Oh yes, it’s time to talk about breasts again!

But first off let me say that Finn will be 7months old on Monday! Which means it’s been almost a month since I’ve last written anything- and yet my blog stats show the readership is almost as high as ever! EEEEK! Thank you folks!

Yes this Mr. Finn is absolutely awesome, full of beans, funny, chatty- he is so active and just works himself into a sweat with all his bobbing and arm waving and whatnots. He shrieks and caws with such fervor, and really sounds an awful lot like like a young pterodactyl preparing to launch itself out of a prehistoric tree. He loves food of all types, and I keep offering new things to explore. He’s just starting to get his little pinching fingers working- he can sorta pick things up with the thumb and forefinger, but can’t quite get it into his mouth. Usually things in his hands get mashed into his ears. Which just means more fun at bath-time trying to excavate the mush from the lobes. He loves standing up (being held around the waist still) and has started in the past couple days shaking his head back and forth like a very emphatic NO! – which makes for funny conversations with him- “Finn, do you want to grow up?” Head shaking. “No? Oh I”m so happy, stay my baby forever!” More head shaking. “No? Do you want to be a boy someday?” More head shaking. “NO? Do you want to be a girl?”… Mostly it’s silly entertainment for mama. Hey, I need something to keep me busy during the day. He’s getting 2 little teeth on the bottom, they are on their way in and they are fabulously interesting to him. His tongue is so busy feeling these two bits of hardness in his little mouth, chewing and drooling like it’s going out of style. Speaking of style! Here’s BABY FINN-O! Mr. Loud Shirt:

Isn’t he perfectly perfect? He has a very savvy stylist.

So let me talk about my breasts now. (Hey! It’s MY blog! I can’t talk about my boobies all I want! Right?) Ok, where to start? After the last post I’m sure folks thought that was it, what more is there? Well after about a week home from Oregon, I seriously regretted making the choice to stop pumping/nursing. I was feeling like I hadn’t made the choice freely, but rather as a consequence of the situation, and my heart was breaking. I was crying a bunch, feeling such sadness and loss (welcome back grieving!)  And then Finn had made some guestures that he wanted to nurse a couple times, but there wasn’t much for milk. So I decided to try to bring my milk back in again- grabbed the pump (3 x daily) and started taking the Domperidone. It worked! Hanging around the house after about 7 days I was back up to the same milk I had before, and was greatly relieved to have the chance again to give Finn more milk. We went to the park one day for a picnic, and after he ate, he pushed on my shirt like he wanted to nurse- it was one of the few times that he initiated nursing- and there in the park looking over the mountains and ocean, he had a little snack for a few minutes, and it was oh so nice to feel connected again to that experience. I loved nursing. I really loved it. (tear)

But after a few days of all of that, I was starting to feel frustrated with pumping again, doing all that work for about 2-3 ounces a day… was it worth it? Why did I really start back up again? And did I really think I wanted to keep this up for months to come? The reality is that if I wanted to try to increase the amount I was making, I would have to start pumping 8-10 times a day, around the clock. I knew this, and I was having a hard time committing to this- it would totally bind us to the house, take away from fun Finn-time, and require a committment to putting Finn at the breast all the time to get him used to being back on the breast (which mostly annoyed him, and he would chomp on my boob. The guy has teeth now- seriously ouch.)

Then about a week ago I was feeling inspired to get walking, so Finn and I started heading out into the early morning, (which means I was sacrificing the time for the morning pump- I had to choose one or the other) with walks down to the pier with Finn to watch the boats and birds and seaplanes. It was that or I had stay at home and pump and push toys in Finn’s direction while I tried to keep him occupied for 3o minutes… hmmm… So about 10 days ago the morning pumping ceased. Then milk supply started diminishing (expected- it’s supply and demand, folks)…

