Moanna’s Birth Story – Part 5: Breastfeeding Battles

Breastfeeding is one of those touchy parenting subjects. It’s not something everyone chooses to do, and even when we really want it for our babies it may not work like we had hoped. It was really important to me to breastfeed. I had known this about myself years before becoming a Mommy, but It turned out to be one of the most disappointing experiences of my life.

If you need a refresher, you can catch with the links below…
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

It’s a week late, but I’ve finally been able to get this next part of Moanna’s Birth Story complete. It took me awhile because I had to struggle to come to terms with a few things. Also it’s a long post, but I didn’t want to break it down into smaller posts and I couldn’t find things to eliminate, so please hang in there with me. If you’re not interested in the gory details, I’ll give you a quick synopsis. I really wanted to breast feed, and tried to for five months before giving up. I had every breastfeeding aliment known to man. I blame the drugs given to me during labor for starting us off on the wrong foot. It was a miserable experience. Despite all of that, I plan to breast feed Deuce. If you want the gory details and to hear me pitch a fit about medieval torture devices disguised as breast pumps, read on…

My swaddled up little baby wasn’t much bigger than a sack of sugar. She was the sweetest little thing ever. The sweetest and the sleepiest.  After the nurses handed her back over to us, and we were done (for the moment) admiring her, it was time to start nursing. I held Moanna up to me so that she would start nursing, but instead of nursing she fell asleep. I moved her away from my chest, and she woke up. I brought her back to my breast, and she fell asleep just after latching on. This went on for a good while.

I had read books and tons of stuff on the internet. Breastfeeding was covered in our birthing class. This was something that was supposed to come naturally. Mothers and babies have been doing this for thousands of years all over the world. Animals do it too. So why was this so darn hard? And why was my baby more interested in sleeping on my nipples than eating from them?

I was on the verge of tears when a lactation consultant came fluttering into the room. “I hear I have a brand new breast feeding mommy and a brand new breast feeding baby and a brand new daddy in here, and I thought you might like some help or have some questions.”

“Help me! She won’t eat. Every time I try to nurse her, she falls asleep. When I take her away from me, she wakes up screaming. Something is not working.”

We talked to her for a bit before she asked me to whip out my breasts and attempt nursing again. She wanted to watch Moanna and me in action before she gave her opinions and advice. Just as I had described to her minutes earlier, I brought Moanna to my breast, she latched on, took a few sucks and passed out. I tickled her feet and she sucked a few more times, and fell asleep. I rubbed her head and she didn’t even budge.

The lactation consultant suggested we undress her down to her diaper. Perhaps she was just too warm and snuggly. We tried that. She squirmed a little, sucked a few times and went right back to sleep. We tickled, rubbed and jostled. She would eat a little bit and then pass out. Anytime I would bring her away from my body she would wake up and have a hissy fit. After awhile the lactation consultant told us to take a break, relax and enjoy our new baby for awhile. She said that she’d be back in an hour or so and we’d try some new things, but until then Moanna wouldn’t starve, so not to stress.

Why was my baby so sleepy and cranky?

The hospital attributed it to having a very low birth weight. “Smaller babies just have trouble with nursing and staying alert for more than a few minutes at a time. Get some formula and nutrition into her and she’ll come around.” Perhaps being petite contributed to her sleepiness. However, without a doubt in my mind, I attribute her exhaustion and frustration to the narcotics given to me while I was in labor. She was drugged and worn out by all of the camel backed contractions she had to endure.

Later the lactation consultant came back, and we started trying to nurse again. Moanna was more alert at this point, so she was trying harder to nurse. Unfortunately after a few sucks, she would pull off or fall off of my nipples. Soon she was worn out again, and would fall asleep and we were back to where we were in the beginning.

My nipples were already starting to get sore and crack and bleed. I was also starting to fill up with milk. My tiny B+ chest was easily a D. The lactation consultant wanted to make sure that my milk continued to come in. More importantly, she didn’t want the hospital staff to have any reason to push formula on us, so she suggested I start pumping milk and finger feed her after each attempt at nursing.

The lactation consultant told me not to be discouraged if I only got an ounce or so because it takes time for milk supply to build up. However, within twenty minutes, I had more than two ounces in each bottle. I pumped several times in the hospital, and towards the end I was producing so much milk that I was filling both bottles up. That breast pump was amazing, and I felt amazing as I watched the bottles fill up with milk. It was one of the only things that made me feel like I was doing any good as a new mom. I pumped milk like a champ.

