What should my husband tell people about my breasts?

[macneil]

After six weeks of trying to get my baby to latch on, I feel further away, not closer. I spend more than 3 hours a day pumping, and hours sterilising the pump equipment, all the bottles, preparing feed, feeding her, burping her because bottles make her gassy, etc, and have absolutely no time to do anything.

Meanwhile, female colleagues, friends with babies, are asking my husband lots of questions about how we're getting on. He knows I'm very sensitive about all this, and don't want to admit a) she's living on formula b) my breasts are strange and that's why she won't breastfeed c) we're fractious and exhausted and depressed. If he says something like 'I'm afraid I don't want to talk about that' he'll sound weird, but he knows I don't want him to share all of our problems with people. But I feel like people should also cut him a little slack - he didn't take any paternity leave because he's an academic and no one can cover for him, and he's taking on some of the non-stop bottle factory slack, doing all the shopping etc, while working full time.

I wish this sort of thing weren't just something people talked about - it is my breasts, after all. I thought we'd be able to keep it from my parents in law, but obviously I had to keep vanishing every 3 hours to pump, and then reappearing with small amounts of breastmilk which we'd then decant, and obviously there were bottles everywhere. Fortunately they didn't talk to me about it, they were very understanding. But I wish people didn't have to know.

Oh wow, I'm a bit overwhelmed. The fantastic posts are too numerous to namecheck individually, but as it's right here and particularly relevant, I want to thank Jenny, whose experience I wish I could have, as I've had almost all of it. I don't at the moment want to give up - the only thing that's really hard is the 'sleep when she sleeps' advice goes out the window, because there's so much to get on with after she's settled, and the time between her settling and the next pump is often seconds. Apart from being tired, just for the sheer heck of it, it seems worth it to try and get a few mls of breast milk into her just in case it does give her some antibodies she wouldn't otherwise have had.

I haven't been trying her every feed, because the dr said only to try once a day. So maybe that's something I could do.

As for telling people, which was the original question, it was because my husband came back that day with a fresh round of breastfeeding confidences and tales, and hadn't been able to answer, and I think for female friends it's maybe a way of engaging in fun, frank talk with a bloke that they can't normally do, and most women can breastfeed so it's not something people think of asking gingerly about. I agree it isn't anyone's business and there are polite ways of skipping the question, and I agree that coming clean is also a good way of sharing and getting good advice - we just found out a friend of ours had trouble for a few weeks, and obviously they didn't tell us at the time, and only by telling them did they tell us. It is very hard not to blame yourself when your nipples don't stay out (and I think my mum has been hardest about this, she says, quite a lot, 'if only you had normal nipples that stayed out - the poor little thing just needs something she can feel in her mouth' or 'if only you'd inherited my nipples', and I think she has no idea how agonising this is).

The posts here have been amazing, and made me feel much less alone. I am equally stunned and admiring of Jabberwocky and all who expressed for many months to a year. Thank you all so much.

What I can't understand is why women like me weren't Darwinned out of existence centuries ago. It seems like a simple enough thing - can't get milk out of nipple, no new generation with same nipples.

Anyway, here's hoping she gets the hang of it, and here's to being a mad old lush for two weeks when/if I finally give up. Many thanks xx

macneil - theres loads of excellent advice on here but I felt I couldn't leave without giving you some support. Firstly IMO trying to feed her once a day from the boob isn't enough. IF you want to continue BFing (and your a very strong person to still want to after all that expressing) I would say at every feed over her a boob, I would do boob, then EBM then formula top up if needed. I did this with DD1 just after she was born I believe by offering the boob first at each feed gradually she was taking more from me and less EBM (we only used formula once though) until the EBM went completely.

Lots of skin to skin contact is brilliant too just lie in bed with her snuggled up your naked chest and see if she has a root.

Would also echo trying to find a breastfeeding group near you, talking to another BFing mum is great.