Then I got a new book from the Library “Making More Milk“. This book, at nearly 7months in, changed my breastfeeding life. There on page 110 are some pictures of breasts that suffer from a condition known as Mammary Hypoplasia, or Insufficient Glandular Tissue. And would you believe that I sat there staring at picture B for a half an hour thinking “Oh my goodness, those are my boobies.” I don’t have enough mammary glands. It’s not my fault. It wasn’t that I didn’t try hard enough, or long enough, or have him at the breast long enough, it wasn’t that he had a weak suck, or problems with hormones, or nutrition, or… It turns out it’s the boobs. I’ve always had rather small breasts, that didn’t change at all during pregnancy like they are “suppose to”. But everyone and everything says that all women should be able to breastfeed, except the rare few (but none talk about those rare few). Me? Turns out I’m that Rare Few. This brought me such peace of mind, I had no idea how much anxiety I was carrying around not knowing why it didn’t work- what is WRONG with me that I can’t breastfeed?! Now I know. (And for the record, I recommend this book to EVERY breastfeeding mama have milk supply challenges. Hell ya.)

The last 2 chapters eased my mind immensely- COPING WITH LOW SUPPLY and WHAT ABOUT NEXT TIME? After reading those pages, and many tears shed, I decided to just stop pumping, that it was OK to be OK with stopping. Heart needs to heal, refocus my time, and just stop. So I stopped. I took some deep breaths, and felt really sure of my self. That night my breasts filled up and were aching with their little bit of milk, so when Finn woke up at 4am, I brought him into bed and he nursed with delight at the milk! The same thing the next night, although the supply was less… then the third night there was hardly any milk, and he wasn’t so interested. The forth night it was pretty empty, with only a few drops, and Finn wanted nothing to do with the boobs. So there we were, done! And a nice way to finish, right? Cuddled up at night with my little guy happily slurping a snack, enough to fill his belly a bit until the morning. What nice memories of those days- the beach picnic and nighttime nursing… it all ended on Monday this week. My Tuesday counseling session had me feeling so satisfied and confident in my decision, so clear headed, feeling like I was really healing from all the ups and downs of that breastfeeding journey. Yeah for me!

Then things changed again…

On Tuesday afternoon I decided to re-enter mommyland and I started going back to the baby/mommy groups again. I had been away for about 4 weeks, and hadn’t seen some of our baby/mommy friends in a while. And after 2 full days of activities, hanging out with breastfeeding pairs, watching boobs left and right with milk spurting and babies slurping, I got home yesteraday feeling wrecked, like I had fallen off the bandwagon of good feelings. I was back to feeling like an absolute failure, that Finn didn’t really need me, that I couldn’t give to him all that he needed… it was heavy, accompanied by much crying and heart aching. How does that happen so fast? That I can fall down the hole again just like that? I got out the book, looking for some helping advice- I had read about a herb in the book that is shown to have some success with increasing mammary glandular tissues, so that became the thing to obsess about for the night- I got out the pump and jumped on it (hello drops of milk!). I put Finn to the breast and endured bites and tried to get the SNS to work, formula squirting everywhere, him in tears, me in tears- what was I doing?! I decided we could endure, and that first thing in the morning I was going to find some of this magic herb and soon Finn and I would be a perfectly matched breastfeeding pair, right?!?!

Morning came and after a night of tears (mine, not Finn’s- he slept well) I got a gorgeous email from a dear friend giving such clear advice and love, and then a phone call from my counselor helped calm me down (crying DOES help sometime). Then I headed off to the herbal pharmacy, and met up with that lovely doctor who helped me find some herbal support and solace when Finn was a very tiny baby… he remembered Finn and I, and after a loving hug, we had a very long conversation that- let me get this visual for you- gave wings to my horrendous anxiety, and I watched in wonder as it flew a few feet away from me and landed safely (cue the calming music). What did he tell me? Yes, there is this herb. Yes, it is shown to have success with improving the condition of Mammary Hypoplasia. But No, it won’t be the magic pill to bringing in your milk with Finn… Unless I am nursing constantly or pumping around the clock, nothing will bring in my milk. Am I willing to try? He gently assured me that it is absolutely fine if I’m not, that most women are daunted by the amount of work to re-lactate. So let’s look to the FUTURE. Let’s prepare my body for a future child (yes, we hope to have another someday), and the hope that it will be better. The Future… What a nice idea. He was the voice of reason that I needed to hear. The kind doctor who could say what was amiss, and how we could work to make it better. The generous firm hand that reached out and said to my sad, sad heart “Let it go. Just let it go. You have suffered for it long enough.” I came home and laid down with Finn for a nap, and cried great big tears over his soft little snoozing head- and those tears were, for the first time, tears of relief. I heard the voice over and over in my head of that dear doctor, “let it go…”, and I fell asleep

