About to give up on breastfeeding

[carang]

just wanted to add one thing:

if you REALLY want to quit, then quit. you will NOT be/ARE NOT a bad mother if you choose to formula feed. please, only follow all of our advice if you TRULY want to breastfeed.

it is equally important that everyone is on the same page, that you are getting enough rest and that you are comfortable with your decision.

also, remember that if you are feeling a little down or even depressed, you should seek help IMMEDIATELY. PPD is not a laughing matter.

 

[Gataloca]

Thanks a lot for your advices. The reason I've been waking up the baby is because he would sleep for more than 4 or 5 hours in a row, even at day time. He would then wake up over hungry and feed for long time, even like 2 hours, after which he would be overtired and cry until we top up with formula. At least this has happened when we first came home. According to pediatrician, a bf baby should eat every 2 1/2 to 3 hours, so we didn't think eating every 5 or 6 hours was appropriate, and ended up waking him every 4 hours if he doesn't wake up on his own. Also thought that getting sucked only every 5 or 6 hours may not be good for building my milk supply.

My concern is not really the weight gain or the wet/soiled diapers (he pops and pees on every feed). The problem is that he never settle down, unless he is full.... and that has been hard since yesterday. Don't know if it is just a growth spurt, since my baby is just 2 week old, but he has been crying a lot, asking for milk.... he has refused the pacifier, so I guess it is not just sucking needs. It has been harder to put him to sleep also. He would wake up and cry and cry.. then his little head would turn to one side, showing sign of hunger :-(

I have been putting him on my breast a lot since yesterday, and putting him on his bed when he falls asleep.... but I am also afraid that he may get accustomed to this treatment, and eventually become over attached to me and would seek conform on my breast for everything.

Sorry for all the doubts, but I am a first time mum.... and yes, I am a little bit depressed.... My parents are here for 3 months to "help me" with the baby, but they have turned into a nightmare, and are driving us crazy. I have pressure coming from my parents, my husband, and the baby....

Also, I don't want to give up on giving my baby breast milk.... but I was considering some other methods, like expressing..... but heard that pumping up may eventually dry up my milk supply...

 

[shuchisingh]

Hi Gataloca,

gosh you remind me of mt first days as a mom... the only difference is my husband and family were just lovely and a big help.

everything you are feeling or thinking is completely normal. i agree with everyone here - LLL would be a great help. also, try reading something like dr. spock - it was alomost a bible for us. very non-judgemental and informative.

all the best !

 

[carang]

PLEASE, call LLL.... they will help you.

if your parents are not helping, maybe send them to china for a "break" or even macau for a weekend without them?

forget what EVERYONE else is telling you that you should be doing. YOU are the baby's mother, if you can take the time to listen to your baby without everyone else's interference, your mothering instincts will kick in. baby's WILL NOT let themselves starve. your baby WILL TELL YOU when he's hungry. YOU need to have faith in yourself and your abilities to care for him.

we are here if you need a shoulder to cry on.

 

[wenyihsu]

Hang in there! Breastfeeding is VERY tough. And no one can warn you enough about what you will be going through but like everyone else has said, it does get better and easier. But if you decide to supplement with formula or quit all together, that's fine too. It is important to provide for your baby as best as you can, but you also need to make sure that you are happy, not stressing too much and able to enjoy motherhood. For my 1st, I exclusively breastfed for 6 months. For my 2nd, I only breastfed her for 2 weeks and then ended up pumping everything out and just feed her from a bottle. She is the most horrible eater - every feed would take at least 1 hour. And then on top of which I was hardly spending with my 1st since I was constantly feeding. Anyways, so I made the decision that I would just pump everything out and since we have help at home, they can help me feed my 2nd if I was in the middle of something with my 1st. Anyways, to make a long story short, it is completely doable if you decide you want to exclusively express. In the beginning I was pumping 8 times a day to build up my milk supply and once my supply was very consistent, I very gradually dropped down to pumping 4 times a day - and I was producing more than she was eating so I was able to build up a freezer stash. I just recently weaned (2nd is turning 6 months in 2 weeks) and it was a very conscience decision to stop so I had to gradually drop pumps. I have enough breastmilk in the freezer to last her another 3-4 weeks. Anyways, if you are interested in exclusively expressing, send me a PM. I can share my experience with you in more detail. But I do want to warn you - expressing is not easy also!

 

[oi0io]

If your baby is sleeping a 6 hour stretch, then you should be pumping every 2 hours during his resting period so that you can keep building your milk supply. To me it was way too tiring to pump every 2 hours and I gave up. For a the first 2 months, I only had enough milk to satisfy my baby in the morning when the breasts are at its fullest. After his morning feed, I gave him formula the rest of the day. At least he would still have some benefits of breast milk and at least I know he'll be full from formula the rest of the day. Now my baby is exclusively formula fed.

I would love to have exclusively breastfed my baby, unfortunately I just didn't have enough milk to satisfy my baby even when I drank fish soup, lots of water and ate oatmeal.