Finger feeding was quite torturous, but at least we were making some progress. I would attempt to nurse Moanna. She would either get really frustrated because she couldn’t latch on (the nipple guards we tried using to protect my cracking and bleeding nipples really made her angry) or she would fall asleep a minute or two into things. After she was fed up and I was in tears, Steve would take Moanna and feed her the milk that I had pumped from the previous attempt. He would place his finger in her mouth and the tip of a syringe. If she sucked on his finger, he would push some milk through the syringe. If she didn’t suck, he stopped pushing. While they played this game, I pumped milked and wiped away my tears.

We left the hospital very hesitantly. The lactation consultant arranged for us to pick up a breast pump from the health department on our way home, and scheduled another lactation consultant to come visit us at home the following day.

The days that followed were miserable. It was more of the same – failed attempts at the breast, finger feeding and pumping milk. The breast pump I was using at home was a medieval torture device compared to the heavenly pump I used at the hospital. My nipples were getting more and more damaged and Moanna was liking me less and less. Anytime I would come near her she would start to stress and get upset. Anytime I would go near her, I would start to stress and get upset. I spent the first part of Moanna’s life tearful and topless.

Every other day, the lactation consultant would come to visit and try to help and encourage us. She was nice enough, but she was not the lactation consultant at the hospital. She wasn’t pushy and she didn’t make me feel guilty, but I wasn’t comfortable with her. On the days that the lactation consultant didn’t visit me, I drove to the health department to meet her or another nurse for more help and to have Moanna and her diapers weighed.

My time line is bad on this, but a week or so after Moanna was born, I got really sick, really quickly. I had a fever, I was dehydrated (so dehydrated that I had no milk and my postpartum bleeding had completely stopped), my breasts were red hot fiery rocks, and I was behaving like a drunk. It was clearly mastitis. It had hit me so hard and so fast I had no choice but to go to the emergency room. Steve was at work when all of this happened, so my mom took me to the hospital. To be perfectly honest with you, I have no idea where Moanna was during this. She may have stayed at home with my stepdad and brothers, she may have come to the hospital with us, we might have dropped her off at Nanny and PopPops. I have no idea. That is how out of it I was. The hospital pumped me with a few bags of fluids and gave me some hefty antibiotics. By the time I had left the hospital, my fever had broke, I was leaking milk, the bleeding had returned and I was less drunk. Thank the stars I had been pumping milk because I didn’t have it in me to pump milk or attempt nursing for the next few days. Instead I slept and rubbed cream on my nipples and slept and sat outside topless hoping the sun would heal me.

A few days after the mastitis emergency, we all (as in all three of us) got thrush from the antibiotics I was taking. My nipples itched, tingled and burned. It felt like a nest of ants were going to town on me. Moanna’s mouth was covered in little white bumps and she was fussier than her usual hungry self. Steve would put Moanna’s binkis in his mouth to clean them off when they hit the ground, so he had white bumps and an itchy fiery mouth too.

As a result of the mastitis and thrush, my milk supply dropped. I attempted to nurse Moanna and she would get frustrated because I wasn’t producing enough milk for her. Someone would take Moanna and finger feed her while I pumped milk. I was getting less and less milk each time I pumped. I would watch reruns on TV and sit there with the torture device attached to me and pray for milk. My milk supply that I had stored up in the fridge and freezer was quickly disappearing.

Steve did his best to encourage Moanna and me. He would sit with us while we tried to nurse and rub my back and legs to show his love and support. He would tickle Moanna when she fell asleep, and talk to her when she got upset. He would finger feed Moanna while I pumped the milk that she refused to take from me. He didn’t run away from us when we were both crying and having fits. On a regular basis he would come home from work and find us both exhausted and in tears. He would take Moanna from me and tell me to go shower or eat or get some fresh air. Within minutes Moanna was a happy and peaceful baby in his company.

My family and friends were trying to be supportive and trying to rescue me from my nursing misery. Unfortunately their support wasn’t the kind of support I needed which upset me more. I didn’t need rescued and I didn’t need people to tell me it was OK to quit. I needed people to encourage me to breast feed. I needed people to tell me that it was hard and miserable, but that I could do it because that is what I wanted for my baby. Instead, they were encouraging me to give her formula and throw in the towel. They all said it was clear nursing wasn’t for me and that it would be much easier and healthier and happier for me to accept bottle feeding and move on.

