Breastfeeding

From the start I swore to myself that I wasn't going to be upset if I couldn't breast feed. I knew that I wanted to give it a shot and hoped for the best. The day Oliver was born my emotions went into full force, mama bear protecting her cub and there was nothing more I wanted to do than to be able to breast feed my little man and give him the best of the best. At first it seemed like it was working great. He was eating a lot and I was still even able to pump afterwards and squeeze out a couple more ounces. I was ecstatic and thought that there was no way this wasn't going to work. Boy was I wrong. I slowly started noticing a lack of milk production, Oliver was losing weight and I wasn't pumping anything. I even started to pump instead of feeding him straight from the breast just to see how much I was producing, it was so minuscule. I tried everything to increase production, talked to a lactation consultant and took all of her advice. Nothing worked. At this point my emotions were getting the better of me and I found myself crying on multiple occasions because I felt like a complete and utter failure as a Mother. I wanted that bonding experience with my Son, I wanted to give him the best food possible, and for me that was breast milk. I broke down, even though I told myself I wouldn't, I promised myself I wouldn't; it didn't matter, I was hurting.

Thankfully I have the most incredible husband and he calmly and rationally talked me through it. Telling me that breast feeding or not didn't make me a bad or good Mom, just the fact that I wanted it so badly made me the best Mom I could be. He constantly told me that Oliver was so lucky to have a Mom who cared so much about him. He also brought up an excellent point, once we switched him over to formula only, he started gaining weight instantly, and that was what mattered. He was growing, flourishing and turning into an incredible little boy because of the formula he was being fed.

It took quite a long time for me to fully accept the fact that I wasn't able to breast feed my baby, and still to this day I find myself wishing that it would have worked. As I look at Oliver today, all fourteen plus pounds of him, I know that we ultimately made the best decision we could. Being a parent is by far the craziest and most fulfilling job I have ever had and I won't stop doing everything I can in order to give my son the best, because that's what he deserves.

I guess I just wanted to put my story out there because as much as I wanted to be able to do this I've come to terms with the fact that I couldn't and I feel like there has to be other Mom's out there who were or are in a situation similar to mine and if I can hit home with at least one of them then that's all I can hope for. It's nothing to be ashamed of even though society tries to tell us otherwise. Our children will grow up to be just as happy and healthy as any baby that was breast fed. While breastfeeding is great it doesn't always work for everyone. We all make our own decisions and figure out what is right for us and our children.