A dream came in that fitful nap: I was hiking through this very dangerous city with Finn in my arms, the stairs and pathways were steep and angular and difficult to navigate. Before long I noticed that clutched in my other hand was the bottle that I used for pumping milk, and there was just a bit of milk in the bottom of the bottle. Every now and then I would stop to try to pump more milk, and I would have to set Finn down in these very awkward and dangerous places, pressing against him with my legs or knees to keep him from falling and I struggled with my hands to pump some milk, precious golden drops, into this little bottle. At one point we came to a very steep staircase that we had to go down, me holding Finn tight in one arm, and the other hand gripping onto this bottle of expressed breastmilk. The stairs became so steep, I sat down on my bottom trying to skootch down that way without setting down my baby or the milk… It wasn’t working and I got completely stuck at this really steep spot- I was absolutely terrified. Just then this strange man came along and offered to hold Finn while I got down. I could tell he was drunk, and although I didn’t feel safe about it at all, for some reason I handed my most precious darling child to him while I gripped tighter to the bottle of milk in the other hand. I watched as he struggled with Finn, almost dropping him, and at that point in the dream I looked at my hand with the bottle and thought “what have I done?!?!”

Then I woke up.

It’s over. Yes, really over. Tomorrow I’ll wash and pack up the pump and bottles and measuring cups and SNS and all that. But today has been a gift, and while I have no doubt that there will be tears in the days ahead, I do believe with absolute conviction that it is over. The last 72 hours have been an emotional roller coaster that I don’t wish to repeat, and let me remember that. The dearest souls who helped me through these days- Thank you, Rowan. Thank you, Erin. Thank you, Sarah. Thank you, Dustin. And more than anything else- Thank you, Finn. Here’s to ending on good memories…

One Response to “A tale of two boobies…”

1. Yvonne says:

   May 31, 2010 at 5:30 pm

   The most important thing you have to remember is that your are a WONDERFUL mother and that you are doing everything with your beautiful baby’s best interests at heart!

   The first year of motherhood can be so tough. We all want to make sure that we do everything right. When I think back to that first year, I remember all the feelings of anxiety about whether I was making the right choices and struggling to cope when things didn’t work out the way I wanted them too. We had huge sleep issues with Ryan and I agonized for weeks over what we should do – everyday I would have a new theory and obsess with that for a few days. I got books out the library, I made plans every day, I became superstitious about every little change in routine – but in the end none of it made much difference – he just slept better as he got older.

   But it does get easier, and I find now when I look back, its almost hard to imagine why I got so worried about issues that now seem small. I don’t in anyway mean to suggest that your milk supply issues and problems with breastfeeding are small, but they are only ONE thing that you will be doing in your role as Finn’s mother. Already you have so many other gifts to give: cuddles, singing, fun walks out, socializing, stories, bathtimes. In a few years it will be fingerpainting, climbing, skiing, toilet training, playdates. And a few more years after that help with homework, finding a job, building relationships, buying a house, planning a wedding who knows? While right now its hard to think past the baby times – this really is only one small piece of a lifetime. You have put in a huge effort to provide Finn with the benefits of breastfeeding over the last few months, but you are so right to LET GO and allow yourself time to enjoy all the other wonderful things that you are able to give him.
   xx