I'm going to have to live with this pain the entire time I breastfeed. - The first month of breastfeeding was agony for me. At the hospital, I told them it was hurting, but the nurses said his latch looked great. We didn't get to see a lactation consultant (LC) until we were about to leave, and E was too sleepy to nurse for her. She poked around in his mouth a little and said he was rolling his tongue, and suggested I mess with his tongue before latching him on. I could never get that to work - it always resulted in him crying, which undid anything I'd done before he got latched on.
A couple of weeks later, things were only worse. Sometime I would hit my head against the wall behind me to distract me from the pain as he latched on. My nipples were ultra-sensitive all the time from the damage. I called the LC hotline; they suggested some positioning changes. With those changes, if I did everything exactly perfect (which rarely happens with a wiggling, hungry baby), the pain would at least be less maybe half the time. I started to give up hope and resigned myself to a life of pain. I'd initially planned to breastfeed a minimum of a year - now the thought of a year of this made me cry, and I hoped I could tough it out to six months.
I finally made an appointment to see another LC in person. She saw both what looked to her like a dairy intolerance (oh, did I mention that he was also screaming his way through these feedings?), and a slight posterior tongue tie. However, she cautioned that she didn't really thing the tie was severe enough to cause my problems, and suggested more positioning changes rather than getting it clipped. If I did want it clipped, she said the only person they knew who would do it was a dentist over an hour away, and my insurance likely wouldn't cover him.
Her positioning recommendations, if done absolutely perfectly, now resulted in almost no pain about half the time. If I did it perfectly a quarter on the time (that's being generous), I was now spending only 87% of our feedings in agony. Woohoo! Luckily, I had the support of a BF community online, and mothers there encouraged me to pursue the tongue tie angle.
Also luckily, E had his one month checkup later that week. The doctor confirmed the dairy intolerance. I asked her about the tongue tie, and if she knew anyone who clips posterior ties. New to the practice and area, she left the room to ask around - and came back with the news that the ENTs upstairs would clip a posterior tie, and we could get in right after this appointment!
Upstairs, the ENT was on the same page as the LC - there was a slight tie, but he wasn't sure it was bad enough to bother clipping. After all the encouragement I'd received online, I knew I didn't want to go through another month of pain just to wind up back in this office. We told him to do it. A minute of pain for E, then nursing calmed him down and he never seemed to notice again. No bleeding, nothing.
Within two days the pain was gone, aside from a little residual sensitivity due to damage already done that was healing. We got that slight, probably-not-the-problem posterior tongue tie clipped 4.5 months ago, and nursing has been a pain-free breeze ever since. I called the LC back to tell her that it had, indeed, worked, and gave her the ENT's info so that she wouldn't have to refer patients an hour away anymore.
Breastfeeding should not hurt like that. A tiny bit of latch pain now and then, some rawness when they're comfort nursing and their latch starts to slide, that's normal. Pain that makes you want to quit nursing is not. You don't have to deal with that, and if one professional's advice doesn't fix it, keep asking more professionals until it's gone. And if anyone suggests there might possibly be a tongue or lip tie, no matter how slight, my advice is to clip it every time. It's minimal pain for the baby, and while it's not guaranteed to be the problem, it could save you a lot of pain and be the difference between giving up and nursing as long as you plan to.
Showing posts with label Myth vs Reality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Myth vs Reality. Show all posts
Monday, November 21, 2011
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Myth vs Reality: Cloth Diapering
Let me tell you, becoming a parent provides fodder for a few dozen of these Myth vs Reality posts!
Cloth diapering is going to be difficult and tedious, but will be worth it so I'll muddle through - Actually, my husband and I agree that it's far easier and more enjoyable than we expected! Changing the diaper might take another step or two, but not so much that you notice it. And while yes, we have to do laundry every 2-3 days, even that has its upsides. There have been plenty of days where the only thing I managed to get done other than feeding the baby and letting him nap on me was diaper laundry, and it's nice to have something that's actually achievable in those early weeks! The laundry really only takes about 15 minutes total of human effort, and most of that is the putting away.
I have to make sense of all this information, figure out exactly what I want to use, and get all the diapers I will ever need before the baby is born! - This one had me going a little crazy a few weeks before he was due. The truth is, if you grab a couple dozen prefolds and a handful of covers you're set to start, and you can try out all the pockets and fitteds and AIOs or whatever you like a piece at a time as you go. Find something you like, buy more; something you don't, sell it. You can even start with disposables and build your stash a piece at a time from the ground up. There's no right or wrong. You don't have to fully invest in any one "system" or commit to one brand. And in the end, you won't know what fits your baby best in advance anyhow, so buying two dozen BumGenius 4.0s or nothing but Thirsties covers might result in having to rebuy your whole stash anyhow!
