My baby is 8 weeks old now and I have only successfully breastfed him about 10 times. A slight bit of background- I have bipolar disorder and as a result, I take medication which makes me very drowsy. It means I need to sleep, every day, as both a side effect and the crucial ingredient of me staying well. So I can't EBF. My husband does at least 50% of childcare and has given up work for it.
We had a traumatic birth- I had a long latent labour and was in active labour for 36 hours. We got an infection, had EMCS- I hadn't slept for 5 days by this point. We were separated. He went to SCBU. I saw him again an hour later and with help we managed to breastfeed. And it was lovely.
During labour I had 11 vaginal examinations and twice there was prep for a crash section. I was pretty traumatised by all this and sick of being touched. I had shitty postnatal support breastfeeding and only managed it a few times with a LOT of help, with a very screamy, anxious baby who kicked me a lot on the scar, with people shoving my boobs into his screaming mouth, and I eventually told them to leave me alone. This was written up as me being, "chaotic" and the mental health nurse was called by the postnatal midwives. I was fine- this was a normal reaction to complete exhaustion- but it made me very unwilling to ask for help again. It put the fear of god into me that if I expressed any sort of frustration or upset, I would be judged as being mad, rather than just a stressed, exhausted new mum. My husband, who had stayed with us for those 5 days, was furious.
I did try, I went to a breastfeeding cafe and got support there. She said it seemed like his urge to latch might be less because of our interrupted post birth bonding and to do lots of skin to skin to encourage him. I felt like shit, like this magic window was gone and we'd never get it back. I did skin to skin, baths etc, always had good milk supply and was pumping him bottles but increasingly falling into depression and dreading him waking up and screaming and us struggling to feed. Then my sister came to stay, and a family member unexpectedly died so we had to travel out of the country, and opportunities for skin to skin and gentle encouragement went, and my milk supply dried up, and now it's gone.
I feel a lot of regret about it. He is thriving and happy but I wanted to breastfeed. But I don't have the same resources as "normal" people in a way- I CAN'T do the all day feeding thing, I can't do all feeds, and I found pumping while holding him miserable and difficult and felt it was beginning to interrupt our bond. I can't do any night care once I've taken my medicaton- it's dangerous. And for that reason, I also can't co-sleep. My family live overseas, we have no support.
So there is this stuff against us- and yet I wish I had tried harder and feel like a failure for not doing so. Everyone said happy mum happy baby etc and that I wouldn't be able to do any parenting at all if I became ill, but I feel like I have been selfish.
Is relactation incredibly difficult? Will I just have to pump constantly and have him at the breast constantly too? Does fenugreek help?
Sorry for the essay and TIA!