 

[carang]

you didn't have enough milk to feed your baby BECAUSE you gave your baby formula. i am in no way knocking women who decide to give formula for whatever reason... that is up to them and none of my business. but if you say you didn't have enough milk, it's because you gave formula. once your milk is established, then your breasts shouldn't feel full...

i was very lucky. i produced so much milk it was sometimes like scenes from a comedy... milk squirting, literally, across the room if baby became unlatched as i was experiencing "let-down"! the number of times i had to give the baby a bath after a feed because they'd been covered in milk... in the hair, up the nose, in the eyes, even in the ears! LOL!

i even experienced let-downs when MY DOG cried or whined! LOL! an ddon't get me started on the difficulty of staying clean while getting out of the shower!

what i'm trying to say, is that each of us have/had our own issues. you shouldn't feel pressure one way or the other. often, i think the biggest pressure comes from ourselves! we do all this reading that says, "breast is best" and while it is most likely better for baby, it's not always better for the family or for mum's sanity.

you've got a myriad of shoulders to cry on here if you need it!

 

[jvn]

I would agree with other posters, if parents aren't helpful then thank them for all their help and try to send them away for a break.

We couldn't get bf established and I expressed for nearly seven months, it was tough in the beginning, pumping every two hours to get the milk supply but after a while that dropped to about 4 times a day - just wanted to say it is possible to pump and have the milk supply BUT it's the worst of all worlds as you don't get the experience of bf or the comparative convenience of formula - hey ho, it was my decision.

Just to reiterate, we've all been there in those early days, unsure and not really knowing what's going on but you know your baby best, not your paediatrician. My baby slept for 10 hours through the first day home from the hospital and I wondered whether to wake him, I didn't and he established a pattern of sleeping around 7 or 8 hours every night, it really didn't do him any harm, if you are sure that You want to wake him then that's fine but don't do it because someone else told you to.

Really don't worry about bad habits now like feeding to sleep - it's still such early days, get to know each other and find out what works for both of you then you can worry about stuff like that, it's just adding extra pressure you don't need. My experience is that you won't need to worry about things like that becoming really hard to break until they are six months plus... so not something to even think about now.

And again, like the other posters, bf takes time and effort and will not work so well and may not work at all if you supplement with formula, my friends who did get bf established said that it took up to a couple of months to get the hang of it and a couple more months to really start enjoying it and finding it 'easy'. Everybody is different but don't expect too much of yourself. And, yes, plenty of babies do just fine on formula if that is what you need to do - it doesn't make you a bad mum.

Best of luck - trust yourself and your instinct, you will know what is best for you and your baby.

 

[banane76]

Don't give up. You're still in the early days and your body is still establishing the milk for your baby. If your baby is sleeping in long stretches, make sure you're either pumping or feeding every 3 hours so your body knows that it needs to make milk. Once your milk is established though, it will get easier! Call LLL or even Hulda from Annerley or Yvonne Heavyside of FamilyZone. They will come to your house and help you out and answer any questions. This is the time where your body is trying to figure out how much baby needs. Your baby suckling signals your body to make more milk. My baby is not 7 months old and mostly breastfed. We just started to introduce some formula in the evening top-up feed at 6 months, but I'm still pumping at night and if I'm at work.

 

[carey]

Another great thread. I will print it out for my reference later.

It looks like your experience is similar to many mothers who posted here. It sounded just like mine. I gave birth to my first at the Union and they encourage mix-feeding there. Not that there was anything wrong with it. I wish there was someone there to tell me how hard it was to get breastfeeding established. Well, I probably would not have taken it to my heart until I was in it and knowing how hard it was.

All my helpers (confinement lady, aunt and parents) pressure me to supplement formula. Like several mothers here, I resolved it to exclusive pumping in the end. It does work. I pump till my bud was 7 month old. My OB told me that pumping would not produce enough but she was wrong in this case. I pumped every two hours during the day and two times in the night. I lost lots of weigh and hair (don’t think it's to do with pumping, but it grew back later) during that first 7 month. Once I stopped, I was my normal self again.

I think my experience of trying to Bf and pumping comes down to:

* it does take 4 to 6 weeks to establish supply. sucking or pumping increase supply.
* I would not worry about getting used to fall asleep om the breast like one mother mentioned. I slept trained my son when he was 7 month. He doesn't need aid (dummy) to fall asleep now
* I could be wrong, but if you worry that baby sleeping 6 hours and not sucking would reduce your supple, I would pump one to two times for 10 minutes each side to build it up.
* the Sarah from LLL gave me lots of support through email and on the phone. Like many suggests here, they are very helpful.
* I would only get helpers who would listen to my instruction when I become to a second time mother. My first helper (a confinement lady was very domineering and never had experience with mother who wants to bf)

I wish I could give you more suggestions. But I know that when fatigue, frustration and agony set it I might not be able to bf exclusively either for my second one. If not, I would just go with pumping too so that I can have time with my first when some mothers suggested here.

Good luck and please keep us posted.