Starting a breastfeeding journey... Again
Thanks for hopping over from HiBabyBlog and welcome to my post for the Keep Britain Breastfeeding Scavenger Hunt Day 2 Positive Public Feeding we have over £700 worth of breastfeeding and baby goodies up for grabs including prizes from Snoob with a breastfeeding scarf, a goodie bag from Forever Patricia and a breastfeeding necklace from Booby and the Bead. Full details of the Grand Prize can be found here and all entries to be completed via the Rafflecopter at the bottom of this post.
Breastfeeding, I've started this journey twice now and although I've not stopped either one, I often talk about the start begging when Kairi was born, but really we had a new start when Naminé was born too, so today I'm going to talk about that.
It was the start of feeding a new tiny baby, I'd done it before and was still feeding (Kairi had fed 4 hours before Naminé was born) so how hard could it be? I mean, I was a breastfeeding peer supporter, I help people feed! So I took that tiny baby and I latched her onto my breast, she was less than an hour old, but she knew what she was doing, she fed perfectly. For the next 24 hours she fed many times during the day (and slept through the night, even though I was awake waiting for her to feed!)
However day 2 came and my breasts started to change shape (due to my milk coming in), with this came the pain. The shape of my breasts changing meant Naminé just couldn't latch properly, every feed hurt and the hours started to feel like days. By the end of that first week I didn't want to feed her anymore, I was dreading her waking up and with my post natal depression I didn't even want to hold her. Which was insane, because I was more that happy to continue feeding her sister.
At around the 10 day mark, my milk started to settle a bit and Naminé could finally latch properly! I knew we had made it! Feeding was sometimes still painful (especially when trying to tandem feed and not quite getting the position right!)
I suffer from hyper lactation (which basically means I make excess milk) and I know that sounds fantastic for most! But for those like myself who have it, it generally means a very painful let down and a baby who posits after every feed... Not fun! At 6 months those things have started to calm down now (although we still have posit at least once a day and my let down can still be quite painful) but we've made it through the hard parts.
Now for the future! Kairi is 2 1/4 and Naminé is 6 months, they both feed on demand and I get to share so many happy memories with them, I can comfort them when ever they need it and through tandem feeding I've managed to give them an amazing bond :)
What's your high and low of the start of your breastfeeding journey? Is there anything you'd do different next time?
For more positive feeding in public experiences please hop on over to Life With Baby Kicks where you can gain further entries into the grand prize draw. Full terms and conditions can be found on the Keeping Britain Breastfeeding website. UK residents only.
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