My breastfeeding challenges...a history...

My initial plan was to breastfeed immediately after birth, but of course he was whisked away to a NICU 20 miles from me that night so..since he's a preemie, breastfeeding has been a challenge. I pumped since day two but never pumped a good amount. In the NICU I breastfed I think three times, each time for 1 to 5 minutes only. Because he's a preemie, he just couldn't stay awake to feed, he was barely awake for the bottle.

Our first attempts were with a shield and did not hurt, at all. I've read and heard if you do it right, it does not hurt....more on that later.

Fast forward a month and I get him home. It was still a challenge. By that time he had nipple preference, and he preferred the rubber kind. He screamed when I tried to feed him, he'd push me away, kick, spit me out, in short...he gave my boob the middle finger. My joke at the time...He doesn't like the boob...maybe he's an ass man. ;-) (Get used to my warped sense of humor or leave this blog) :-)

So I'd pump while Chris bottle fed him nasty smelling and over priced soy based formula. Whatever I pumped, we'd feed him but it was never enough in volume.

Fast forward a month and we get...thrush! Which we still have! Awesome! Each week got better in terms of his feeding and my supply growing....along with my pain.

Not sure when the pain kicked in exactly but it did indeed kick in. Ouch. Let's put it this way, in labor I never cussed, screamed, yelled, even held Chris's hand let alone clinched it, never broke a sweat....breastfeeding on the other hand, all of thee above...when I say scream, I mean scream. Pant, sweat, shriek...sometimes his latch sucks, pun intended, mix that with thrush and you have...blistered, dry, cracked, bleeding nipples! Woo hoo! I have calluses on them! Yup! I use lanolin but it doesn't do much. When his latch goes array I break the seal with my pinky and try to breathe again.

Lately I'm determined to get him off formula. So I tried a formula and bottle free day....he fed off me for 12 hours...pretty much non stop. Um, ouch and hello, I had things I needed to do, like PEE! After all that he was still hungry and he got a bottle. Talk about a 'let down'.

That same week though I noticed I got bigger, quite a bit bigger and he no longer preferred the bottle over me. He took the breast like a champ! He still needed a booster of bottled formula from time to time but far less of it. Also when I pumped my supply went way up, enough to fill a bottle for him! And I've not pumped since. That was a week ago.

In this last week, he gets on average, 2, 2 ounce bottles of formula, the rest comes directly from the breast...my callused, blistered, cracked breasts. I'm in so much pain I can't even wear clothes, which Chris loves btw.

So, why do I persist? I'm a masochist. No. I have fibromyalgia and am in pain all the time, I don't need additional pain and this is bad, bad, bad pain. I do it because it's best for him and me and I like a challenge. I'm going to make this work. I want him off formula all together by month's end. This is much easier said than done.

I'm done with the rant for now. Today I earned my '3 month' badge of honor the breastfeeding forum on live journal. I wear it with pride...painful pride.