As for "women like you" don't be so hard on yourself woman!!! Years ago all our female relatives would have been BFing too, would have been there to help out when things got rough maybe with a bit of wet nursing, you wouldn't have been expected to be doing 100 other things just feeding your baby. There's nothing wrong with your boobs or your body, you've just had a rough start that's all, some crack it early some need a bit of help, please offer her a boob constantly if need be, chances are she will crack it too. Please don't let this cloud your first few months with your precious daughter.

FWIW parenting is all about guilt, I'm trying to wean 12 month old DD2 off the boob right now and although I know it's right for us I feel so guilty.

sorry I meant offer her a boob

If anyone asks say it's going fine, and if you have bottles about say it's EBM if you have to.

Have you got a dishwasher? And one of those little baskets that you put little bits in in the dw, to stop them floating around? And can you find £20 (CAN equivalent!) for an extra pump? Cos then you can throw the pumps in the dw, and thats 2 lots of washing and sterilizing done (dw is a giant steriliser). And the rest of the day you can do two lots of washing up together IYSWIM. Less rushing frantically from baby to pump to sterilizer.

And I second the advice to get you and baby half-naked and cuddle up at each feeding time. Even if you then give her a bottle after she has sniffed your nipple! It really works to get them more interested.

Someone once commented that I bottlefed like a breastfeeder - snuggling baby up really close to my boob I think. You don't have to miss out on all that.

Sorry if I'm bombarding you with more advice. The nice thing about MN is you can pick the bits you like.

Hi there,

Just thought I would add my experiences to the thread. My baby was born 6 weeks premature and was in hospital for three weeks, during which he was on a drip and unable to breastfeed. I spent most of each day expressing with the aim of getting him breastfeeding as soon as possible. He had other ideas and would not/could not latch on at all. We consulted a lactation consultant, several neonatal midwives, la leche league etc etc to no avail. I spent a lot of time in tears and we reached a point where we had to give the poor little one some of my expressed milk in a bottle.

At this point I decided to give up trying to bf but carried on expressing and bottlefeeding. I expressed every three hours for three months and he received only my milk during this time. I continued to feel guilty about not being able to bf. I come from a very middle-class family where every baby has been breastfed and there were some very disapproving looks when we gave him a bottle of EBM even.

Anyway, flash forward. My baby is now 4 1/2 months. I gave up the night-time expressing at about 3 months as I was too tired and Joe had started sleeping through anyway. I introduced some formula at about three months. I felt very quilty about this at first, but I now don't as he is clearly healthy and thriving. Joe has also finally learnt to breastfeed. Hurray! One day it just clicked for him and me. I would recommend Clare Byam-Cook's book 'What to expect when you're breastfeeding and what if you can't' as it helped me to see where I was going wrong. We now have a peculiar system involving some EBM, some breastfeeding and some formula. Not what I envisaged, but it works!

Anyway, just wanted to say hang in there and I understand how you may be feeling. Personally, I think that the person who gave me the hardest time was me!

Hi macneil

I think you have had some great advice on this htread - I especailly agree about chucking stuff in the dishwasher and having extra sets of stuff so you don;t run out. Anything at all to make life easier.

What I also wanted to say was this...

life in teh first few weeks of having a newborn is like you described, regardless of how you feed!

Having no time to do anything is..well..normal!

Baby feeds, you wind it, change it, top the feed up, they sleep, you whip frantically around the house trying to get something done like wash up, put the next lot of laundry on, cook dinner, baby wakes up, then you start all over again!

But whatever your feeding choices, it does get an awful lot easier...everyone will tell you.

I think you have done really well and in your shoes I would definitely have started FF by now.

I think anything you can do to continue to feed your baby at least some of your milk is a fantastic thing.

Please, please don;t beat yourself up about all of this.

In a blink of an eye your DD will be taking her first steps and saying her first words.

And none of this will be important any more.

oh mcneil
youa re fab and you have done so well.

