I don’t breastfeed, and I couldn’t be happier about it. Don’t get me wrong. My son, Ryan, still gets breastmilk, just not directly from the breast. I do what’s called Exclusive Pumping or EPing (which I still never refer to it as that). I use a Spectra double electric breast pump to pump milk about 6 to 8 times a day. This was no easy decision for me either. It took me 8 weeks, 3 infections, and a hungry baby to finally decide that pumping was the best for all three of us.

The first two weeks

Since the first time Ryan nursed in the hospital, just shortly after he was born, we both had issues with breastfeeding. Because I had inverted nipples, Ryan had a hard time latching. Lactation Consultants at the hospital quickly got us using a Medela nipple shield and things seemed to be going fine.

As we expected, Ryan lost a little bit of weight after leaving the hospital, so we worried that I wasn’t producing enough milk to help him grow. To try to fix this, I fed him all the time, around the clock for weeks. He’d be fussy, crying, and seemed to only be soothed when he eventually fell asleep while nursing. After a couple of weeks, we check in with the pediatrician again, and thankfully Ryan has gained some weight back since he left the hospital, but we figured it was because we finally started bottle supplementing with some formula (We used the Joovy Boob 5oz. bottles). Thinking back to all those times Ryan was crying, we were so ignorant and clueless about what he wanted, when really, he was probably just hungry.

At first, I thought the formula we had was just going to collect dust in our pantry, and breastfeeding was going to be this easy and simple, almost beautiful thing. No. It was painful, frustrating, and defeating. I would spend an hour on the couch with Ryan nursing, constantly trying to keep him awake and active, and he’d unlatch and be crying with hunger. We’d feed him a small bottle of formula and after he’d just be so peaceful and happy. That was crushing.

The lactation consultants and his pediatrician recommended that after nursing I should immediately pump to trick my body into producing more milk. Supply and demand, they explained, was how my body responded to making more milk. If I pumped after feeding it would tell my body to produce more milk as if a hungry child was nursing again.

So after a 40 minute (what seemed unproductive) nursing session, I would then pump and get a combined half ounce of milk, if I was lucky. Second defeating moment of the day. And I did this every time Ryan was hungry, which was about every other hour. On top of all this, I’m still trying to recover from just giving birth. Getting out bed was difficult to say the least. I developed Diastasis Recti during my pregnancy, and my abdominal muscles still haven’t recovered. And I bled, all the time. Just like having a heavy period. My hormones all over the place, dealing with a crying baby and no sleep just piled on top of me. I still got out of bed every day, made sure I tended to my son, and tried to make each new day count. But those first few weeks were the hardest days of my life.

TL;DR – Ryan has issues latching, I start pumping to build milk supply, postpartum recovery

The next two weeks

One hurdle Ryan and I got over was the use of the nipple shield. We eventually learned how to get Ryan to latch on without using it and it seemed to be going great. Until I got Mastitis. I was put on antibiotics and told to nurse, nurse, nurse. Unfortunately, with all that nursing came the cracking, bleeding and sore nipples. While I had Mastitis we had a couple of lactation consultations to try to help with my latch and supply, it was recommended that I start taking Fenugreek and applying an All Purpose Nipple Ointment (APNO). The consultant gave me a “recipe list” to make the nipple ointment at home, rather than buying a prescription ointment that would cost me $50. Let me tell you, after making the one at home and then later caving in and getting the prescription, I would recommend getting the prescription from your doctor. It was a waste of money making the one myself, since it didn’t help at all. The prescription ointment is professionally mixed and made with all the correct and necessary ingredients for healing.

A week on antibiotics goes by, but the pain when latching comes back…with a vengeance. I could only describe the pain as if someone took a pair of pliers to my nipples every time Ryan would latch. I followed up with Obstetrician and she diagnosed me with Thrush. To try and recover from the pain, she told me to take a week off from breastfeeding. The next day, I thought Ryan had white spots in his mouth (which would indicate he developed Thrush and would also have to go on an antifungal medication). I took him to see his pediatrician and turns out he just had a little formula on his tongue. I mentioned the week break I was going to take from breastfeeding to recover and his pediatrician advised against it if I ever wanted to continue breastfeeding, in case Ryan became disinterested in the breast after such a long break. And I suffered through the pain again. And on top of everything happening, my parents were visiting us in North Carolina from Arizona for only two days. Time spent with them was interrupted with doctors’ appointments and trips to the pharmacy. And when these appointments and store trips are a 30-minute drive away from our house, this took up a lot of precious time.

