Breastfeeding - what if you can't? (The Breastfeeding Debate)

Member Name: KLockwood75

Product:	The Breastfeeding Debate
Date:	19/02/09 (90 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Natural, free, best start in life for your child

Disadvantages: The guilt when it doesn't work out

Pregnancy / being a new Mum = information overload. Sometimes it feels like you're being bombarded from all sides with information about what you should / shouldn't be doing but the message that 'breastfeeding is best' is always there. And yes, I do believe that it is what is best for babies - it's completely natural, it's free, it provides great benefits to your babies immune system and promotes an amazing bond between mother and child.

But, what if you CAN'T breastfeed... There are lots of women out there who wanted to breastfeed but it just doesn't work out. Sometimes it's a medical reason, sometimes it's psychological, but it's not always your fault.

My story is that I wanted to breastfeed - I attended a workshop on it at the hospital prior to having my son and, although I'd had reservations about whether I'd have the self-confidence to breastfeed in public, I'd decided that I wanted to do it to give my little boy the best possible start in life. I wrote about how I wanted skin-to-skin contact as soon as he was born in my birth plan, bought a breastfeeding pillow, stocked up on breast-pads and nipple cream and fully believed that it would work out for me.

My son was born after 36 hours of labour, me begging for an epidural because I couldn't cope with the pain anymore (so much for that natural birth I'd wanted) and eventually a forceps delivery in theatre. I was spaced out by the whole thing and so disorientated by both the narrow bed in the operating theatre and the loss of feeling from the epidural, that once I got that skin-to-skin contact I wanted, I got scared that I'd drop my precious newborn so my husband had to hold him until I'd been stitched up and was on the way back to the delivery suite. Once back in relative comfort, I tried to get him to latch on but he wasn't interested. The midwives helped me express colostrum and we fed him with a syringe.

Once on the ward, I tried to get him to feed with varying degrees of success - it's hard to know whether it's working or not in those days before your milk comes in. But, the next day he was diagnosed with jaundice and put under a light box - I was only allowed to take him out every four hours and given half an hour to attempt to breastfeed before topping up with formula. We still couldn't get the breastfeeding right but he was a natural where the bottle was concerned. By the time we left hospital three days later I'd only managed to get him to latch on properly a couple of times, but he was guzzling milk at the first sight of the bottle.

I hoped it might be different at home, in an environment where I felt comfortable. We had all the bottle-feeding stuff anyway (just in case - I like to be organised) and we'd been advised to keep on with the top-ups until the midwife was satisfied that the jaundice had gone. I kept to the same routine as in the hospital - four hourly feeds, half an hour on the breast and then a formula top-up. First time, he latched on straight away - it felt great that he was really feeding and I was so proud of myself. But then it got worse and worse... Every time I tried to feed him he'd screamed, arch away from my breast and pummel me with his tiny fists. It was like that each time I tried, but as soon as he saw the bottle he'd relax into a contented sucking and snuggle into me.

After a week, still exhausted and sore from the birth and with sleep deprivation on top of that, I cried when the midwife visited. My milk still hadn't come in properly and the breastfeeding was just making me cry and ruining those first precious days with my newborn. The midwife was great - she told me that the support was out there if I wanted it, but if I wanted to give up then that was fine too.

I found giving up a really difficult decision, and even two years later I'm not sure I've fully got over the guilt, but I decided that I had to stop... I feel like I did my best, but it just wasn't working for us. Maybe if I hadn't had to top up with formula, or if I could have spent those early days feeding on demand, it would have been different. I have nothing but admiration for those women who can breastfeed but sometimes I feel like those of us who can't (or choose not to) are looked down on because we feed our babies formula, and I don't think that is fair, especially when they don't know the full story.

Summary: Great when it works, tough when it doesn't