The Desire to Carry on

Here is my confession;

I am guilty of frowning upon Mothers who have chosen not to breastfeed or stopped…..before I had to breastfeed myself. My thougths were exactly what I always heard…everyone makes milk, as long as you want to. I dismissed everyone story as lazy and not wanting to put forth the effort. I just could not understand why, with breast milk being so valuable. Little did I know that this is so not the case, all breast/lactations are not created equal.

My breastfeeding trials have been a long journey. I have worked very hard at maintaining my milk. I got mastiss at 3 months, I had to wear cabbage in my bra for 3 days, I had to take medicine to cure the infection, spiked a fever, was sick with chills, you name it I have been threw it to maintain milk. My milk dropped to almost nothing and NEVER picked back up early into my daughter’s life. I was determined for my daughter her to have the breast milk, even if it was only a bottle a day the nutrients are priceless.  I was pumping every 3 hrs and taking fenugreek to only get 5 – 6 oz a day.

It takes a lot of effort to breastfeed and I was a slave to the pump. My daughter never latched on so I never nursed, all of her milk was from pumping, every three hours, all kinds of teas, pills and oatmeal cookies to keep it going.

I was ready to quit one day, even though it has always been my goal to get her to 1 yr. Then I found an article titled Breast-feeding Boost Children’s School Performance, this article gave me the inspiration to latch on to my pump.

I was pumping all day for 2.5 ounces, for about a week (7 days after the article). On the eighth day I pumped an entire day and produced less than ounce for the day. This almost brought tears to my eyes, knowing that it was over. I was just shy of 9 months and I was not ready for it to be over. I have never been a quitter and I want only the best for my little one. Succumbing to the inevitable, left me feeling upset, unsatisfied but satisfied knowing that I gave it my all and there was nothing else to do at this point.

Now its time to pray. I prayed for my daughter’s health, immunity her strength, growth and development.

I now regret frowning on nonbreastfeeding moms, understanding the struggle, believing that if you want to produce milk the milk will automatically be there and stay there.

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