September 2, 2006
Breast Feeding Issues - Volume II
My blogging buddy, Queen of Spain, posted this on her blog about breastfeeding. The Queen has a 17-month old daughter who continues to nurse and many people ask her questions or give her funny looks for various ridiculous reasons. This is something that upsets the Queen and many women for obvious reasons.
The first thing that springs to mind is, “Who are we to judge how long a mother nourishes her child by breastfeeding?” Followed by, “It’s my decision and my child’s decision how long we will continue to breastfeed.”
Yes, there may be extenuating circumstances that can prevent one from nursing their child. I can affirm that for you. But upon reading the comments to the Queen’s post, Suebob found the following link and I became heated. Really heated. Reading this article was like remembering the hell I went through during my own breastfeeding days.
When I gave birth to Dawson in September of 2004, 1 year 11 months, and 2 weeks ago, I was gung-ho about breastfeeding. I couldn’t wait to do what so many other mothers were doing: Nourishing their babies.
I admit, I had this blind optimism that it would be easy. Piece of cake, easy. So many of my friends and family members told me how wonderful and simple it was. I was in for a huge surprise the first night in the hospital.
Dawson wouldn’t latch on. I had 4 different nurses showing me “new and easy” ways to get that baby to suck. I have flat nipples. After all the poking, prodding and nipple manipulation of my already sore breasts, I started to cry. I started to worry. I panicked. “My child is going to starve to death.” I kept mumbling.
My husband was very encouraging. “You can do this,” he’d say. “He’ll get the hang of it.” But Dawson didn’t catch on. He didn’t latch on. I tried the hospital breast pump to extract some milk but only tiny drops of colostrum were there that first day. The pump helped my nipples to protrude and I was able to get Dawson to latch on. But my son was frustrated as nothing was coming out of my breasts. My milk wouldn’t be in for a few days.
One nurse offered formula and I nearly gave in, until my husband told me to try again. He consoled me and calmed me and I gave it another shot. We had some foibles and when I got home from the hospital it seemed to be working until Dawson stopped wanting to nurse. Again, I nearly gave up.
In a panic I called my friend and she came over to “show me” how to nurse. Her daughter was 7 months old and nursing. My friend whipped out her breast and explained step-by-step how to get the hang of this. It worked. We were nursing.
For the 6 weeks of maternity leave I managed to get through the cracked, bleeding, sore nipples. The breasts that were too full of milk and leaking at the sound of every one of Dawson’s cries. I managed to get through nursing around the clock all night and all day. I managed the sleepy walk to his bassinet to nurse him as I dozed off on the couch.
Then I had to go back to work. The guilt set in. I was angry. I was sad. I was depressed. I had to leave my baby. I would have to pump at work. I cursed myself for not being debt free so I could quit my job and stay home with my baby.
I can say I was lucky to have a private room in the Noel Learning Center to pump. I couldn’t afford to send Dawson to the NLC daycare at that time. I wished I had that option then. I could have gone downstairs to nurse him on demand. I had to send my precious 6 week old child to a private daycare, where he would be bottle fed my breast milk.
While my employer provided the room to pump, I only received two fifteen minute breaks and a half hour lunch to pump 3 times a day. I barely had time to eat my lunch because I spent 20 minutes pumping. Even my 15 minute breaks ran long and I was docked time on my paycheck. I was paying my company to pump my breast milk, so to speak.
For 12 long weeks I pumped breast milk at work and nursed at home. I watched my milk supply decrease because I wasn’t nursing as frequently. Eventually, Dawson preferred the bottle because it was faster than nursing. Again, the guilt set in. Followed by the anger. My manager had a child who was 4 weeks older than Dawson. She could afford to have her son in the NLC daycare and she was able to nurse on demand. With no docking her paycheck if she took longer than 15 minutes.
And so this internal battle went on. I flippantly decided to stop nursing and cried because I felt like a bad mom, so I changed my mind and continued nursing. Then Dawson stopped taking the breast altogether and I pumped exclusively for one whole month and then quit. He was almost 6 months old when he was put on solely formula.
I felt jipped. I wanted to nurse for longer. At least a year, even two years. But I never had the chance to establish a nursing regime while being a working mother who was responsible for contributing to the house payment and other bills.
It pisses me off to read the articles about how breast is best. I know it’s true. But some of us don’t get the opportunity to continue to nurse. How can we choose to quit our jobs to stay home and nurse our children or cause a financial collapse in which we lose one source of income followed by the loss of our home if we can’t pay our mortgage?
Sure, I’ve heard the attacks before. “You should have waited to have children until you could afford it.” That’s what many of you will be thinking. It’s not that we couldn’t afford to have Dawson. We couldn’t afford the 8 weeks of bed rest that caused me not to work and the bills to pile up. I could have planned for this emergency, yes, but we decided to use our emergency money to pay other bills early, thinking the last two months of my pregnancy would be a breeze and we’d be ahead so I could take 12 weeks of maternity leave. In the end I only got 6 weeks because I need to work to catch up on our debts.
