Breastfeeding and Pumping, Pumping, Pumping, Pumping, Pumping....

My mum coaching me through my first sucessful latch with Phoebe at 1 week old.

I have unresolved emotions about my breastfeeding experience and I think a lot of mothers do.  It’s not like I think about it all the time (I have moved on with my life!) but when I reflect on the first 3 months of their lives and my battle to breastfeed two premature babies I do get emotional.  

I had some obstacles to successful breastfeeding.  This is my list of “premature baby” breastfeeding issues:

• My babies were unable to suck until they were 3 days old
• They did not successfully latch until they were 7 days old
• My babies needed help latching for the several weeks (you have to kinda do it yourself, often several times!)
• My milk did not come in until they were 8 days old because I had to bring it in with an electric breast pump
• I only ever had enough milk to feed one baby even though I tried natural medicines, drugs, extra pumping, etc.
• I only had half an hour per child to change their nappy, breastfeed, burp, bottle top up, burp and resettle to sleep while they were in Special Care.
• I was only allowed to gradually increase breastfeeding from 1 feed a day to 5 feeds a day between 1 week and 3 weeks old.  Premature babies find breastfeeding absolutely exhausting and are really not up for breastfeeding around the clock.
• The first time they ever received all their feeds at the breast was at 3 weeks old and even then I could only offer the breast then top up with formula in a bottle because I didn’t have a good supply.

This is my list of “reflux baby” breastfeeding issues that presented at 7 weeks:

• Baby would scream and arch back mid feed
• Baby would quickly pull off (taking half my nipple with them!)
• I would cry every feed because it hurt me so much and it absolutely killed me to hear them scream in pain.

As I’ve mentioned in a previous post - my nipples were so badly damaged and I was so emotionally and physically drained that I gave up breastfeeding at 8 weeks.  I will always feel guilty that the day they developed reflux was the day I missed a pumping session (our first outing with our babies!) and they were given more formula than breast milk.  I know reflux can develop in breastfed babies but I also know reflux is more prevalent in formula feed babies.  I wonder if I had enough milk for both would they have gone through all that pain?

I then gave up pumping at 11 weeks because they developed RSV and were admitted back to hospital for a week.  This was extremely stressful for me and I had a baby lying on my chest 24/7 in an upright position so she could breathe.  I have written about this in a previous post about sick babies. I know what some of you are thinking..."why didn't she start pumping again when she got home?".  The thought did occur to me but honestly - they were very, very, very demanding babies and I was barely coping with the hours of crying as it was.  Maybe I could have tried to bring in my supply again at around 5 months?? Maybe??  But I tried to pop them on the boob and they'd already forgotten how to breastfeed and so I would've been pumping every 2-3 hours again and I did not enjoy that the first time!

I guess the point of this post is to let people know that breastfeeding twins is more than just trying to latch two babies at one time.  There are many obstacles to overcome that many people would be absolutely clueless about.