In honor of World Breastfeeding Week 2015...
Shit! I just lost half my audience, didn't I? Oh well, they'll miss out (losers).
Like I'd started, in honor of this week promoting and normalizing (can you believe that crap? We are still working on normalizing in 2015...because America can't deal with tits or something) breastfeeding, I'm gonna share my experience, but of course I'll make it funny and touching and universal and and the best thing you ever read....because I know that's what you expect of me by now, and I'm here for you. Maybe though you should raise the bar a little bit? Whatever, I don't judge (except sometimes).
I made the decision to breastfeed while I was pregnant, but it wasn't a committed decision until the very end - or the very beginning, depending on how you look at it. I remember my mom breastfeeding my younger siblings, so I suspect (because I can't remember) that early on in my pregnancy I'd assumed I'd be figuring that part out when the time came. I do, however, recall the process of solidifying the choice to avoid formula altogether, to breastfeed exclusively, when I was commanding a huge, super round and shiny belly, and absorbing every piece of pregnancy/birth/newborn info I could find in the weeks before I was due. I knew it all, bitches. I was ready to yell at the entire hospital staff if necessary. I had a midwife. I had read 3 entire natural birthing books, and about a million and a half articles.
Fast forward to the birth NOT going anything like I'd planned. Because my little guy decided to literally sit down inside me and get his tiny ass stuck in my pelvis, because two back-to-back attempts at external cephalic version (when they try to manipulate a breech baby, from the outside, to flip into the right position - it's really painful and it was the worst thing ever), and because countless headstands, yoga bullshit, music, directed light and other coaxing didn't help to get him flipped into position, I had to finally succumb to a scheduled c-section.
I use the word succumb because at the time, it felt like complete defeat, even though it was an informed and thought out decision. I had been prepared for, and rather obsessed with, a natural birth, which I now felt cheated out of. That's another story for another time...and I got over it, no worries. However, because I'd read that having a c-section can negatively impact one's success in breastfeeding, I now felt like..ok, I lost control over this birth, I am definitely not losing control over how I feed him! And I think that was maybe the moment I literally turned into a milk monster. Lactzilla. Nippleratu.
Titacabra.
I'd also read that in the recovery room, they are observing, among a number of things, for signs that the spinal block is wearing off, so that you can be taken back to be with your baby again. I made it clear to my c-section team that I knew this information and I'd be monitoring myself. I'm sure they all rolled their eyes. Don't care.
In recovery, as the cocktail of narcs that had been pumping through me for hours began wearing off, my face starting itching intensely. Like inside my face. I thought I would scratch my face right off - they gave me Benadryl for it. That was an awful feeling, but also kind of cool - for a moment I imagined I was a famous junkie rock star, in withdrawal, doing a stint in rehab against my will. My face has worms in it! Spiders! I need a fix! It's not funny. But it is.
Except I was a post-surgery blobby mess and probably not remotely cute, or funny, or cool at all.
Once I could finally wiggle my toes, I let the nurse know immediately that it was time for me to latch the baby. He needs colostrum or he'll DIE! Roll me back up to maternity at once, you bastards!
Latch the baby. What a fucking joke. It just wasn't working. I think every nurse on that floor, including sweet, quiet mustached Stanley, handled my stupid boobs and inadequate nipples in an attempt to help. I didn't care who it was - if you knew anything at all about babies and breastfeeding, you were going to be introduced to my breasts.
Oh, my dad is here? Cool, here's my left breast just chilling. It's out because it doesn't work. I'm gonna whip out this other one now and try it again. Poor guy. My dad was great about it actually and never made me feel weird. I'm not gonna ever tell him or thank him though because that might be weird. Some things just don't need words.
Nipple shields. SNS tube. Cup feeding expressed colostrum. Pumps. Engorgement. Let-down. I learned a new language in a couple of days. The more walls I hit, the harder I fought. The more people tried to tell me it's ok to 'give in' the more single minded I became.
Anyone that came to our house in those first few weeks got a boob show because I did all the things they tell you to - go topless as much as possible. Air dry those poor nipples. I was a little bit more reserved in public, sometimes positioning a small cotton blankie early on, but I never used an actual cover up because fuck you, people that think I should. That's right: I'll breastfeed on the hood of your car, in front of your kids, and laugh.
It took almost 3 months for things to work smoothly. I breastfed exclusively all that time though, through mastitis, cracked and bleeding nipples, thrush, and poor latch - but we kept going, and he kept growing and thriving, and then one day, just like that, it stopped hurting. And it was easy and mindless and convenient. I soon went back to work and figured out the whole electric pumping thing, (which is really on the edge of weird dystopian fuckery if you think about it), and I had accumulated a respectable stockpile of frozen breastmilk. My monster ways yielded amazing results. We kept right on going past his first birthday and almost to his second. It was around 20 months when he was down to just one breastfeeding a day, usually the last one they give up, first thing in the morning. He just started forgetting about it...and I didn't remind him, and he self-weaned. That's kind of how it should happen. I still had milk for months though. That was freaky.
I can still imagine what it feels like to have a let-down. It's part pain, part pleasure, and all life-giving. It is a super power. I can close my eyes and see his little round baby face looking up at me, breaking away from my body for a second and giggling, then going right back for more. Even years later, I'm still so grateful for the experience. Looking back, I can see that I should have cut myself some slack, and that by not doing so, I caused myself a lot of anxiety with my constant, unwavering focus...at the same time, that was part of my learning process: I learned how deeply and fiercely I can dig in my heels when I know with all my heart that something is right, and it's a trait that has served me well much more than it hasn't.
So anyone out there breastfeeding - you're at one of the peaks of motherhood. You are the vessel that sustains your baby. You are full of magic at the same time that you are so very normal.
Everyone else - support breastfeeding mamas everywhere. Protect them, and stand up for them, and smile when you see them. Because that's the normal thing to do.
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