This is a read best left for those who are seeking reassurance and solidarity in their breastfeeding struggles. I wanted to write it up and share it, because I felt like most of the people publishing about breastfeeding were doing so from a perspective of success. When we were in the depths of our struggles, I felt far from a success and did not see my experiences reflected in their words.
This is the raw breastfeeding story that I was looking for, and I hope it helps you feel less alone.
before birth
During my pregnancy, parents who I spoke to often asked if I planned to breastfeed. Having had breast reduction surgery in my teens I wasn’t sure whether I would be able to so I always answered noncommittally. After all, I’d heard so much from my mum about how breastfeeding didn’t work for her, so who was I to assume it would work for me even if I hadn’t gone messing with my physiology?
During third trimester I started to find small grits rubbing off my nipples in the shower. Over several weeks, cleaning these eventually led to small beads of colostrum, but I never had enough to make it seem worth collecting in a syringe. I attended breastfeeding classes, but all the time there was this voice in my head telling me not to get too excited because what if it didn’t work?
Fast forward to golden hour and expressing those tiny drops of colostrum to lure my magical newborn to open his mouth and learn to latch. What a surreal experience. I was breastfeeding my baby!
Well, he would latch and suck at least…
in hospital
As his weight continued to drop in the days following birth, nobody explained to me how I should literally be holding him constantly and keeping him close to me. There was so much emphasis placed on Safe Sleep principles in all my babycare classes that I didn’t know the absolute best care I could give my baby was to hold him and give him constant access to my breasts.
I feel like this one piece of information would have completely transformed our first days together. I cried as I watched him sleep in his sidecar bassinet, wanting to hold him but believing that I should leave him to sleep on his back for his safety – and in turn my milk was slow to come in.
Eventually the hospital team encouraged me to start pumping every 2-3 hours to stimulate milk production. It was horrible. They didn’t provide a pumping bra setup so I had to sit with both hands holding the flanges to my breasts to suction mere millilitres of milk out per session, and of course I couldn’t hold my baby if he cried for me. Slowly my 2mL of milk turned into 10mL, but the toll was heavy.
I felt like I was neglecting my baby when he needed me, I missed out on the sleep I needed to actually help my body recover from my c-section and produce milk, sitting in the pumping position pressed harshly on my incision scar during its most tender days, and my meagre output looked pitiful and demoralising in the full-size bottles they had me using.
The process of nursing and pumping then feeding baby the pumped milk is known as triple feeding. Milk production in the breasts is regulated by how much milk is present in them. By removing milk constantly, triple feeding is considered to be the optimal way to stimulate milk production either immediately after birth or following a drop in supply. It’s also acknowledged (by everyone who has ever tried it) to be brutal. Whether it worked for my milk production or not, it did not work for me newly postpartum and isolated in a hospital room.
In a more naturalistic community, my baby would have been fed by someone who already had a solid milk supply, while I would have nursed an older baby instead of a pump to stimulate production. I would have been supported and guided, not left alone to hold plastic suction cups against my nipples whilst my baby cried for connection. I told the hospital team I was gonna take my chances with formula and worry about my milk production once my baby regained his birth weight.
At baby-friendly hospitals, staff are trained to discourage formula usage at all costs, and I had to determinedly advocate for feeding not starving my baby. All the obstacles of giving birth in a language that I don’t speak fluently suddenly loomed even greater, as my baby’s survival and my health felt acutely at risk. I leaned into my limited vocabulary hard and worked on everyone’s nerves who could hear me. 12 hours later I was allowed to give him a bottle of formula. After just 90mL of formula (spread across 3 feeds) plus unlimited time on the breast, he had gained over 100g.
early days at home
Once back in the comfort of my own home I started working with a lactation consultant, but if I’m honest (as I was with her) the advice she offered was not useful to me, so instead I consulted the r/breastfeeding subreddit and the sites they recommend. I continued pumping while we continued to supplement with formula for the next couple of weeks. (Pumping during formula feeds is important if establishing supply as otherwise my body had no way of knowing that it needed to produce milk for that particular feed.) Baby regained his birth weight by his 2-week checkup. What a relief!
Eventually I was pumping the same amount as baby was receiving during a formula feed, so we stopped feeding formula. Baby’s weight gain started slowing down and witching hours escalated.
After a dispiriting visit to the lactation consultant at 3 weeks old, we decided to supplement with formula again to see what would happen. The first change was that we had a happier baby. By his 1-month check-up he had gained enough weight that we were reassured this was the way forward.
1-month old and beyond
We continued to supplement with formula and I continued to pump with every bottle, but baby’s poops were green and he threw up constantly.
I was already dairy-free because of my own lactose intolerance, and we had started out on dairy-free formula because that’s what they gave in hospital so we just continued it, so we ruled out milk protein allergy. My partner asked how I would feel to stop feeding him my pumped milk and only give him formula. Once I got over my initial emotional reaction, this seemed like an experiment worth exploring.
Immediately, his poo lost the green shade and foamy wetness. It was clear that even my pumped milk was not the right composition for him in large quantities, so I started freezing it to make it a problem for future-me to figure out.
The final step was trying out mainstream formula instead of the hypoallergenic formula, and he was totally fine. Whatever was causing the green poops from my breastmilk was not a dairy issue, and it makes me wonder how many of the parents I hear about, who are micromanaging their diets due to suspected intolerances, might be struggling needlessly.
It seems like there are so many unknowns in baby feeding that when it’s not working out, there’s no guaranteed magic bullet.
Every healthcare professional I encountered tried to encourage and help me to breastfeed, citing “breast is best”. I am well aware of the advantages, and I too want to provide my child with a customized elixir of nutrients, antibodies, and love, but the truth is that “fed is best” and breastmilk is still more magic than we care to admit.
There is never one-size-fits-all in living beings. We can follow general trends with statistical distributions, but our variations from the norm come in infinite combinations. There is no collective benefit in pushing inflexible policies for baby feeding or sleeping or anything else, because every pregnancy, birth, and combination of parents and children is unique.
If you’re feeling like you’re the only one not figuring this out, I promise you’re not alone. It can be hard but it doesn’t need to be as isolating as it is. My comments stay open if you’d like to reach out.
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