I have got a dishwasher, but since yesterday discovered how to double pump with my spare attachments, so I have to wash them both immediately after pumping, ready for use in less than 3 hours. They're in there right now, though. But double pumping is going to save a lot of time. Everyone is quite right to say it'd be the same thing with breastfeeding - you still have to get up in the night, you're still exhausted all the time, and there is no easy way of getting food into them. Don't feel guilty, Sterny, you're doing better than me by giving exclusively breastmilk, I never manage more than 30-40mls by the fourth pump of the day. I've ordered Clare Byam-Cook's DVD, should be here in a week.

Anyway, opened up thread to say, this morning, dick of a husband told his running group - ie, a bunch of old men he goes running with on Saturdays - that I wasn't breastfeeding, as an excuse for getting away early so he'd be back in time to see the Arsenal. I feel the sensitivity here has been utterly wasted on him.

Oh, macneil, I think I love you. Esp "What I can't understand is why women like me weren't Darwinned out of existence centuries ago. It seems like a simple enough thing - can't get milk out of nipple, no new generation with same nipples."

(I had all that and the same thing with specs - can't see where you're going, whoops, there's another one squished by a mammoth!)

Haven't read whole thread but you sound like a fab mummy and your DD will have a wonderful life with or without breast milk.

mwaah

can i also suggest that you find an old bra that you hate and wreck it by cutting holes where your ludicrous Creationist nips would be?

one slit right down the front to the middle of each cup is good, but see what you think works best with your bras.

then bra on, jam the pump things in, safety pin the hole closed to keep them in the right place and get pumping. after a short while you can let go of the pumps as a vacuum will have set up, leaving you free to eat biscuits, drink cups of tea and MN.

i take it you know all the cheesy 'look at a photo of your baby' stuff? it actually does make a difference. just stick it in the corner of the computer screen, so as not to interfere too much with maximum mning.

sooooo thrilled that you have a dishwasher. i only got one when we had dd, sometimes i think i love the dishwasher almost as much as her... i have been known to blow it a kiss goodnight.

Okay, I realise I am way too new to say something so weird, but having looked down at myself double pumping, and having just read H007's last post, I thought to myself, 'this whole strapping pumps on and having them hang there thing is so ludicrous and hideous that there just have to be some nutters who find it sexy', and wrote 'porn "breast milk expression"' into google.

Loads of hits. I didn't click on any.

or maybe you're way too weird to say something so new?

and thank you for reminding me to revert from my new year name, been meaning to do it for a few days now.

god, that's right, mmj. i hadn't noticed that before...
what possible thinking was there behind telling you only to try once a day? did they explain?

macneil - you definitely need to have your baby near the breast more than once a day. Try and access a breastfeeding advisor close to you - there will be one.

Try skin-to-skin contact - that can encourage your baby to root. I am not suggesting you try and feed her - just let her enjoy the experience. She may they start to look to be fed. Babies do not nipple feed - they breast feed so flat nipples osn't the main problem. If you get support from a breastfeeding advisor they can show you how to latch her on. Nipple shields can make the problem worse.

If you are expressing every 3 hours and not getting much milk you could try taking Domperidone 10mg, 3 times a day for at least 10 days. That is what we give mothers who have supply problems when expressing for their babies.

Do definitely need more support than your doctor.

have you seen this site ?

or this one?

You will be able to find a breastfeeding supporter near you in the links on the site.

Good luck.

Why don't you want to share? They sound lovely and you sound like you could do with all the help you can get.

mcneil, I never used the hands free pumping straps b/c you get a lot more by using breast compression while pumping.

HTH

"the only thing that's really hard is the 'sleep when she sleeps' advice goes out the window, because there's so much to get on with after she's settled, "

OMG - I did this and if there is another one I am so going to bloody well do it by the book. YOU NEED REST!

Me too, MT. The only problem is that with the second one you have to get the first one settled at the same time I sooo wish I had been better at resting w/ds1 when I had the chance,

oh yeah. forgot about that. doh!

rofl @ Monkeytrousers in superior mother-of-two-already sort of way

[grrr]