Judecorp.

Bogo went to his first movie today, at 13 days old. He saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part 1). Not bad for less than 2 weeks, you know? He slept through most of it, grunted a couple of times, cried for about 15 seconds, nursed, and had a bottle. Good times. I dropped popcorn on his head a few times (whoops) and he got startled by some of the noise. The movie was very loud, so I covered his ears.

Speaking of the Bogo, he was weighed today and was 10 pounds on the dot. Not yet two weeks old. Punk was 9lbs and change at one month, and 11lbs and change at 2 months. Yikes! Big baby!

We had to take him to the pediatrician today to check weight because he was still under birth weight last week and because of all of the nursing issues I had with Punk (when she lost so much weight and got dehydrated and sick). We ended up meeting with a new nurse practitioner instead because the doc was super busy. She was very nice and very sweet and very pro-breastfeeding. Which is nice, because I'm pro-breastfeeding. But she kind of was crossing that line between "supporting breastfeeding" and "making women feel like they are never doing enough." She just kept hammering me with ways to increase my milk supply and stop supplementing, and was full of "How do you know you won't make enough for this baby?" Because, lady, I /know/. I know like I know that I'm breathing. I know that my kid nurses without swallowing. I know that my kid nurses for 30+ minutes and pops off STARVING. She told me to cut the amount of supplement in half so he would wake to eat more and therefore nurse more and therefore I would magically make more milk. Except I won't. I'm maxed out on galactogogues and I won't. Aah well. She should just be happy that we were proactive and our kid is gaining weight and being healthy and thriving.

Also, I like the longer stretches of sleep when we give him formula bottles at nighttime. ;)

Little punk is three months old today! Yesterday was my last ever pill of domperidone. It did its job as best as it could but I couldn't justify ordering more pills when we're still having to give her 22+ ounces of formula a day. I don't know if I will continue to make enough milk to keep her at the boob. She nursed this morning but I don't know what tomorrow morning will bring.

She nursed to sleep for her afternoon nap and I hope that's something that will continue. This whole breastfeeding journey has been incredibly painful but also incredibly sweet, and part of me wishes I had it in me to find a way to justify shelling out big bucks on more pills of minimal improvement. I know that mama milk is best for my little punk, and she is still getting at least one bottle of it per day... it's just not from her mama.

And that, I think, is the hardest part for me to take.

~//~

Jen got me some flowers yesterday to mark the occasion. It was very sweet but it is hard for me to look at them without feeling sad. I wish my body wasn't broken and I was able to feed my sweet baby girl.

I am having a bit of a crisis of faith with respect to breastfeeding. I guess I am just not used to failure. I'm a goal-oriented person and when I want to do something, I do it. And if it's hard, I work hard and I get it done. I can't really think of anything I really wanted to do that I couldn't pull off. Except this.

It hit me the other day that I am taking 9-12 pills a day and getting half an ounce (or so) of milk per feeding. In a perfect situation (where the domperidone is timed just right and I don't nurse for 6-8 hours and it's first thing in the morning when milk peaks) I can squeeze out 2 ounces of milk, and let me tell you, it takes a lot of work. I have to pump for a long time, all the while squeezing the crap out of my boob with my hand in all kinds of funky ways to eke out every last drop. And then I actually get 2 ounces, which is a minor miracle.

Usually, though, pumping involves all of the above things, but half an ounce of output or less. That's disheartening. Like WOAH.

So here's the thing: generous friends have given me about six boxes of domperidone, and one is en route from juliann as well. I have about four boxes left to my name. Do I buy more? Is it worth spending hundreds of dollars on bootleg medication to frustrate my little baby by continuing to put her on the boob that barely spits out milk? When she is really hungry, she gets PISSED OFF. I can't say I blame her. It's like being starving and having someone offer you one hors d'oeuvre. And making you work really really hard for it. It actually makes me sad when she's so frustrated. And then she guzzles 4oz. of formula and loves life.

It's so hard because I love nursing her and I love the time we spend, but is it worth dropping big bucks that we don't have on pills when we're already dropping big bucks on formula? (Although we haven't dropped bucks in a while, thanks to the generosity of folks sending us their free samples and Jen's parents buying us $100 worth of formula at BJs when they were here.) Do I spend $190 on 18 boxes of pills (a box lasts 11 days, so 198 days' worth) and try to stick it out? Do I use the pills I have and then see what happens when I run out? Do I continue to force the angry, hungry baby to suck out every last drop before I let her eat her real meal?

It's hard because I have a hard time separating what I'm doing that's best for her versus what I'm doing that is best for me. I wonder if I'm being selfish with all of this nursing business and whether I'm just beating a dead horse. 12 pills for a couple of half-ounce servings? I know every drop is helpful but sometimes I wonder if my money is better served buying someone else's breastmilk.

I've been doing a lot of reading on boob issues and milk supply. I did a lot of reading about breastfeeding when I was pregnant, and about ways to increase supply, but I never really read about actual issues - probably a denial thing. And then when I started having a lot of problems, I started looking.

A guaranteed tried-and-true, even-the-LLL-doesn't-deny cause of insufficient milk supply is undeveloped or underdeveloped breast tissue. Signs of this include lack of breast changes during pregnancy (hello! how many times did I complain about this?) and markedly different breast sizes (check).

My boobs are so different in size that my previous primary care physician asked me if I wanted her to write me a referral for an insurance-approved breast augmentation. (I said no. Yikes!) They were about a cup and a half different in size BEFORE pregnancy. Now I'm guessing more like two or more. It's awful.

I wish someone had told me this stuff (you know, like a medical professional who had seen my boobs multiple times) ahead of time so I wouldn't have been as devastated. Aah well, live and learn, I guess.

I am a nursing failure. My child is 11 days old and it's true, I'm a nursing failure.

( This got long and depressing. )