us that the hospital should have never had me supplementing. That I was just confusing Noah more than anything with the boob, the shield, the bottle and then the formula. She told me to just keep trying to breast feed, come back in 2 weeks and we will see how his weight is. I called my Mom right after the appointment and asked if she would come help me. She had 5 natural births and breast fed all of us successfully! She was there by the end of the night. Yay! I just kept praying and hoping that one day soon we would get the hang of breast feeding. My mom had me pump like crazy, like every hour to get my milk to come in. We kept trying to get him to latch on the boob and he just wouldn’t. He would get so upset!! He wasn’t eating anything so I chose to supplement with formula. Noah wasn’t eating much of anything and the mom in me just couldn’t let him starve. My mom picked up fenugreek and brewer’s yeast. Finally with all the pumping, my milk came in almost a week and half later. I gave up on the breast for the first week; I just pumped the colostrum and milk and gave it to Noah in a bottle. I figured as long as he was getting the milk it was okay. It finally came time for my Mom to leave and my husband to go back to work. I was overwhelmed and just kept thinking “how on earth am I going to keep pumping and giving Noah bottles?” It was so time consuming and he was eating like every 2 hours. I just kept praying and finally I thought I would try one last time to put him to the breast and guess what? He latched right on and ate for 20 minutes straight. I was crying and in complete shock! I couldn’t believe that he was finally breast feeding. At Noah’s 2 week appointment he weighed 8lbs 10oz. The pediatrician said he was in the 75^th percentile for his weight. He was gaining twice as much than the normal! From that day on, he has breast fed ever since. We are going on 5 months!!

So I want to let future Moms and struggling Moms know that you can do it!! It was the hardest thing I have ever done but I wouldn’t trade it for anything. It is the most amazing feeling ever. I wish I would have done more research going into labor. Next time I’m going to have a birth plan for the hospital and it will say that I want my baby trying to breast feeding right away! I feel that I missed out on some things having the c-section and then struggling so much with breast feeding but now we are doing great! Now I know what I need to do differently the next time. So ladies you can do it!