Tonight Paxey didn't nurse before he went to sleep and in a way it broke my heart. I was feeling that I was needing to wean him soon since my trip to Hawaii is in June, but just for his sake I wanted to nurse him as long as I felt that he needed and wanted to nurse. I felt that since he was preemie I definitely wanted to try and nurse him longer than 1 year. He was a little fussy tonight and never has been one to take a sippie of milk to put himself to sleep, but eventually he just held his blankey and cuddled with it and was snoring before I knew it. He didn't once try to tug on my shirt to nurse either, I think we both felt like we were done.
He's getting so big now and it was challenging to try and hold him in the football position to nurse him anyways, I couldn't help but get teary at the thought that he didn't need me in that way anymore. I 100% believe that it was my breastmilk that got him out of the NICU so quick, and that it was a form of survival for him while I couldn't be there to hold and Mother him at nights. Being able to nurse him was something I looked forward to doing since initially he could only take my milk in a bottle.
I remember the first time we tried breastfeeding the lactation consultant told me it was just good for him to even smell my milk, they called it non-nutritive feeds. When he was able to nurse I would started off with the nipple shield because his mouth was still pretty little he wasn't able to get a wide enough latch. Since he was born early it was hard for him to learn how to suck, swallow and breath at the same time. He eventually did learn to nurse at about 3 weeks old and we would have our 20-30 minutes of exclusive nursing each day.
I had my battles with nursing this time around too. I would even say it was harder with Paxton, because I had to retrain him on everything when we brought him home. At first I could only get him to nurse with the nipple shield, because in the NICU that was on the only way he could nurse was with it since he was so little. So, when we came home he was hooked on the shield, in a way I liked using it because it kept my boobs from getting so sore, but at the same time I knew he would get more milk without the shield. He nursed with the shield for a good 5 weeks after we got home, it got to be annoying to have to clean it each time and those little shields get lost so easily too!
Each time I would try and nurse him without it he would get so frustrated because he couldn't latch on correctly. He just ended up crying out of frustration, and I had my moments of getting frustrated by it as well. I just wanted to nurse my little boy and give him the nourishment he needed. He was hungry and just wanted to eat, and I wanted to nurse him without the shield and it all just became an obstacle. Jeff was always really encouraging and supportive about me trying to nurse without it, and kept telling me to try and even do one feeding a day with no shield and that he would get used to it, and he did. The times I didn't use the shield I would spend up to 20 minutes trying to get him to latch correctly and to stay on my nipple, but both of us would just get so frustrated and it always ended in tears on both ends. I just have to remember that babies are trainable, and adaptable and they learn and change constantly, and as their Mother I am here to guide them.
I'm proud to say that I nursed Paxton close to a full 16 months, that's a lot longer than I ever anticipated. I'm patting myself on the back for having earned another badge to put on my Mommy sash of honor. I wanted to blog about what I had learned this time around, to confirm that I can conquer breastfeeding, and that it ALWAYS gets better and easier. I didn't want to forget the tips I learned from the sweet lactation consultants I was able to meet either. Vonnie in the NICU helped me tremendously with pumping and Linda at KRMC was an angel about teaching Pax how to latch better and not hurt Mommy while breastfeeding.
I think I felt more passionate about nursing this time around because I knew it was going to be a key factor in helping Pax get out of the NICU quicker. I had only pumped a little bit with Annabelle, but quickly became a full time pumping machine in the NICU. I wanted to provide Pax with enough milk where they would never have to supplement with formula. Fortunately I had an amazing milk supply and kept the little fridge in his room well stocked. After delivering him it only took a couple of days for my milk to fully come in.
My first day in the NICU I became well acquainted with their high tech pumping machines they had there. Thankfully my friend Jenny Stephen let me borrow her double pump that I could use at the house when I wasn't at the hospital. I never even considered that there was a technique to pumping the "right way," but there was. The first day we got to the NICU they let me use their pumps, I had a very well established supply of milk by week 2, I could easily pump 8 oz on each breast in 10-12 minutes. It's amazing to me how naturally our body works and that I could produce such high quality milk like that for Pax.
I usually went in the mornings to visit and take care of Pax, but one day it had worked out that I could go late in the afternoon. I was behind the curtain pumping in his room and in walked Vonnie, she was the LC for the NICU and by far one of the sweetest people I have ever met. She honestly was heaven sent because I had been struggling with pumping and knowing how much to do, how much Pax needed from me, and of course it was starting to get painful for me. She came in, introduced herself and sat with me for a good 2 hours and guided me through the pumping process. She told me it had been hurting and my breasts were sore because I wasn't using the right cup size to pump. Once we corrected that and she got me additional pumping parts I could tell a huge difference. The high-grade pumps I used at the hospital were so nice and quiet and had different settings depending on your comfortability with the pump and how much pressure your breasts could handle to get the milk out.