Reading this article, I started to cry. “I feel like I had to choose between feeding my baby the best food and earning a living,” said Jennifer Munoz, a former cashier at Resorts Atlantic City Casino who said she faced obstacles that included irregular breaks and a refrigerator behind a locked door. She said she often dumped her milk into the toilet, knowing that if she did not pump every few hours, her milk supply would soon dwindle. This is deja-vu for me.
I read all these articles by the Department of Health and Human Services, by WIC (Women, Infants & Children) and other sources — all promoting breastfeeding. Yes, there are companies who try their best to accommodate nursing mothers. But it’s never enough. It will never be enough. In my mind, I firmly believe that in order for me to breastfeed exclusively I wouldn’t have been able to work. Honestly, I wouldn’t have wanted to work. I would have chosen my child over my career any day. That is, had I been able to afford it.
It really makes me want to start a campaign. A campaign to get our government to help mothers. If we can pay taxes to provide welfare to those less fortunate than us, why can’t we use that tax money for a Nursing Mothers Campaign? Something that allows us to stay home with our children so we can nurse however long we wish. Something that pays our mortgage while we nourish our children and spend time bonding with them.
I know you’re thinking there will be women who will abuse the privilege, but it’s no different than my friend who keeps having children so she can stay on welfare (she’s a single mom and has 6 children with different fathers — she gets pregnant as soon as hewelfarere is about to run out — and apparently there’s nothing we can do to prevent this).
My campaign would last two years. Seriously! It should state “You can nurse exclusively for two years and the government will supplement your income during this time.” And I don’t want to hear that two years (or three or four) is too long to nurse. I don’t want to hear about how uncomfortable it makes you to see a woman nursing or to see a partially naked breast. Nursing is good for our children. Why shouldn’t our government and our society accept and support that?
What? Am I being too naive? Do you have any better ideas?
Posted by Dana @ 1:29 pm • Uncategorized
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September 3rd, 2006 at 1:27 pm, mommaobrienx7 Says:
Love this post. After 7 children I have learned that each baby is different, each situation is different and each mom is different. I myself, believe moms should do what works for them and what feels right. Bottle or formula, the baby is getting what they need nutritionally.
I do believe that nursing mothers should get more support and encouragement and have long believed that there should be more rights afforded to parents so that they can stay at home with their children longer. It sucks that the most important job there is in the entire world is so disvalued.
Anyhoo, my comment doesn’t do justice to your post. It’s one of my favorites!
September 3rd, 2006 at 9:44 pm, WHW Says:
I really wish I could post a response….:>)
September 4th, 2006 at 7:28 pm, Texas Mammie Says:
7 babies. Wow.
Well, back in my day…oh, well.
I had smallish boobies(B cup)back then, and when my oldest daughter was born, I just assumed that I wouldn’t be able to breast feed. Not much info back then. Stupid idea, I know. Small boobies, small areolas, but I didn’t realize had huge nipples. I hadn’t seen too many.
So I got the shot to dry up the milk, but I still leaked a little.
The next year, when I had daughter #2, I had already decided not to BF because my kids were so close in age, it would be a real time constraint problem. So I got the shot again, and again I leaked.
In fact, I was a milk factory. I could have fed a tribe. So I got a second shot to dry it all up.
I look back now and see all of that wasted time and money - buying, mixing and warming up formula because of lack of info.
My friend did the classic no-no. She didn’t think she needed a breast feeding class. When she had her daughter, she had a horrible experience with breast feeding. She found out she had inverted nipples, that she was supposed to ‘toughen up’ the nipple and a whole lot of other things she could have done to make the experience better.
Same with my daughters. The didn’t think they needed the classes offered and both could have by-passed the problems they encountered.
I don’t get the controversy. Get the facts, try out different ideas. Find out what works for you both and stick to it.
xoxo
The Other, other Dana
and p.s. ALL moms feel guilty.
September 5th, 2006 at 7:11 pm, Brighton Says:
I agree, all four of mine were very different in their nursing habits and lengths that they continued with it.
Why can’t we as a society accept that all babies, like breasts are unique??
September 7th, 2006 at 10:23 am, Amy Says:
First of all, gov. programs have a vested interest in promoting breastfeeding - it’s a heck of a lot cheaper for them than providing formula thru WIC.
I like to say “breast is best, but formula is an excellent alternative for those who aren’t able to breastfeed.” And that can be for a myriad of reasons. I know many moms who do either, and my approach is that they are doing what works for THEM.
I tried to nurse my firstborn, but it didn’t work out too well. I also have inverted nipples, and furthermore, my daughter was not a good latcher or a regular eater. I also went back to work after 6 weeks, at which point I decided it wasn’t worth it anymore, and she went on formula from then on. I was luckier with my two youngest, since I was a stay-at-home mom by then, but also, Julia in particular was a great, natural nurser. I still struggled with sore nipples (for 3 months!), but it was easier to deal with at that point.
Anyway, I suppose this issue will always be controversial, but I also think that MOST people accept the “do what works for you” approach.