Dry
August 29, 2007 by Veronica Mitchell
The baby is not getting enough to eat.
I took PoppySeed to the doctor last week for her four-month check-up. She has dropped from the 91st percentile for weight to the 57th.
It was not really a surprise. The last several weeks she has been repeatedly latching on and letting go, a sign familiar to me from my first two babies. She is looking for more milk than I have.
I have been through this before. I knew it might happen again, but I hoped it would be different this time. The first ten or twelve weeks after the birth were wonderful. I finally understood the bond that other women talked about. Now I cannot feed her all she needs.
Now I must decide whether or not I am willing to unearth my breast-pump again. If I use it every night after the baby goes to bed, I will probably make enough milk for another few months. I hate the idea, but I will probably do it.
Breast-pumping is possibly the most boring activity on the planet. I can’t read a book. I can’t give a movie my full attention. It takes an hour, and then I have to wash all those tiny pieces. The idea of doing all of this on one of the bad nights when the older children won’t stay in bed, or even on the good nights when they go to sleep and I finally have some time to myself, exhausts me.
Before I had children, I did not know that feeding my baby what she needed was a pipedream.
I am waiting for the tears. I certainly cried a few over my first two babies and their feeding struggles. This time, I have not cried.
If I could change this flaw of my body and make enough milk, I would do it in a heartbeat. I am saddened by my inability. But I have been through this before, and I know my baby won’t starve.
I know that everybody gets disappointments in life. No one fulfills all their dreams. This time, in an unexpected way, I find myself grateful for the pain of my breastfeeding troubles and what it has taught me.
So much of motherhood involves learning to be a failure. I will never be as patient, as kind or as wise as I dreamed I would be before I had children. My first task as a mother - feeding my baby - has shown my human frailty and brokenness. I tend toward the paralysis of perfectionism, and there is possibly no more important lesson I could have learned from that first act as mother.
My forefathers and foremothers in the Reformed faith taught that the gospel - the good news from God that brings freedom to our souls - consisted not in working hard to achieve perfection, but in accepting the grace of Jesus Christ. Grace is not only that eagerness with which God rushes to forgive the soul that throws itself upon him, but also the love that aids and supports us when we are broken or frail or failing.
My inability to make all the milk my baby needs is not my fault, but there will be many times when my failures toward her are my fault. She will outgrow her need for milk. I will never outgrow my need for grace. And I am grateful - profoundly grateful - that God has chosen the very beginning of motherhood to remind me of this.
******************
(I have been working on this post for a few days, not wanting to publish it because it wasn’t perfect. Irony, anyone?)
Oh dear sister, we understand.
I have a dear friend, a missionary to China who had been told to avoid pregnancy due to her severe diabetes. Of course she conceived, returned to the U.S., birthed, then mothered a lively little girl. She told me that motherhood was the anvil, and she felt God pounding out her pride, her perfectionism, her selfishness, shaping her into His image.
I think motherhood is making you holy. Your writings are certainly pointing me to Him. Thank you.
I definitely needed this today. I have been struggling with feelings of inadequacy as a mother lately. A mother who also happens to teach her children. It’s overwhelming at times to think about all of the things I want to teach my children and instill in them and how many of them I seem to fail at. Thank God His grace is abundant and His mercies new every morning.
I am past the breastfeeding stage with my children now, but I did experience the same thing when I was nursing them. I never felt as if I had enough milk. Even pumping didn’t seem to help my supply. After about six months with both girls I began supplementing with formula. Guilt did haunt me then, but as you said it wasn’t my fault. I had to learn to let go of the guilt.
I know you’re not asking for breastfeeding troubleshooting in this post, but may I offer two thoughts? One is that your doctor may not be using the appropriate growth charts. It’s absolutely normal for exclusively breastfed babies to slow down their rate of growth at 3-4 months. The WHO growth charts available at http://www.who.int/childgrowth/standards/en/ reflect this growth pattern, but many doctors’ offices continue to use charts normed on formula-fed babies.
As an alternative to miserable late-night pumping sessions, consider power-pumping, described briefly here.
Oops, no HTML in your comments. Here’s the link:
http://community.lsoft.com/SCRIPTS/WA-LSOFTDONATIONS.EXE?A2=ind0412C&L=LACTNET&P=R4578&D=0
CJ, it isn’t just my doctor’s charts. It is obvious while nursing that my babies want more milk than I provide. As for “power pumping” EVERY HOUR - I am very skeptical that it would work, and anyway, I have three children under four to take care of. Not likely.