We'll use disposables or pocket diapers when we're out and about, and only use the prefolds at home - Some people do this and it works fine. But we found it annoying to keep track of what to put in the diaper bag separately, plus we'd either have to change him before we leave (whether he's wet or not), or else wind up with extra stuff at changing time. With disposables, we'd still have the wet diaper we just took off of him to deal with. And with pockets, we'd have a clean cover and snappi that we'd have to remember to dig out of the diaper bag later. Changing a prefold on the go is a little harder, especially if you're somewhere without a real changing station, but for us the annoyance factor is lower overall.
Cloth diapering is going to be difficult and tedious, but will be worth it so I'll muddle through - Actually, my husband and I agree that it's far easier and more enjoyable than we expected! Changing the diaper might take another step or two, but not so much that you notice it. And while yes, we have to do laundry every 2-3 days, even that has its upsides. There have been plenty of days where the only thing I managed to get done other than feeding the baby and letting him nap on me was diaper laundry, and it's nice to have something that's actually achievable in those early weeks! The laundry really only takes about 15 minutes total of human effort, and most of that is the putting away.
I have to make sense of all this information, figure out exactly what I want to use, and get all the diapers I will ever need before the baby is born! - This one had me going a little crazy a few weeks before he was due. The truth is, if you grab a couple dozen prefolds and a handful of covers you're set to start, and you can try out all the pockets and fitteds and AIOs or whatever you like a piece at a time as you go. Find something you like, buy more; something you don't, sell it. You can even start with disposables and build your stash a piece at a time from the ground up. There's no right or wrong. You don't have to fully invest in any one "system" or commit to one brand. And in the end, you won't know what fits your baby best in advance anyhow, so buying two dozen BumGenius 4.0s or nothing but Thirsties covers might result in having to rebuy your whole stash anyhow!
We'll use disposables or pocket diapers when we're out and about, and only use the prefolds at home - Some people do this and it works fine. But we found it annoying to keep track of what to put in the diaper bag separately, plus we'd either have to change him before we leave (whether he's wet or not), or else wind up with extra stuff at changing time. With disposables, we'd still have the wet diaper we just took off of him to deal with. And with pockets, we'd have a clean cover and snappi that we'd have to remember to dig out of the diaper bag later. Changing a prefold on the go is a little harder, especially if you're somewhere without a real changing station, but for us the annoyance factor is lower overall.
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Myth vs Reality: Breastfeeding (Part 1)
These aren't necessarily all things I believed right up until my baby proved me wrong, but they are certainly things I believed at some point before getting pregnant and learning more on the topic.
Teeth are nature's way of telling you to wean the baby - First, of course, some babies get teeth at just a couple months old, or are even born with a tooth; but let's ignore those outliers. What I didn't know was that, even after starting solids, babies still have to have either breastmilk or formula until they're a year old. I was envisioning eight-month-olds living on nothing but jarred baby food, but that's not how it works. Why would I voluntarily "wean" if it just means switching to formula? I haven't yet had to nurse with teeth, but I've heard it's really not bad - and honestly, I know full well that he could bite me plenty hard with those gums if he wanted to.
Nursing in public is kinda weird and unnecessary - The truth is, it's very easy to nurse discreetly (until he pops off and tries to make me nipple-flash the world), and it's far from unnecessary. If I could never nurse him in public, I'd either never be able to go anywhere, or would have to pump a LOT more in order to always have a bottle on hand just in case. I think my opinion on nursing in public was changed by one experience: I'm a grad student, and a fellow student had brought her baby to a research meeting. She was sitting next to me, and at one point I snuck a peek at the baby and had to do a double-take when I realized she was nursing and I hadn't even noticed! I couldn't see any boob or anything, and if I hadn't looked right at her I never would have known it happened. I hadn't realized until then just how unintrusive it can be.
Pumping is easy, I'll always have plenty of pumped milk around! - For some people, it's tedious but not too bad. But I don't respond well to the pump. See, a baby gets milk by simultaneously squeezing and sucking. Their mouth is the ultimate mommy-milking machine, and is very efficient. The pump only has suction to work with; some people can get plenty of milk that way and some people have some trouble. I generally get 1-2 oz in a 20 minute pumping session. So I don't have a freezer stash; I'm doing well to have just enough to leave my husband one ounce per hour I want to work, which is just enough to keep the baby from rioting.
Teeth are nature's way of telling you to wean the baby - First, of course, some babies get teeth at just a couple months old, or are even born with a tooth; but let's ignore those outliers. What I didn't know was that, even after starting solids, babies still have to have either breastmilk or formula until they're a year old. I was envisioning eight-month-olds living on nothing but jarred baby food, but that's not how it works. Why would I voluntarily "wean" if it just means switching to formula? I haven't yet had to nurse with teeth, but I've heard it's really not bad - and honestly, I know full well that he could bite me plenty hard with those gums if he wanted to.
Nursing in public is kinda weird and unnecessary - The truth is, it's very easy to nurse discreetly (until he pops off and tries to make me nipple-flash the world), and it's far from unnecessary. If I could never nurse him in public, I'd either never be able to go anywhere, or would have to pump a LOT more in order to always have a bottle on hand just in case. I think my opinion on nursing in public was changed by one experience: I'm a grad student, and a fellow student had brought her baby to a research meeting. She was sitting next to me, and at one point I snuck a peek at the baby and had to do a double-take when I realized she was nursing and I hadn't even noticed! I couldn't see any boob or anything, and if I hadn't looked right at her I never would have known it happened. I hadn't realized until then just how unintrusive it can be.
