Baby #1 Breastfeeding Story
In 2015 I gave birth to my first child, a beautiful baby boy. I had read all the books, took all the classes and knew that I would exclusively breastfeed by baby for the first year. Because that was what you were supposed to do, right? It was going to be so magical and natural. My mother was a strong advocate for breastfeeding and I’ve always leaned towards hippy, natural options in life. It never even crossed my mind that I might have complications with this goal.
I nursed on-demand from the get go and it seemed that “on-demand” in reality was “all-the-time”. My baby was born at 7 lbs. and wasn’t gaining weight as expected. I must need to nurse him more I kept telling myself. I had one of those breastfeeding pillows that snapped on around your waist and I glued that baby to the boob. I’m sure we spent more time attached then we did apart.
He was having trouble gaining back his birth weight and around week four he only gained 2 ounces when he should have averaged between 4 and 7 ounces per week. The doctor said he should be a pound over his birth weight by now. She wanted me to supplement some formula into his diet but I said no, we wanted to try to work it out without formula for the time being. I thought it was just a bad week and we would power through it. I thought this was something I just needed to work harder at. We had introduced the pacifier the previous week and thought that may have been the contributing factor. Maybe he was giving us hunger cues and I was just missing it. We had already been feeding on-demand which ranged from every 1-3 hours. But despite that, we made an effort to really, really, really focus on feeding knowing he hadn't gained his weekly quota. That week he had also began throwing more and more fits during the day. I was reading everything I could about what it could be. I was trying to avoid eating anything that could cause gas or colic. But also making sure I was eating foods known to help increase milk supply. I was drinking water like crazy and started documenting all his feedings, naps, diapers etc. I spoke with the lactation consultant from the hospital over the phone who went over a few things with me but pretty much said you are doing everything right, just keep it up and try to get some rest. One lactation consultant also suggested some herbal supplements that I sent my husband to the store for.
The next week came and his fits were worse, his crying became more like screaming - red faced and tears... and I had to know if we were making progress so I called the clinic to bring him in for a weigh. He'd gained less than 2 oz. in 5 days. Not good. The nurse sent me out the door with some formula and told me to call the doctor tomorrow since she was out of the office for the day.
My mom’s cousin in California, is a very good lactation consultant so we contacted her for some help. She went over our case over the phone but suggested we call a private practice consultant in the area and get some help ASAP. Someone who can come see us at home and get to the bottom of this problem. She suggested I continue to feed on-demand but also start bottle feeding him my supply of frozen breastmilk I'd pumped earlier for going back to work. It was small but he needed the extra milk until he figured out what was wrong. Giving him a chaser bottle after a breastfeed about every 2 hours. He immediately gobbled down the bottle and even napped longer and harder.
With the powers of technology, I was able to video us nursing and sent it via text to mom’s cousin who asked us a few more questions and told us she thinks he suffered from tongue tie. She guessed he had been sustaining on my breastmilk letdown but not getting a full suck when feeding. Without draining my breast at each feeding my supply was going down and he was getting less to drink. Also, with his limited range of motion he was latching poorly, allowing air to get in his tummy at feedings, causing gas and pain. He was hungry and gassy. He was also only getting the foremilk, not the hindmilk where the fatty nutrients are that would help him pack on pounds, or in his case ounces.
We were able to get in pretty fast to see the lactation specialist who spent almost 2 hours with us going over things. She confirmed his tongue tie (Stage 2), was able to work with me on latching, my husband with bottle feeding, answer all our questions and go over a game plan to get both our baby’s weight up and also my supply. Thankfully with our cousin’s help we were already getting him more milk by pumping and bottle feeding. In less than 24 hours he had already gained an ounce.
Mommy multi-tasking at its finest: pumping, bottle-feeding and taking a selfie.
We went back to the lactation consultant for an in-house procedure where they clipped that little membrane under his tongue that was holding back his full range of motion. We could see a visual difference right away. There was also a difference in nursing and as we worked on proper latching and stretching.
This story is getting pretty long so I’ll fast-forward and condense some here. I did everything I thought I was supposed to do. I wanted to breastfeed my baby more than anything in the world. But after all our hard work, all our struggles, my baby just wanted to be held and fed. We spent hours going to physical therapy appointments, doing tongue-tie stretches at home, paying for personal lactation consultants, renting an infant scale, documenting weighted feedings, writing down what I ate, trying to eat foods to help my supply, taking herbal/prescriptions supplements to increase my supply. But my son refused the breast more and more and just wanted a bottle. I ended up pumping, turning right around and giving him that milk in a bottle, then chasing the breastmilk bottle with a formula bottle and then doing it all over again. This routine left no time to enjoy our time together. Once he refused to feed at the breast, I focused my energy on pumping and trying to get as much breastmilk I could to him through a bottle. But I could never keep up. I spent so much time stressing over getting him this liquid gold it brought me to tears from exhaustion. I finally broke down on the phone one day with the hospital lactation consultant (maybe around month 5). I wanted to know if I should be spending longer time pumping or doing it more often but shorter session. I just needed answers, I needed someone to tell me how to fix this. She stopped me and said the words I needed to hear. She told me I had done everything I should have. That I had given my baby the gift of breastmilk but that I need to stop and look at the situation. Is all this time and energy I’m spending pumping and worrying about making milk consuming time I should be spending enjoying my baby? She told me I did good. She told me that formula was OK. She told me what I needed to hear. I’ve always been an extremely hard worker and I don’t stop until my goals are achieved. But I’ve always struggle with this crucial question… When to say “all-done” and move on or when to try harder. I made the decision then that spending quality time with my baby during these limited and special days was more important to me then the type of milk he received. My first born is now almost 4 years old. He is as healthy as can be and could not be closer to his momma. That is all I could ask for.