I disagree with you. I think this post is perfect. You perfectly illustrated the frustrations and feelings of failure that come along with motherhood.
Do you have a good pump? It makes a difference.
I’ve had some friends who just didn’t produce enough milk, and it HURT then so badly. Here’s what I know about breastfeeding:
1) You are not your boobs.
2) Try stripping your baby down to her diaper and taking her into bed with you for the day - apparently, the relaxed skin-to-skin contact can REALLY increase the hormone the controls milk production.
3) And rather than stressing yourself - and your relationship with your baby - out, you can always nurse her for a while and then feed her formula. It’s not ideal, but there’s more to being a mother than what you feed your baby.
Your daughter has had four months of breastmilk - that is AWESOME. And I’m so glad that, at first at least, you got to experience a happy, comfortable nursing relationship.
I was so pump-phobic that I never used one, not even when Pie self-weaned cold-turkey and I was exploding. So I’m with Beck - formula is not the devil.
beautiful
yes, yes, went through this with my second child and was heartbroken at the time, still he needed food and I had to just find a way to selflessly get over my ideal - neither my first nor my last act of the kind, crying because I felt guilty for wanting the ideal, crying because I could not have, crying because I wasn’t really sure if maybe formula was the devil, there were so many voices in my ears. And yes, acceptance and grace were what healed me, and him too.
With my third child, I started to have a similar problem and decided to go with unconventional advice (from CANADA - I love Canada!), supplementing by feeding solids to my 4 month old, followed by milk and taking all the herbs, plus a nonFDA approved drug. I was just that desperate to nurse “full time. Both routes got me what I needed: a well fed baby. In retrospect, I am glad I had both experiences. I was healed in different ways each time, with great results, plumper babies who slept more. I’m wishing that for you too, however you come by it.
Whatever you decide to do she’ll be fine and if you do half breast, half formula there’s nothing wrong with that at all.
When my son was born only nine years ago the received wisdom was that at six months you started to wean them onto formula..I’m not quite sure why. I got flu when he was seven months, when I was still giving him two breast feeds a day and that dried me up completely and ended breast feeding with a jolt. He was fine though, it was me that was wistful.
I second Bubandpie. The months of breast feeding you have given you daughter are a complete success. It makes me sad to imagine that you can think yourself a failure in any way. You have selflessly given of yourself to your babe. There is nothing better! As for the future? I know without a shadow of a doubt that you will continue to do the absolute best by PoppySeed that you can…whatever that turns out to be.
This was such a lovely post. A wistful and sad post, but lovely none the less. Lessons of grace are so hard to come by. I love how you have described yours.
I’m so sorry.
This post IS perfect, just like the grace!
I needed a good sniffle this afternoon….thanks!
I know how you feel. Thank you for expressing yourself so beautifully.
It is a gift to learn such an important life lesson in the midst of personal disappointment. Thank you for sharing your story with us.
And I hate pumping too. So boring. So unsatisfying. Be sure to extend grace to yourself if you decide not to continue.
You said that all so beautifully. This is not a failing. But I, like you, have a perfectionist streak and it is so true that the fact that perfectionism and parenting are not really compatible is a great and valuable lesson. I am still working through this one myself.
Thanks for sharing your story. It’s pithy, but I really know how you feel.
“She will outgrow her need for milk. I will never outgrow my need for grace. And I am grateful - profoundly grateful - that God has chosen the very beginning of motherhood to remind me of this.”
Oh how achingly true these words are. This post is breathtaking and full of wisdom.
I linked over from Bub and Pie and I am so glad I did.
So many times I feel so bad about how imperfect I am as a mother to my girls.
Such a difficult thing. I have the opposite problem, too much milk–ironic, isn’t it, that having too much can sabotage the relationship too? With my second baby, he refused to latch on because he hate the drill a hole in your throat letdown. I ended up pumping exclusively for six months for him. That was a feat. (My first baby had managed to gulp it down and I made it to a year with him.) This baby, I gritted my teeth and we made it to three months. Now that I have to work I couldn’t bring myself to pump again. Because some things are more important, like my mental health. So he’s getting formula when I’m not around, and I realize that the time I spent pumping with number two is time I can spend cuddling number three. So I am still nourishing him in a way that will help him to be a healthy, happy child. And that is my goal, right? To nourish, to nurture, to fill him full of love. Not milk. You’re absolutely right–we have to learn that our idea of perfection is often too influenced by the world and not enough by the principles of love.
