I'm not going to lie or sugar coat it the first three months of C's life has been rough. I'm not saying I don't LOVE my baby, do i ever love her. But what i'm saying is what i expected and what is reality is completely different! The past 2 - 3 weeks i've been really struggling with thinking about supplementing formula some. The guilt i feel/felt is enormous. I think breastmilk is best for babies but my sanity and stress were going and gaining strength. I broke down to ben one night, that was a relief in itself, b/c i was ashamed/scared to tell him how i'd been feeling. These are some of the things i talked to him about....
i feel like she's not getting enough milk towards the end of the day
you never really know how much she is getting
i'm a slave - she eats every two to 3 hours about 40 minutes each time! whew!
cant be away from her very long unless i pump all day and then it's just one bottle!
don't like feeding her in front of people
feel isolated if we do go somewhere and i go feed her in another room
blah, blah, blah
a lot of those are selfish reasons. but for me to remain sane i needed to quit pumping. I do it once before bed and that's it now. before i would pump one while she ate the other! tiresome.
We gave her her first formula bottle on saturday. i felt bad. at first. now i feel awesome! we are looking into organic formula too. woot!
2 comments:
OMG, I totally know how you feel. I felt the same way with Darcy. I was shocked at how depressed I got just from breastfeeding. Sure, I enjoyed the closeness on occassion, but I felt like she was smothering me. Plus I really wasn't a big milk producer. So I too got worried that she wasn't getting enough milk, because she wasn't gaining much weight. So we started supplementing too. It helped a ton. Then she eventually just weaned herself off the boob around 9 months, and was strictly formula.
Don't feel bad about supplementing. <3
xoxo
Amy
I hear ya sister...and don't worry...every nursing mom feels the same way at some point. I from the beginning didn't produce enough milk and I had to supplement from very early on. He still got MOST of his nourishment from me but the occasional bottle is fine!!! She's still getting all the good stuff from you! Seriously, I've been there and had the guilt and all that...felt like a failure for giving him formula but that is ridiculous! Take care of yourself and give the boob a break!!! Lol (just my opinion b/c I HATE when other mothers tell me what to do!!!) XOXO
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