breastfeeding

It pays to be persistent – Liz’s story

The following is an excerpt. 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.

Expressing for twins – Linda’s story

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

It would have been easier to just give up but I knew that breastmilk was so important for their brain and immune development, and I hoped that by keeping up the expressing I would slowly build up my very tiny supply. I also knew that I needed to have milk if I was ever going to get them to take the breast, which we were still trying continuously. I was very proud of the 30 or 40 millilitres I could give each of them each feed, topped up straight afterward with formula, a small percentage compared with what most healthy women can express, and it took me fifteen minutes at the pump to get even that.