I had the opposite problem too — all three times. We joked about “the dairy queen” but constant leaks and gagging babies aren’t so fun either.
That was a beautiful post, Veronica. I’m sure you’ve already thought of this, but plenty of moms can’t nurse at all, e.g. they’re on a medication or their baby is adopted, and they are still able to give their babies all the love and nurturing in the world. You will too!
I can also relate to the perfectionism problem. I used to strive for perfection in parenting. Now I simply strive for adequacy, and I’ve (finally) come to the conclusion that adequate is perfect.
My baby is also 4 months old and we have also had problems nursing- it is better now and will hopefully continue to be ok- but I understand the disappointment/ perfectionism issues! Your writing is beautiful.
Lovely post. I wish you luck - not being able to completely feed your baby can be a huge disappointment - I went through that.
I’ve been there. It’s a horrible feeling. Don’t beat yourself up over it any more. You are clearly a dedicated, caring mother who would do everything you could for your babies, and you have!
You are not a failure. You are not a failure. You are not a failure.
In fact, you’re a hero mom for recognizing right away that your wee one needs more food than she’s getting and you’re going to make sure that she does, one way or another.
She will thrive, just like your first two.
This WAS a perfect post. I’m bookmarking it to share with others.
Grace and peace to you.
Ahhh, this post resonated with me. I had a terrible time with supply, and latch, and cracked and bleeding nipples both times. Tristan was nearly failure to thrive twice, and I remember the abysmal feelings of failure, especially after all we’d gone through to conceive him.
Both boys were around 4 months when I started supplementing with formula, at my ped’s suggestion. Even at that, I nursed part-time until Tristan was 9 months and Simon was 16 months. You do what you can, and your best is your best - even if you can’t force your body to succumb to your will.
This truly was a lovely post…
It’s funny, just before I came over here to thank you for the link, I was Googling around for newborn weight info because it just occurred to me that after all the pain I’ve been through, my seven-day-old baby is probably not getting enough to eat. It’s so incredibly discouraging and, like you describe, bothers me on some deep, fundamental level. I know the pediatrician is going to push me to start her on formula. I really, really hate to do that…but I also don’t think that I realistically have the time to pump regularly since I have a 1 y.o. and a 3 y.o. to keep up with as well.
Anyway, all that’s to say…I can really sympathize with what you’re going through.
[...] I may be weaning the baby, but I’m still in denial. We have been supplementing with formula for my usual reasons, and that will gradually snowball until it is all formula, I [...]
I just finally read this one, which is weird, since I have been reading your posts for a while. I actually am sending this to my husband to read. We constantly talk about nursing. Our son (first, only, who knows….) is 13 months old, and I am still nursing him, thanks to God. And supportive friends, etc. I, too, don’t make enough milk. And I have supplemented him from birth. I went through a brief period of time when he only needed one bottle of formula a day. I also went a three-day period exclusively nursing. I could do it if I nursed him every 45 minutes during the day and at least every two hours during the night. Sigh. You can imagine how long that lasted.
It has been hard for me to reconcile the “God made me with deficient breasts” fact with the fact that I know that He loves me and my child(ren) more than I can possibly imagine and He wants the best for us. Maybe that “best” is more about shaping us into who He wants for us to be rather than about “doing” what we think we are supposed to do.
Anyway. I love your blog.
(And I second your emotion on your “cheapness”. I fed my kiddo “Good Start” b/c someone recommended it. But also b/c I had the most coupons. And it was consistently cheaper. )
I’ve been there twice. With my daughter (number 1), I made it work for almost 6 months, at which point a small bout with the stomach flu dried me completely up. With my son I was in the midst of planning a cross country move, and of course caring for my 5 year old daughter. It wasn’t working and I couldn’t make it work at all.
And I’m cheap
[...] Mark just brought her home from the doctor, and the doctor gave us preemie formula. Preemie formula is higher in calories, and all our babies have been so skinny that they have needed it at some point. [...]