Wow how crazy life has been the last two months. Since I have updated a lot about our travels and such, I thought I'd switch gears a little and talk about life as a parent. The road was not an easy one by any means in the beginning but we are going uphill now! This post will get a little deep & personal & long, you have been warned...
You always hear how great life is when someone has a baby (don't get me wrong, being Jase's mom is THE BEST thing that has ever happen to me), but there are also a lot of hardships you go through as well that no one really warns/tells you about. I think the only thing people told me was I would be tired, well duh! What they don't say is just how tired & emotional one can get. That perfect picture of how everything would be does NOT always happen. Every waking second you're worrying about if you're doing this parenting thing right! When the baby is asleep you're making sure they're still breathing, when they're awake you wish they were sleeping so you could sleep, LOL! It's crazy how once the baby is actually here things can change and what you planned on doing can be thrown out the window in a second. I had this image in my head that Jase would be breastfed for 12 months, he would be sleeping in his nursery around 3 months of age and so on, but things change VERY fast. Along with plans being changed brings a lot of stress and guilt. Now every parenting story is different, and some people get REALLY lucky and have a great experience and everything goes right, to those people I envy you!!! I'm not going to talk about everything we're doing different, that would take too long (LOL), but I am going to talk about our breast feeding struggle since I fee thats the biggest struggle us new moms have.
I know I had mentioned in a prior post about Jase not being breast-feed anymore, and that was one of MANY things as I was pregnant preparing for baby I'd never thought I wouldn't be doing. When we we're at the hospital Jase was breast feeding really well. This was of course before my milk came in and my boobs were still soft. Once my milk came in I got SUPER engorged, like canons, NO JOKE! This made is really hard for Jase to latch and caused a lot of cracked/bleeding nipples. I got out of the shower one morning and my arm brushed my boob and my wrist was covered in blood. I'm not kidding. (to who ever had breast feeding come easy from the start, I hate you... Just Kidding!!!) That is when I started using a nipple shield. My boobs needed to heal but I did not want to supplement with formula so the shield was my best option. This also helped Jase stay latched for an entire feed. Things seemed to be going well at this point. I was tired, of course, but Jase was growing and thriving. He had his moments of course, but overall he was great.
Soon we started noticing Jase was becoming more and more "fussy" as my doctor calls it, and I guess thats what we thought it was at first too. I thought maybe he was taking in air due to using the shield so we got a lactation consultant to come by and see if we could get a latch back. My boobs were still getting engorged before every feeding, which made it hard, but he did it. We stopped with the shield for about 8 hours and had to use it again. He would take forever to latch and just cry. He would cry during the feeding (I assume to a overactive letdown based on what the LC told me) and now he was screaming (due to pain, we now realize). This didn't happen every feeding at this point, but still no fun to watch. This was also about the time my mom went back home so it was me and Jase alone all day, a screaming baby can really wear on you FAST! I would call Scott is tears because I just didn't know what to do. Then he started to spit up in between feeding (normal) and would cry every-time that happened (Not normal). I also started to noticed his stools were watery with mucous and he was having multiply blow outs a day that once again he was crying through. We took our concerns to our doctor who completely ignored my poop concerns and said the spitting up & pain was probably due to reflux. I did not want to put Jase on medication so she suggested keeping him upright after feedings for 30 min. Well we were already doing that since we couldn't put him down anyways due to the screaming. I had also been making my diet very bland as well as cutting out dairy since I've heard a lot of babies have issue with it. The doctor did not seem concerened at all becasue Jase was thriving, gaining weight and growing, which was reassuring!
We continued with my bland diet/keeping him upright and elevated his bed for a couple days and things seemed to get worse. He would eat, scream and finally sleep, but not for very long before he was hungry again. This got me so exhausted, I basically stopped eating (maybe had a snack a day) and was wearing thin fast. Something was not right and needed to be fixed. While this was going on I had also confided in other mommies to help me get through this time, and found that some of his symptoms aligned with a protein allergy. I hated seeing my baby in pain, and it was so heartbreaking knowing it was most likely my milk casing the pain. I was SO against feeding my baby formula, but I was at a loss at this point and something needed to change. I was going down hill very fast. (Bring on the back in forth in my head) We called the doctor again for advice and asked if we should try a hypoallergenic formula. Our main doctor didn't seem to think this would help, but another doctor said it wouldn't hurt to try.
The doctors gave us two kinds of formulas to try, Nutramagin (spelling?) and Alimentum. We tried the Nutramagin first with no avail. He wouldn't take the bottle and I ended up nursing him, which resulted in crying of course after. We decided to start fresh in the morning with the Alimentum. There is no way to know if it was working unless it was consistent formula for a couple days. I did not want to loose my milk supply incase this wasn't the issue so I would pump as well. I thought I was tired before, that was like double feedings (I don't know how parents with twins make it through the day)!
Jase almost immediately started doing better. He was basically a completely different baby. During his awake time he was not crying/screaming every second! Now this had a crazy effect on me. I mean my baby was happy now, but he was not getting my milk. This was and still is REALLY hard on me. I continued to pump as I was holding on to "maybe he'll be able to take my milk again." With that thought I tried to nurse him again after a couple days. Now, this was a good and bad thing. The good was HE HAD A GREAT LATCH!! I was so happy, text Scott and told him, maybe we could go back to nursing. Jase stayed latched, without the shield for an entire feed. The bad, he was almost immediately in pain after. Text Scott again soon after, never mind. It was official, this baby was going to be formula fed.
I had a REALLY hard time with this decision. I wanted to breast feed so badly and didn't want to give up hope, but Jase was doing SO MUCH better with the formula. I think the biggest factor in this "guilt" was that breast milk is best for baby, and from what I read and would hear formula is some kind of poison. (I blame society for that one) Don't get me wrong, I still think Breast is Best, but what I had to realize was it want working best for us this time. I was a BIG MESS throughout this process and looking back probably on the verge of depression dealing with everything going on. Your natural instinct is to nurse your baby, and this was something I was no longer going to be able to do.
Jase has now been on formula for about a month and doing GREAT! He is still consistently growing like he was on breast milk, which was very comforting for me to hear. You always hear formula fed babies are bigger/fatter then breast milk babies and since Jase was already growing faster the normal, this really worried me, BUT he's consistent!
What I have realized about this whole experience so far is that what makes a baby healthy/happy is how/what you feed them, where they sleep, ect, but that they're being taken care of and nourished. Since we have switched I am able to bond/play with Jase when he's awake and cuddle him when he asleep. No longer being AS sleep deprived (due to his issues) I can function to be the best I can be for him. I've also realized you will second guess yourself almost all the time, but that mommy instinct will kick in and you'll just do what feels right for what ever situation you're dealing with.
If you're reading this blog and you're a mom I hope you take something away from this that will help you or encourage you. As long as baby is happy and healthy you're doing it right, only you know what's best for your baby. I also hope that you realize just because something was easy for you doesn't mean it's easy for someone else. My perfect picture of how I would raise Jase is ever changing, but it's still PERFECT for us!
Thanks to all the mommies that help encourage/comfort me during this parenting process! Hopefully I can be there for all the new to be mommies coming about too!
Stay Tuned...
