As soon as he put the blood patch on my spinal cord I was feeling much better.  By this time Hannah was hungry.  I had been asking the nurses if I needed to feed her.  All the books said to put them to the breast right away and I was very concerned, but everyone kept assuring me that she was fine.  She wasn’t crying so I figured they must be right.  The first time I tried to feed her she latched right on and went to town.  No trouble whatsoever.  I have never claimed to have the most sensitive nipples, which came in very handy when you have a hungry newborn on the attack.  It was painless and she had great latch.  We were in business and I felt pretty good.  Cindy watched me nurse and talked to me about any problems ( we weren’t having any ) and all seemed to be good.

    I was not totally sold on the no pacifiers thing.  Every other baby I had known or babysat for had a pacifier and they seemed to be magical.  I wasn’t completely thrilled about the prospect of having nothing but my boobs to settle down a fussy baby.  The lactation specialist at the hospital ( which was a very pro-nursing hospital that I am eternally grateful for ) came by to check on me and she said that there was no reason to not use a pacifier, but if I was going to use one I should use Mams.  The hospital gave me some samples and Hannah was thrilled to have something to constantly suck on.  As Jo, the lactation lady, explained it to me, some kids have a greater need to suck than others.  If you have a sucker, give them something to suck.  I was absolutely adamant that I would not have a thumb or finger sucker ( you can always take a pacifier away, but short of lopping of digits or waiting for it to get too embarrassing, there is really no way to force a thumb/finger sucker to stop ).  So we started using the Mams and Hannah fell in love immediately. 

    Since then I have done research on the Mams and Jo was right.  They are specifically designed to coincide with breast feeding and are European.  As most people know, Europeans are much more likely to nurse than feed formula.  We didn’t have any problem with “nipple confusion” ( which many say is a myth ).  She knew exactly which nipple it was that was supplying the good stuff and if she was full she just wanted that bink to help her drift pleasantly off to sleep.  And they were just so darn cute!  And, no “bink ring” around her mouth!

    The next day we had our first little snafu.  Hannah was eating like a champ and after that ridiculously long and difficult labor she was exhausted.  She slept for 8 hours straight the next day.  I kept asking random hospital workers that wandered in if I should wake her up to eat and they kept telling me no, not to worry, she will wake up when she is hungry.  My mom agreed and was having entirely too much fun holding my little sleepy bundle. 

    Finally, when one of the nurses came in I told her that the baby had been asleep for a little over 8 hours and I was wondering if I should get her up to eat.  Well, the nurse got all freaked out and told me OF COURSE we should wake her up and feed her.  They gave me about 4 milliseconds to get her eating good ( she still didn’t really want to be awake or eating ) and then the nurse suggested that Jeff give her a bottle because it had just been “too long”.  At this point in my motherhood I had not developed my Nursing Nazi confidence and I gave in.  I still regret it.  Which I know is ridiculous.  But it bothers me that I can’t say that Hannah never had a bottle.  So Jeff fed her.

    Hannah was a little jaundiced ( according to the nurse it was because of the long lapse in feeding ) but we got discharged and sent home.  That was the last bottle that she had.  Or so I thought.  Apparently at some point in the week after she was born and I was a crazy psychopath hopped up on hormones and anxiety attacks, Jeff and his mom decided that I should just sleep and gave her an occasional bottle instead of waking me up.  Which I’m sure I appreciated at the time, but what I appreciate more is that they didn’t tell me until years later.  I still feel guilty about that too.  I was too crazy for people to wake me up to feed my own baby.  Sounds pretty awful to me.  But like every other new parent says, we were just.so.tired.  Things cruised along pleasantly until about 6 or 8 weeks and then she got all colicky and gassy.  Mylicon helped tons, but there were some nights that were just unbearable.  In retrospect we probably could have done more to help her out ( I could have altered my diet in some way ) but it wasn’t that bad so we just let it go. 

    At nine months, in direct violation of every book ever written, I started weaning Hannah onto whole milk.  Strawberry whole milk, no less.  I had been using milk based formula for her cereals ( I am ridiculously intimidated by pumping... never done it... doubt I ever will ) so I knew she could handle regular milk pretty well.  I started dropping one feeding a month and by her first birthday she was taking tentative steps and I dropped that last bedtime feeding exactly one year from the first feeding.  She handled it awesomely.

