An unexpected benefit...

Milk has been a big topic in our house lately. Kestian can often be found rattling off the different kinds of milk that he knows of: cow milk, soy milk, breast milk..., often in conjunction with some discussion about animals. He's wildly interested in animals and asks tons of questions as he tries to group things in his mind. We've told him that all mammals have fur and make milk, so he often asks if such-and-such animal makes milk, and then (somehow) ties that in to how his friend at school has to drink soy milk. It's a wonder that he hasn't asked what kind of animal "soy" is.

And Adelaide talks about it too, but more as it relates to feeding Fenton. She adores him so much, and is interested in every aspect of his life. So much so, though, that we are often having to say "Leave him alone!" as she is always touching and squeezing and rocking him. He's a hardy little baby, but I worry that she might get caught up in her enthusiasm and rock him a little too hard.

So yeah, feeding Fenton... This has been a long journey so far. When he was born, he was the perfect, big, baby. Right away I tried to nurse him, and he seemed willing to go for it. But within hours I was in so much pain. I figured it was just due to nursing a new baby. Then on his second night, when he was crying because he was hungry but my milk had not come in, I immediately saw the problem. As he cried, his little heart-shaped tongue set off alarms.


Before I could even think it through, I yelled out "He's tongue-tied!" The only reason this occurred to me was because when I was having so much trouble trying to nurse the twins, I came across that in my research as a possible reason for my lack of success. I don't know why I never pursued it, but it makes me wonder today if maybe, since it is a genetic disorder, whether they suffered from it as well. I can't remember them having the "heart" tongue, but latching just never worked. Hmmm... Well, I cannot dwell on it now. They got their breastmilk anyway.

So the next morning I asked the lactation nurse what she thought about Fenton's tongue, and she agreed. She sent for the pediatrician to examine him, who also agreed - and then offered to clip his tongue. Little did I know how uncommon that was. Turns out he's only one of maybe two pediatricians in the area who will do it. So the nurse frantically ran around getting this and that and we soon all gathered in the nursery for the clipping. After an unceremonious 2 minutes he was clipped and we tried to nurse. But I was already so sore that I couldn't tell a difference. The LC armed me with a nipple shield - you know, the "silly hat" - to use until I was healed.

I got better but even with the shield it was still painful. After discussing it with our pediatrician, we decided he needed to be clipped further, this time by an ENT doc. Fortunately, we got an appointment the same day and he was sympathetic to our case. Apparently, he doesn't like to do any clippings until the baby is about 6 months old, but I told him that we won't be nursing in 6 more days if this doesn't get fixed. Perhaps because he had a new baby himself he took pity on us. A few days later, Fenton's tongue was clipped again.

Still, nursing was a bit painful without the shield as I was not all the way healed, so I did not try to go commando. But all this irritation soon lead to bigger problems, as mastitis reared it's ugly head. I'm convinced that I got it because I just couldn't heal: infection was inevitable.

This bout with mastitis put me in the hospital for 5 days on IV antibiotics (and 5 more days at home with IV antibiotics). Onset was sudden. I went from feeling fine during the day, to a 102 fever in the evening, to a 104.3 fever by midnight. Damon was in a panic and soon we found ourselves - all five of us - in a local ER at 1:00 in the morning. The ER doc immediately admitted me and had no concerns about having Fenton stay with me. Mastitis or not, I was still going to nurse this baby.

While I was in the hospital, I met a lot with the lactation nurses, one who I remember from when the twins were born. Everyone was helpful and one even got him to nurse without the shield. Hooray! But it didn't last and I was still sick and tired - literally - from the mastitis. I would work on it when I was better. However, I was warned: use the shield for too long and supply could go down. And my supply did go down while I was in the hospital, but not from the shield but from the mastitis. I supplemented once or twice, but we made it through.

A few weeks after the mastitis affair, which was probably now a week ago, I noticed that Fenton was nursing differently. I can't really describe it, but it was different, so I dropped the silly hat and gave it a try. Adelaide, who is always within 3 feet of Fenton, noticed too and mumbled "I hope this works!" He nursed just fine. I was beaming. I still needed the shield sometimes, but there was hope - because up until then I had resigned myself to nursing for a year with the silly hat. Perhaps that won't be necessary...

But a few days later, I was sore again and I blamed it on hat-less nursing. But it still hurt with the hat. Hmmm... A few Google searches later and I realized I had thrush. I had it before when pumping with the twins - yes you can get it even when you exclusively pump - so it all came back to me. Of course, it didn't help that it was a Saturday and it would be days before I could talk to my doctor. Then, before I knew it, the redness and pain from mastitis was back. Oh no! But this time I wasn't hit with the high fevers that put me in the hospital. It was treatable with an oral antibiotic, thankfully, and is already getting better.

So yeah, I'm still using the silly hat, and will try again to get rid of it when I heal from this latest round of crap. It hasn't affected my supply like everyone said. In fact, I have been freezing probably 10oz of milk a day that Fenton doesn't eat - and he eats a lot, thankyouverymuch! I know I'll need it later.

So anyways, this whole nursing thing has been quite a wild ride. And I must say, the whole family has never seen so much boob as they have in the last few months. Yeah, it's always out. And at first, I was shy about it - for about 2 seconds - but figured the kids will just have to see how it is. And that's a good thing. I keep reading articles about how a woman's success with breastfeeding often can be tied to the support she receives - and especially the support from her male counterpart. I hope that Adelaide (as a future mom) and Kestian (as a future dad) are seeing all of this and think nothing of it...that it's just normal. Because it is. Yeah, it's a lot of work (so much that the kids often declare "Having a baby is a lot of work!") but it's what you do. I figure that if I ever want grandchildren, I better make it look at least do-able!

But while my main focus is providing Fenton's milk, I'm noticing that the kids are taking it all in stride. Kestian often walks by while I am nursing and approvingly pats Fenton on the head, declaring "He sure does LOOOOOVE to nurse!" while Adelaide is always asking how many bottles of milk I pumped at work, or if my boobs had enough to feed him today. To them, nursing and pumping is the norm (as it should be).

And that makes it so much more worthwhile. I'm glad that they can appreciate the work that goes into it, but yet it doesn't bother them. I'm happy to go through all of this for Fenton..the shield, the mastitis, the thrush, the mastitis again...because I know how important breastmilk is for a baby. But I am even happier to make two more future breastfeeding supporters for this world. I only regret that Fenton will not be able to observe this process for himself...


unless...