The first time she latched on was the first time I felt like a mother. The contraction pains didn't do it. The ginormous belly didn't do it. Even holding her for the first time, I still felt like I was living someone else's life. But when they brought her into my hospital room that first time, at three in the morning, with Jason's rumbling snores as our score, it finally hit me. This child is mine. I created her. I'm a mother.
The first time Jason gave her a bottle, I sat across the room and cried. It's just hormones, I rationalized with myself. It's just hormones can be used to rationalize so much those first few weeks.
As it turns out, five weeks later, it wasn't just hormones. Giving up breastfeeding has been the most emotional part of this whole experience so far.
At Adelyn's first doctor's appointment, I was told she'd lost more than ten percent of her birth weight. She wanted me to supplement her with formula. As soon as the doctor walked out of the room and I unhooked my nursing bra to feed Adelyn, I told myself we'd figure it out. We weren't going to give up.
I really didn't know how I would feel about breastfeeding. I knew I wanted to try it; I knew it seemed like the more obvious and natural choice. But I didn't know how connected it would make me feel to my baby, to all women, to myself. And to hear that word come out of a doctor's mouth--"formula"--meant that I was failing.
I know it could easily sound crazy to anyone who hasn't experienced that post-pregnancy hormone surge and dip. But let me tell you. It was gut-wrenching, soul-shattering, heartbreaking feeling like Adelyn was still hungry. Feeling like it was my body--the very thing that housed her all those months--that was keeping her from growing.
So I called in support. Jason's cousin, Micki, a doula and a lactation consulatant and someone I trust, to pull me out of the supplement-trap. I did some research and found out that breastfed babies can sometimes take a little longer to catch up to their birth weights and that (surprise!) doctors all-too-often force mothers on the formula-train.
Micki stayed over for hours, watching Adelyn eat, teaching me better ways to support her little head and my back. When she left I felt a renewed sense of confidence. For the first time since she was born, Adelyn was getting that drunk look on her face after nursing. Finally. I was doing it, and she was satisfied.
While all of this was going on, I was fighting another battle on the side. With my health. I knew from the first day we got home that I was inching toward a Crohn's flare-up. My gastroenterologist had warned me that breastfeeding could trigger one. He told me if I insisted on going that route, that I should only do it for a week. But this is the same man who told me I'd need a C-section because of Crohn's, that I'd most likely deliver Adelyn dangerously early. He was wrong.
So I stuck with it. My nipples cracked. Every single one of my shirts got stained. I never slept for more than two hours. Because that's what you have to do in the beginning when you're breastfeeding. But even though I was exhausted and my breasts ached I got an indefinable thrill being the only one who could feed my child. I felt like a mother.
Three weeks postpartum, I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight. And I wish I could say it was because of the magic of breastfeeding. It might have been partly thanks to that. But I also wasn't eating. Like, at all. I'd eat some toast for breakfast and maybe get down a few forkfuls at dinner. And each bite was forced. I was nauseaus, weak and running to the bathroom when I wasn't sitting on the couch with my Boppy and my daughter, trying to satiate her enough to avoid formula.
I went to my gastroenterologist two weeks ago and told him everything. He thought I might have an infection that's pretty common after pregnancy, especially for people with digestive diseases, because I was given IV antibiotics during labor. So he took some samples to confirm I had it and sent me home with a prescription for Flagyl, which would get rid of the infection. It's also a medicine that has tremendously helped my Crohn's symptoms in the past. Great. An easy solution, I thought.
Then I got home and looked at the prescription bottle and saw the great, big "Don't Breastfeed!" warning. Deep down, I knew it was coming. I knew something wasn't right, despite that nagging voice telling me the natural way would--and should--prevail.
My plan at that point was to stay on the medicine until I kicked the infection and to just pump and dump until it was out of my system, to hopefully keep up my supply. Luckily I'd been pumping like a maniac and had enough stored in the freezer to get Adelyn by for the next few days.
It only took 24 hours on that medicine for me to start feeling a little more like myself. I wasn't breastfeeding, but I was able to spend time actually looking at my daughter, enjoying her. The time usually spent running to the bathroom or lying down fighting desperate exhaustion could be spent with her.
Another 24 hours later, I got a call from my doctor. Turns out, I didn't have that infection after all. It'd really just been Crohn's all along, no quick fix. Still, the Flagyl was helping.
Adelyn will be six weeks old on Monday. She's now exclusively eating formula. My supply dried up quicker than it came--two days of only pumping and I was getting out half an ounce at a time, then a quarter, then droplets. Then nothing. By the time Adelyn had finished the breastmilk in the freezer, I wasn't even leaking anymore. It was gone; I was done and officially on the formula-train.
As disappointed as I was to give it up (especially that first time, watching Jason feed her, realizing it was over), I have to admit. Everything's gotten better since we switched to formula. I feel better. Adelyn's gaining weight. Jason and I get to take shifts at night feeding her, and her grandparents get to watch her for more than an hour at a time.
Giving up breastfeeding was both the hardest part of my postpartum experience so far and the key to finding my rhythm as a parent.
The breast-is-best movement has its good intentions, and I admit, the breast is best. And the idiots on 16 and Pregnant make formula feeding look careless and evil, because those girls don't even try. They just say "ew, gross" and look the other way. And because of mothers like that, the rest of us feel embarrassed when our doctors ask us, "are you still breastfeeding?" Saying "no" feels like admitting we're less-than.
I spent the last week being ashamed not only that I gave up breastfeeding but also that I--and this is scary to even admit out loud--enjoy being a mother more now that I've stopped.
There. I said it. My name is Sarah, and I formula feed my baby. And our lives are better because of it.
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