TL;DR – Develop Mastitis, recommend prescription APNO, develop Thrush

Weeks 5 and 6 (AKA, Hell)

Here we go again. I start to feel a lump in my armpit and see redness creeping up again. I called my obstetrician, set an appointment and confirm I had an unresolved case of Mastitis and a clogged duct. This time, they put me on Diflucan, which I also took while in the hospital since I am allergic to Penicillin drugs. Anyone who knows me, can confirm that I cry and I’m stubborn. (I’m also competitive, like when playing games or sports, but that’s for another time). I knew I was going to be upset and cry when I had the appointment with my doctor because breastfeeding still wasn’t working for us, I was developing infections, and nobody could come up with a solution. He assured me that it doesn’t work for every woman, that you’re not a failure if you stop breastfeeding and ultimately, I need to make a health decision for myself. My mental and physical health were depending on how I wanted to move forward.

This is when I decided to just breastfeed a couple times a day when I recognized I had a decent supply of milk and then would pump the other times of the day. I still wasn’t making a lot of milk (based on the amounts I was pumping throughout the day), but now I could make an entire bottle of milk for a single feed, in a single day. All that hard work for one bottle of breastmilk.

TL;DR – Unresolved case of Mastitis,

The Final Weeks

We saw at least 6 different lactation consultants over those eight weeks trying to figure out what was wrong, and here’s what we figured: Ryan was a lazy eater in that he would never empty my breasts of milk and would always end a 40-minute feeding session hungry and crying. We were also told that he had a tongue tie and an upper lip tie which prevented him from having the proper latch. After talking to other moms who had the same diagnosis for their child, going through that laser surgery, and breastfeeding still didn’t work, we decided that was not an option for us.

I tried to hold on to breastfeeding for too long when I think back about it. I slowly decreased the amount of times I had Ryan latch, and we all started benefiting from it. I was pumping more, my milk supply was increasing, Ryan seemed happier and fuller, and his Two Month Well Child appointment with his pediatrician went well. I remember the last time I had Ryan latch. I wasn’t expecting him to get everything out, he stayed on for maybe 10 minutes, and then I immediately gave him a bottle and that was it. It was a relief not to have to stare at the clock anymore, to struggle to keep him active, to calm him down after a forceful letdown or low supply. I didn’t expect anything from that feed and it felt great. And now, we know exactly how much he’s eating, I can produce a whopping 22 ounces of breastmilk a day (pumping for 15 minutes, 5-7 times a day) and then we supplement with formula.

I’m looking forward to pumping less and less as Ryan will probably start to become interested in eating baby food which we plan to prepare ourselves. And now that I’ve been pumping so much, I kinda feel like an expert and will write my advice, tips, tricks and favorite purchases that worked for us in another post.

They always say, “It’ll get better.” But when you and your partner are exhausted, frustrated and clueless, it’s hard to see that light at the end of the tunnel. You wonder, well, WHEN does it get better? It got better for me when I stopped breastfeeding. It got better once I didn’t HAVE to pump every other hour and can stretch it to about every 4-5 hours. It got better once Ryan could start sleeping longer stretches at night. And parents of multiple children will probably agree that their second child was easier to take care of because you already went through all of this, learned from your mistakes and are more confident.

TL;DR – Reasons we thought breastfeeding didn’t work, the last latch, it’ll get better.

To wrap it all up, I don’t feel like I gave up on breastfeeding. I tried everything I could to make something work that just wasn’t for us. Moms who tried to breastfeed and it didn’t work; you didn’t fail, and I’m not going to tell you to hang in there. I was told that, and I wish I had stopped much sooner, for all our sakes. Formula isn’t poison, and if your baby is full and happy, you are doing the right thing!