Finally, I caved. It had been a particularly long and tearful day, and I was at the mercy of post partum depression. Moanna and I couldn’t even be in the same room together without having a fit. I threw myself on Steve and told him I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t able to feed Moanna what she needed, and she hated me. He calmed me down and then sent me to the store by myself to buy a can of formula and a bottle.

It was the first time that I had been alone since Moanna was born. I dressed in the crappiest clothes I could find and ran out the door. Part of me wanted to drive right past Wal-Mart and keep trucking it until I reached Canada. I came to my senses by the time I reached the second entrance to Wal-Mart and pulled in. I made my way back to the bottles and formula. After a few minutes of label reading, I sat down in the middle of the isle with all of my bottle and formula options surrounding me so I could take my time and read every last word. If I was going to give my baby formula, it would be the best formula I could find. I had been deep in my research for about twenty minutes when a baby from the next isle down started to cry. I jumped to my feet and grabbed my chest, but it was too late. I was soaking wet with milk. I had milked straight through my nipple cups, breast pads, bra and oversized crappy t-shirt, and the milk was not letting up. There is no place worse than a small town Wal-Mart for something like this to happen. I grabbed the most expensive bottles and formulas I could find and headed for the door.

By the time I got home, I had lost so much milk that my jeans were also soaking wet. I walked in the house,  threw the bottles and formula at Steve, and told him that I was going to take a shower. I didn’t even have it in me to sit and pump the milk that was gushing out of me. When I got out of the shower, I found Steve playing video games with an empty bottle beside him on the night stand and Moanna passed out on his lap. I should have been relieved and ecstatic to finally have a sleeping baby with a full tummy, but I was defeated and angry. This was not at all what I wanted for Moanna, or myself.

Soon after that, I returned to work. No one understood why I wanted to return to work just four weeks after giving birth. “You should be at home resting and loving on that baby. You’ll never get this time back.” Trust me, I would have loved to stay at home longer, but Moanna and I desperately needed our space. We were both causing each other way to much stress and anxiety being together all day, every day. I was so stressed and depressed that just two weeks after Moanna was born, I was back in my old clothes and at my pre-pregnancy weight. Once I returned to work, I was able to breathe, eat and sleep. I started to gain some weight that I desperately needed. I was able to be a social human being and not just a failing dairy cow. Moanna was much more peaceful. She slept for longer periods of time during the night, and she was much happier during the daylight hours. We enjoyed each other more and cried less together.

The downside to returning to work was that my milk supply continued to drop. I wasn’t able to pump at work. The nature of the job just wasn’t conducive to taking the time to pump. If you’re not on the floor working as a server, you’re not making money and you’re putting extra stress on your coworkers. After a few attempts of pumping at work, I decided that it wasn’t worth it. I would feed Moanna and pump right before and after work, and whenever I could at home. When I was at work, I would be off milk and Mommy duty.

By the time Moanna was about five months old, we had completely stopped nursing and pumping. My milk supply never recovered from the mastitis and thrush episode, when I returned to work my supply dropped even more, and eventually it totally fizzled out. Moanna had lost just about all interest in nursing. She was much happier guzzling her pumped breast milk and formula from a bottle than she was in working to get her nutrition from me.

I don’t blame my breastfeeding struggles totally on the drugs that I was given at the hospital, but without a doubt I know that it was the catalyst and a major player in the pain Moanna and I (and those around us) went through. If I had worked harder, had more self confidence and demanded the support I needed, Moanna and I may have been able to overcome our struggles and make breastfeeding work. Unfortunately, that is not how things played out. Breastfeeding Moanna was a horrible experience, and it made me second guess my abilities as a mother in more ways than I care to count.

One would think that after all of that agony, I would never consider breastfeeding again. However, the exact opposite is true. Breastfeeding was pure torture at times, but I know it’s what best for my babies and me, so I’m going to do my best to make it work for each of my children. I have done more research, I have purchased the glorious breast pump that I used at the hospital with Moanna, I have more experience and confidence, and I have a birth plan that only allows for a supportive birth experience. I know and accept that breastfeeding may not work for Deuce and I, and if it doesn’t, at least I will know that I have done my best.

Read what we learned from Moanna’s birth in Part 6…

Prev Post -> Quotes from Moanna Next Post -> Soup Veggies