breastfeeding

I was always going to breastfeed - Jo-Anne’s story

The following is an exerpt. Please click the title above to read the entire story.

So we had a go at breastfeeding. Trying to attach a very small baby (he was 2.4kg) was tricky and time consuming. He had no idea and didn’t think a nice wide mouth at all necessary. It also turned out he was just too small to suck hard enough to draw out my inverted nipples. Luckily for me there was a lactation consultant on. She came and assessed the non attaching feed and suggested using nipple shields. Once I started using nipple shields it all fell in to place. Oliver was able to attach and suck well. It was certainly not comfortable feeding, in fact down right excruciating would be a good term. Sucking basically rips all the tissue attachments that keep the nipple in. I screwed up my toes and breathed deeply. Feeds hurt the most at the start and then settled to a dull pain which I could cope with.

Getting to my goal - Erin’s story

The following is an exerpt. Please click the title above to read the entire story.

My daughter was born 6 weeks early. I wasn’t prepared for how that would effect my efforts for breastfeeding. I assumed that I would have a normal birth, be able to put her to the breast and maybe have some of the normal difficulties that most mothers experience. I ended up have a c-section and having her whisked away after seeing her briefly and not to see her again till the next day. The nurse that night asked me if I wanted to pump then or in the morning. Not knowing how much it could affect my milk supply I said I would wait till the morning and get one last full nights sleep.

It pays to be persistent - Liz’s story

The following is an exerpt. Please click the title above to read the entire story.

Meanwhile, I was pumping and trying to build my supply so that I could nurse them when they were strong enough. At first, we were adamant that they not have pacifiers or bottles, but when the nurses said that bottle-fed babies go home sooner, I gave in. It was two days before they even were able to have the first drops of colostrum swabbed on their gums. Slowly, they started to be able to take little bits of my milk from a bottle nipple, once they were off the ventilators. It was five days before we got to hold Jonah, the stronger of the two. I kept asking when I could nurse them, but the nurses told me that it would make their oxygen levels drop, and they had to be on a certain type of ventilator, and all kinds of other excuses.