    My mom was in town for her birthday so instead of me going in to nurse her and rock her to sleep we just sent my mom in with her “spacey b” and a bink.  There was no trouble at all.  I had always said the whole year I was nursing that I wouldn’t shed a tear.  It was so inconvenient and troublesome to be the only one able to do it.  I had to skip things or rearrange things around our nursing schedule.   I know it doesn’t have to be that way.  I chose that.  I chose not to pump.  I chose not to supplement.  But I did shed some tears that night.  Quite a few, in fact.  I know that she would have kept that last nursing for a little while longer if I had kept offering it, but I also knew that she was plenty ready to be completely weaned.  I didn’t have any engorgement issues or discomfort in the whole process.  So my first nursing excursion was a total success.  I met all my goals.  One year.  No bottles.  One baby, fed from the breast for one year.  Oh, that it would be that easy with the second.

Hannah

Robby

    I had to change hospitals for Robby’s birth and the hospital I was going to had a reputation for being very anti-nursing.  So I was prepared.  I brought my own Mams.  I had my Nursing Nazi attitude ready and this time I was going to stick to my guns.  No bottles.  I knew what I was doing and that I could do it.  Just leave me be and I’ll get the job done.  Robby was a more difficult nurser from the start.  His latch was atrocious and consequently there was a lot of collateral damage, as it were.  Not good for me.

    There was no lactation consultant and my mother-in-law wasn’t able to be there for Rob’s birth, so I was on my own.  It took me a couple days to fix the latch problems, which I mostly blame on ending up with a C-section.  NOT part of my plan ( but that is for another week, I believe ).  By the time I was able to get in more nursing friendly positions and work on his latch it was a struggle and my nipples were pretty torn up.  It took almost a month for them to heal.  At one point ( if you are squeamish you might want to skip the rest of this sentence ) one of my nipples had been so damaged that it was over halfway torn off.  I remember crying at the thought of having to nurse him.  I remember him latching on and me crying through the whole feeding.  I remember my painful bleeding nipples.  And I remember how awful and helpless Jeff felt.  He tried to get me to pump or supplement, but I was stoic.  I would not be deterred.  Eventually I healed up and things went pretty smoothly after that.  This time around I had my confidence to carry me through the low points.  Robby was such an awesome sleeper so I wasn’t nearly as psychotic.  He slept through the night at 6 weeks.  Hannah didn’t accomplish that feat until she was over 9 months old. 

    Robby was also jaundiced when we left the hospital.  I didn’t let him go hours on end without eating and he still ended up jaundiced so I absolve myself from the guilt I harbored over Hannah’s jaundice.  Apparently I just have kids that need to go through a carrot phase.  I think Rob’s was actually worse than Hannah’s.  I remember him still being pretty orange after we got home.  Jeff always called him his little glow-worm.  But he was eating good and the jaundice was flushed out pretty quickly.

    Aside from the initial latch problems and the pain and suffering that ensued from that I had no troubles with Robby nursing either.  I have always tried to be discreet and with Hannah I spent a lot of time nursing in the car.  Having Hannah while I was nursing Robby necessitated that I nurse in public more and I did.  As discreetly as possible.  Robby refused a pacifier, but fell in love with the touch of fleece on his face.  He holds a fleece blanket like an old fashioned ether mask against his nose and mouth and breathes deeply until he is asleep.  He was more ready to be weaned and by his first birthday the last feeding was all of 1 minute long and probably more for me than him.  Mission accomplished.  Second kid.  Fed from the breast for one year.  No bottles on this one.  It gives me a real sense of pride to know that God gave me a body  to make and feed my children and I was able to use it to do so.  Hopefully any future children will be as easy as these two were.

    I have to end this post with this statement.  I am very pro-nursing.  I am willing to share my story, advice, experience, knowledge, shoulder to cry on, etc with anyone who is needing encouragement in this area.  I am very proud of the way I fed my kiddos for the first year of their life and I genuinely believe that it was the best thing I could do for them.  That said, I pass no judgement on anyone who didn’t decide to breastfeed, or tried to and just couldn’t, or tried and didn’t want to.  In the end we all make our decisions based on what is best for our little family unit.  My main point is that I want women to be educated on the decision they are making.  That’s why I wanted to share my story.  And I think this idea of sharing is immeasurably helpful for someone else who is trying to decide.  I had it pretty easy.  There are women who really struggle or infants that really struggle.  In the end, you have to do what is best for you and the baby.  Don’t beat yourself up if you wanted to nurse and couldn’t.  Don’t beat yourself up if you didn’t want to and feel judged.  Is there a smile on that baby’s face?  Then you did a damn good job.