Pumping is easy, I'll always have plenty of pumped milk around! - For some people, it's tedious but not too bad. But I don't respond well to the pump. See, a baby gets milk by simultaneously squeezing and sucking. Their mouth is the ultimate mommy-milking machine, and is very efficient. The pump only has suction to work with; some people can get plenty of milk that way and some people have some trouble. I generally get 1-2 oz in a 20 minute pumping session. So I don't have a freezer stash; I'm doing well to have just enough to leave my husband one ounce per hour I want to work, which is just enough to keep the baby from rioting.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Myths vs Reality: Newborns
The books, the websites, the classes - they lied like rugs. And things would have been a little easier if I hadn't been fed these lines.
Babies sleep 14-18 hours/day - Ha! Not this one! Try 11-12, and yes, I've tracked it with iPad apps so that's not an estimate. Every single person who met him for the first three months - starting with a pediatrician the day he was born - commented on how "alert" he is. We decided that alert is a euphemism for awake, since most newborns that we met were asleep and he never was.
Babies eat every 2-3 hours - See, that's the longest a newborn goes without eating. In this case, I know E is normal. I've seen plenty of other new moms convinced that something is wrong because their baby eats every hour, or for several hours straight. Most newborns eat more often than every 2-3 hours, and almost all engage in "cluster feeding" for 2-4 hours (or more!) now and then, especially during growth spurts.
Babies sleep through the night by three months - Actually, he did this. Around three weeks, he started sleeping longer stretches, and from 3-12 weeks he reliably slept a 4-7 hour stretch every night. But after he was born, I found out about the four month sleep regression, when it all goes to shit. And he hit it a month early. So for nearly two months, he was back to sleeping in 1-2 hour chunks. Now, at 5 months, he's starting to alternate between bad nights and nights where he'll have one or two 3-hour stretches. So hopefully we're slowly coming out of that, although I know now that some babies don't sleep well til nearly a year. Just never listen to anyone who tells you that babies sleep through the night by X weeks/months.
Changing diapers is a nasty, disgusting chore - Reality isn't always worse than the myth! I don't mind the diaper changes at all (well, except when E is in a bad mood and screams through one). Maybe this is because cloth diapering slows the process down just a bit, but I often find diaper change time to be a nice bonding time. I sing him some songs, kiss his bare tummy, maybe even read him a book while letting him air out a little (but with a cloth over him just in case, of course). And everyone was right that exclusively-breastfed poo really isn't that bad. Sure sometimes a big poo that he manages to get on his feet while I'm removing the diaper is kinda gross, and he does pee everywhere now and then. But we change his diaper a good 10x a day, and those things happen maybe once a week. Overall, changing diapers? Not as bad as advertised!
Babies sleep 14-18 hours/day - Ha! Not this one! Try 11-12, and yes, I've tracked it with iPad apps so that's not an estimate. Every single person who met him for the first three months - starting with a pediatrician the day he was born - commented on how "alert" he is. We decided that alert is a euphemism for awake, since most newborns that we met were asleep and he never was.
Babies eat every 2-3 hours - See, that's the longest a newborn goes without eating. In this case, I know E is normal. I've seen plenty of other new moms convinced that something is wrong because their baby eats every hour, or for several hours straight. Most newborns eat more often than every 2-3 hours, and almost all engage in "cluster feeding" for 2-4 hours (or more!) now and then, especially during growth spurts.
Babies sleep through the night by three months - Actually, he did this. Around three weeks, he started sleeping longer stretches, and from 3-12 weeks he reliably slept a 4-7 hour stretch every night. But after he was born, I found out about the four month sleep regression, when it all goes to shit. And he hit it a month early. So for nearly two months, he was back to sleeping in 1-2 hour chunks. Now, at 5 months, he's starting to alternate between bad nights and nights where he'll have one or two 3-hour stretches. So hopefully we're slowly coming out of that, although I know now that some babies don't sleep well til nearly a year. Just never listen to anyone who tells you that babies sleep through the night by X weeks/months.
Changing diapers is a nasty, disgusting chore - Reality isn't always worse than the myth! I don't mind the diaper changes at all (well, except when E is in a bad mood and screams through one). Maybe this is because cloth diapering slows the process down just a bit, but I often find diaper change time to be a nice bonding time. I sing him some songs, kiss his bare tummy, maybe even read him a book while letting him air out a little (but with a cloth over him just in case, of course). And everyone was right that exclusively-breastfed poo really isn't that bad. Sure sometimes a big poo that he manages to get on his feet while I'm removing the diaper is kinda gross, and he does pee everywhere now and then. But we change his diaper a good 10x a day, and those things happen maybe once a week. Overall, changing diapers? Not as bad as advertised!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)