(3/3) “I remember people warning me that having both of them nursing would be hard when she was born. I remember him coming in the room and I said “here is your sister” and he said “yeah I know. Move over sister, I want to nurse too.” They were good nursing together. She had a tongue tie as well, and he would always help with the let down and make her nursing easier ... You can
(2/3) “My son’s breastfeeding journey was long and full of struggles; he had a severe tongue tie and lip tie. I had some people tell me, oh if you aren’t enjoying the nursing experience you should stop. It isn’t good for either of you if you don’t like it. But it IS good and healthy for him. There are lot of things I don’t like doing. I don’t like getting up and rocking babies in the middle of the night
(1/3) “A little while after my son was born he started having blood in his diapers. When we spoke with the doctors, they suggested we could try cutting out dairy for a month to see if it goes away. They said If it didn’t, they would have to send him to a specialist who was a couple hours away. So I cut everything out. I ate only sweet potatoes, squash, rice, and plain chicken for 3 weeks until
(4/4) “I think moms just don’t know that it’s going to be so hard. I mean I was really prepared for birth. I spent months preparing for the birth. That’s all you think about: the birth, the birth, the birth. And you know in hindsight, that’s 12 hours of my life. And then you have this baby that you have to care for and feed, and that is so much scarier and more overwhelming than the birth was
(3/4) “A really positive part of my journey has been bonding with other moms over breastfeeding. Some of the lactation consultants at the hospital I became close with, because we had been seeing each other so often. They started using me as a sort of peer counselor for other moms who were going through similar experiences. So for about a year after he was born, every once in
(2/4) "I started dealing with postpartum depression that manifested as a lot of anxiety. I was in a really bad place and wanted to quit nursing every day. It felt like a constant struggle: one minute I would be saying “no, I’m going to quit” and the next I would read some encouraging blogs and decide to stick with it a little longer. Finally, when he was two months old, I found this specialist
(1/4) “Probably like most moms, I thought breastfeeding was going to be easy and natural and just come to me. My mom has been really involved in the breastfeeding initiatives at the hospital where I gave birth to both my kids, and has really advocated for making breastfeeding available to everybody. So I just kind of thought ‘oh, this is going to be a walk in the park.’ And then my
(3/3) “I feel like my story is a little unique because I did go back to work after that 12 weeks, and was able to successfully keep breastfeeding through the first year. I know sometimes when people aren’t able to have daycare on site, supplementing with formula often happens. The support makes such a big difference. Originally, I wanted to breastfeed a year. And now we are
(2/3) “At lunch time I would go down and breastfeed her at daycare; I spent all of my lunches with her. I would nurse her, then put her down for her afternoon nap. It made going back to work bearable. I knew from the beginning that I would go back after my 12 weeks of maternity leave, but at only three months old, she was still so fragile, and it was really hard to go back and commit
(1/3) “My husband and I are both planners, so we got on the waitlist for my company’s daycare two years in advance, right after we got married. They said if baby is going to start in the fall that would be ideal. Fortunately, she was born in the fall, right on schedule, and I was near enough to visit during the workday. I was lucky enough to work for a company that not only supported ...
(2/2) “From the beginning of I would get anywhere from 10-15 ounces during a 5-10 minute pumping session. Within a short period of time, I had an extremely large freezer stash, more than I could ever possibly use. Given that I was exclusively breastfeeding, and could pump enough for an evening out in just 10 minutes, I knew I would need to look into donating because I was quickly
(1/2) “I'm one of those people fortunate enough to have an oversupply. I didn't breastfeed my first child for a combination of reasons: my of age, lack of knowledge, and an extremely difficult postpartum recovery. I wasn't worried about being able to breastfeeding my second child though, due to the 4 months it took for my milk dry out after my first baby was born. I know the ...
(4/4) “Before we even knew for sure that it was cancer, we had discussed doing the double mastectomy and looking for donor milk if needed. I have become such a breastmilk advocate in my journey with my son that for me, formula didn’t feel like an option I wanted to consider. The community here is awesome. I just bought a second freezer which is being delivered soon. I have ...
(3/4) “The very next week I had a ton of scans and a surgery to put a port in for chemo. It was my first surgery - I had never been through any surgery - and I was pregnant. At 15 weeks they wanted to get the ball rolling, and I started chemo. You can have a surgery once in the second trimester; they put you under and the monitor the baby. Originally, I was going to do the ...
(2/4) “I found the lump while I was breastfeeding and I just knew it wasn’t a clogged duct. I knew something was wrong. I had been breastfeeding for two and a half years; I was very aware of my body. The local doctor said it was a blocked duct, to massage it and use heat. The following week I called the doctor again, and said they had to do something for me, that this was not a clog...
(1/4) “I started breastfeeding my son because my husband was a student and we were really poor. I was afraid I couldn’t afford formula. So in the beginning, it was purely a financial decision. When my son was born, the lactation consultant at the hospital had just quit. It was a small town in the middle of nowhere and there was zero support, unless I wanted to drive 90 minutes to the next ...
(3/3) “Now that my son is almost three, I never know if I’m getting weird glances from people while breastfeeding because of how different we look, or because of how old he is. I’ve just gotten immune to all weird glances at this point. What’s nice is that Oregon has one of the best breastfeeding rates in the country, so I feel at ease publicly breastfeeding my kid here. I have ...
(2/3) “We’ve lived in majority-white neighborhoods all his life, and due to our different complexions, people often assume I’m the nanny—both white people and people of color. I’m pretty sure that I’ve missed out on various friendships with other moms because they thought I wasn’t my child’s mother, especially before he was verbal. When he was little, he nursed very ...
(1/3) “My son has blond hair and blue eyes; I’m half Asian and much darker than him. His light coloring was definitely a surprise to my family and me when he was born, and nursing was a really straightforward way to establish that even if we look pretty different on the outside, I’m still his mom and he’s still my kid. I’ve been biracial my whole life, and have made peace with that. But ...
(2/2) “You don’t know what you will be able to do when you’re first starting. You hear of all these people who had no choice, who had a hard time getting started and producing or whatever, and ended up needing to use formula. So I didn’t want to assume I would be able to breastfeed until the time came. I was taking medication for my seizures too, and I wasn’t sure if it would affect my ...