Our Long Road to Breastfeeding: part 1 (from his caringbridge)

This entry is not made to cause guilt, hurt, shame. Some will likely feel it is controversial, others will dismiss it as myth entirely. That's fine, but for those who want to understand the link, the evidence, and how this ties in with my son , please keep reading

The Hospital Days

During the very first hours and days of my son's life, he could not be with me due to his fragile condition. I could not pump milk due to the medication they had shot into my system to keep my pre-eclampsia from causing seizures. I could not even sit up for the first 24 hours following my c-section. I had to wear compression stockings because I was unable to move. I had a catheter. It was impossible to even go to the nursery to see my son. So, instead of being latched at breast following his birth, he was whisked off in one direction and I in another. Like two ships passing in the night, only a brief moment of recognition. His first 24 hours he was given formula in a feeding tube. They had already determined he could not take a bottle and was exhausting himself trying. On August 1st they brought in a breastpump and lactation consultant. I began pumping little bits of colostrum for him. They would give this first before following it with formula. In addition to the feeding tube he was on an IV drip with glucose and a broad spectrum antibiotic. They thought perhaps he had an infection, when the magnesium should have been out of his system and he still wasn't *sprucing up*..

On August 1st I took my first steps, was able to have my catheter removed, and be wheeled to his nursery window. I was not allowed in yet to hold him, I was still weak and wobbly. I continued to pump every 2 hours and pass his milk to the staff. By that evening I was pumping 30ccs some of the time. I was making enough that he could not have the formula every time.

On August 2nd I walked to the nursery on my own and was able to go in with my husband and we held his fingers and touched his feet for the first time. Up to that point, all the touch he received was by hospital staff. That evening he was stable enough to come out of the warmer and I got to actually hold him for a brief few minutes.

On August 3rd they allowed us to try giving him bottles of my pumped milk. He had a minimum required feed amount, and whatever he did not take in the bottle was fed through the feeding tube. We continued on like this 2 more days.

On August 4th they removed his feeding tube. He was warm enough to not need the warming bed as long as he was bundled, and his sugar and breathing had normalized. They brought him into my room. I admit it, after enduring all this I was terrified. I tried to latch him that afternoon with the help of lactation. They told me his mouth was just too small and he was just too little yet. I cried, but later that night by myself, I was able to latch him. He nursed for the very first time. It lasted about 2 minutes before he fell asleep. But those two minutes were enough to give me hope. I continued to offer the breast, but he was just tiring out too fast. I stopped trying and resigned myself to pump for him until he could latch.

At midnight on August 5th they circumcised him in preparation for going home soon. He began having cold spells and oxygen issues again. He had only been in our room for about 12 hours. He didn't come back after the procedure. At noon that day, the NICU staff had a consult about my son. Not long after, on the day we were supposed to be going home, we were moved to the NICU. I cried. I was terrified.

The monitors went back on. The feeding tube went back in. The bed was now an isolette with windows where we could slip our hands in to take his temperature, touch him, and change him. I went home and tried to sleep. Leaving him there alone was the most difficult thing I ever did. I cried and cried until I finally fell asleep. But I had 2 other kids and I had already been in the hospital 3 weeks counting the time before the emergency c-section was performed. They needed me too, and Silas needed me to be rested.

Silas was two weeks old when he came home. We were finally bottle feeding tolerably and gaining weight slowly. I saw a lactation consultant for the second time before we came home and was told the same thing: he was too small and too weak still.