Vonnie quickly became someone I loved in the NICU, she was so full of knowledge and always so willing to share it and help any of the Mom's out. I remember her telling me that even a drop of breastmilk could work wonders for a preemie baby. I was so dedicated to pumping that I would set my alarm at 3 a.m. to wake up and pump milk for Pax, it was that important to me. Annabelle could even sleep through me pumping too, I had a fold up chair next to my twin bed that I would sleep on and had everything ready to go so I could pump and go back to sleep. I would always have to put a sticker label on all the bottles I brought into the NICU with the date and time I pumped the milk, that way it made it easier for the nurses to track which milk to give Paxton next. Vonnie had such a passion for breastfeeding and truly did want to help all the Mom's in the NICU be successful with it.
After pumping like 5-6x a day for Pax it did become quite a demanding chore. Late January of 2014 my body was producing so much milk I had to keep up with pumping or else I would feel so engorged. I even got so good at pumping I did it in the movie theatre with my single pump when Jeff and I had taken Annabelle to see a show. Anything for my little Paxey Poo.
Even though Pax was nursing better near the end of his stay in the NICU I still continued on with pumping, because when he would just breastfeed he wasn't getting enough. It was important for Pax to take his full feedings everyday because he needed to put on a certain amount of weight before they would discharge him.
When it was time for us to bring Paxton home on Valentine's Day I had so much milk at the hospital, it barely all fit in the little fridge they had in his room. I didn't know what I was going to do with it all, I knew that we wouldn't be able to take it all home and fit it in the car. I would have happily shared my milk with the other Mom's in the NICU, but in order to donate milk you had to do some blood work and other testing. I felt so blessed that I was able to pump so much milk because with the high level of stress in the NICU a lot of the Mom's weren't able to pump hardly anything at all. One of my other favorite nurses Kirsten offered to take some of my milk home to her freezer because she had room for it, that helped a lot because the car was jam packed when it was time for us to go back to Kingman. We later on ended up getting the rest of my milk from her on our way home from one of our trips from Mesa.
The nurses all advised me to keep pumping after I got home because Pax still wasn't taking all his feeds by breastfeeding. I was hesitant to keep pumping because it was so time consuming and somewhat annoying to always have to do it in addition to nursing. I kept at it for awhile, but I noticed just how much milk I trained my body to produce and it was just too much for both me and him. Pax would never be able to drink all the milk that I had in the freezer from what I had pumped in the NICU. I just really wanted to get to the point with him where he just nursed exclusively for his feedings, because when we got home he really didn't prefer to take a bottle either.
It was a huge achievement when I weaned him off the nipple shield and got him to nurse without it for all the feedings. We even got to the point where he was latching a lot quicker and he cried less too because he was getting the right amount of milk he needed to satisfy his little appetite. I also was able to fully stop pumping, but that took awhile too because I had to gradually cut down on it. For a couple weeks after I had stopped my breasts definitely had to adjust to making just enough milk for what Pax needed only for nursing. Another incredible thing with breastfeeding is that your body truly works off of the supply and demand you tell it to.
Many nights I found myself hanging out with Linda, the LC at KRMC. Come to find out she was actually the nurse that was on shift the night I delivered Paxton and she remembered both of us. She had later on told me that her and the other nurses were so worried that I was going to deliver Pax on the toilet because I wouldn't get off! She also said she was happy that we had come in because she always had wondered what had happened with him. It's nice because at KRMC they even had a Mother's Lounge where Linda could work with the Mom's on bf. After going in about 3x to visit her she was determined to pin point where my pain was coming from because she couldn't see any real big issues with Paxton's latch. She pulled out her BF book she had got from some training and we looked at some pictures and found something called nipple vaseospasms. We both sat there and read the symptoms of it and it clearly described what I had been feeling and seeing before and after nursing Pax. It's where the baby has such a strong suck that it takes all the blood pressure out from your breast after nursing that the nipple turns white, and that's exactly what had been happening with me.
It was such a relief to kind of put a label as to what we thought had been going on because then we were able to research remedies for it. Some pointers that I don't want to forget that really helped out while experiencing such pain from the spasms:
1. Use a hot pad before and after each feed to get the milk going and to also bring back life to my nipple after each feed.
2. Massaging around my nipple and kind of squeezing it after Pax nursed really helped with the lingering pain I had been experiencing.
3. Take Ibuprofen.
4. Taking hot showers.
5. Make sure that Pax was opening his mouth big enough so that I could shove enough of my breast in his mouth to get a better latch.
6. Use refrigerated gel pads after each feed to sooth my breasts.
7. "A Perfect Latch" video from Stanford University really helped me understand how babies are supposed to nurse:
http://newborns.stanford.edu/Breastfeeding/FifteenMinuteHelper.html
8. Always apply Lansinoh cream after each feed and let your nipples air dry.
9. To ALWAYS remember the pain and pinching will not last forever and it does get better!!!
10. To enjoy the moments I have with breastfeeding and that 1-1 time with each baby.
I'm thankful that I have the super power to nourish my babies with my breastmilk, and to know that it's the best thing for them. Even though at times I would look down and see that Pax had blood in his mouth from my nipples bleeding, it's been another victory for me to have nursed him too. I know that a Mom's breastmilk can protect, comfort and shield them from sicknesses and really strengthen their immune system and brain development. Cheers to another child being breastfed!
