Our Breastfeeding Adventure

I just need to type this out and process a bit :)

Laney is now a year old and I'm done pumping. She is still getting my milk each day because of my freezer stash, but nothing new is going into the freezer now. She's drinking coconut milk (the only option as she's allergic to everything else!) and doing well with it :)

So it started with the birth I had dreamed of. It was everything I had wanted! Within hours of Laney's birth we knew something was wrong. We latched and fed well right after birth and everyone kept saying she would fall asleep and give us a couple hours of rest but she wasn't! She was up and fussy and just not happy. So I got out of bed (and bled EVERYWHERE whoops!) and was bouncing her and rocking her. Finally I woke Matt up and told him I had to lay down or I might pass out. He was able to get her to sleep and all was well.

Then the next day as we were getting ready to leave the hospital Laney spit up clear fluid (later learned that it was straight acid) and screamed. She was making choking sounds and scared me!! We watched her super closely and were not sure what to think.

Once we got home I could tell our latch wasn't good. Stephanie (God bless that incredible woman's soul!) came over on Thanksgiving day and helped us. I kept telling her how upset Laney was and I just did not know what to do! Our latch was improving and my milk was IN. Laney was eating every 45 min or so around the clock. She was killing me! She had green foamy explosive diapers every hour or so. For the first few months we hardly ever changed a diaper than was just wet. They were all dirty. Then the screaming started. She would scream from about 630 each evening until somewhere between 1 and 3 that morning. Matt and I would take shifts bouncing her and listening to her scream. She would arch and get even more upset when I tried to feed her and if we laid her down it was the saddest most painful and ear piercing cry. Uh, it just broke our hearts!

So we went back to see Steph in her office. She helped us again with latching and this time I got it! She also gave us some probiotics for Laney. Unfortunately nothing seemed to help. We were in and out of the pediatricians office every few days. Doing weight checks, talking about her screaming, talking about her weird skin, her poop, and the likes. I was overwhelmed to say the least. I remember just sitting there bawling because I knew something was wrong and no one knew what! We saw our ped and her nurse practitioner  on and off. I finally decided to figure it out on my own. I started researching and researching and we eventually switched peds to help us figure this all out.

Then came the blood. Every diaper was full of it. Tons and tons of blood. The worst our two peds had ever seen. They wanted to run lab tests and try antibiotics and I just wasn't comfortable with any of it! We thought maybe it was a foremilk/hindmilk issue but that only helped a little. Finally our new ped confirmed that Laney was intolerant to dairy/soy and possibly other things too. She put her on reflux meds and life began to improve! But at 4 months Laney started spitting up blood. She still was not a consistent or great sleeper and we were tired. So they sent us to Phx Children's that evening. They did some X-rays and we spent our entire night in there and nothing happened. No one helped us. I was devastated. So our Ped gave us a referral to see a pediatric GI.

We went to see the GI and he directed me to change up Laney's meds which led to more sleep and less screaming and to go off the top 8 until we could get her diapers cleared up. A month later Laney's diaper tested negative for blood for the first time in her whole life!! Woo hoo! We were thrilled. That same month her feeding aversions began. Eating had caused her so much pain for so long that she just didn't want to do it anymore. She lost tons of weight. She screamed each time I would lift up my shirt or pull out the boppy. It broke my heart. It was SO personal to me even though it wasn't about me. I just couldn't handle it and everyone was (once again) pushing formula. I decided to start exclusively pumping after speaking with the GI. He encouraged me to give her the best I could and not upset us both at each feeding. So she began to thrive once again! Gained weight and was growing and eating and not screaming and arching anymore. We were thrilled. We tried several times to get her to latch again but without success. Each time I would cry and hurt again in my heart so much that I would swear I wouldn't try again....but I always did.

So I pumped for the next 6.5 months. She developed more feeding aversions over this time. To her bottle and to the spoon. We were able to find Nuk bottles and sippies she would drink from and just gave up on pureed baby food all together. Around 10 months she finally started eating table food (we took a baby led weaning type approach) and has done well with it ever since. I was able over that time to slowly add back in foods. First fish and corn and eggs. Then soy. Then at 9 months we trialed nuts and she failed. Two weeks later we did dairy and it was a success! I was thrilled. So at 9.5 months I was only off of all nuts and we stayed that way until a year. I had planned to pump much longer but once Laney started doing well on coconut milk I realized I was just really ready to be done. Prior to that we had not had any other option as she failed all three hypo-allergenic formulas. But once there was a choice open, I wanted out. I was tired of spending 30 minutes 5 times a day hooked up to a machine! At my height I was producing almost 40 oz a day which is HUGE for me. I am not an overproducer. I'm proud. I'm proud of the steps we took, that we fought for our baby and figured things out, proud that I was able to still feed her my milk despite all of our issues.

This was NOT an ideal experience. I would never recommend exclusive pumping to anyone that did not have to do it. This was not my goal nor my dream. I had hoped to breastfeed Laney past a year. I had hoped to protect her from illnesses and get loves and cuddles during that special time until she was done with it. This didn't happen. I was sad over what did not come out of this experience for us for quite some time. But not anymore. Now I just feel proud. Proud of our thriving baby girl who has hardly been ill this first year and who has outgrown most of her intolerances fairly early (which we've been told is attributed to us sticking with breast milk vs a hypo formula). She's outgrown her reflux and is mostly a very normal kid! She's petite. She never did seem to catch back up after losing all that weight. But she is beautiful and perfect.

I just wanted to write this all out and process a little. I can't believe we made it. There were days I never thought we would be here, like ever. My hope and my prayer is that we will never have to do this again. But already we've been able to help so many other friends who are experiencing this same thing. We've been able to help people get meds and know what to go off of or what to try and how to avoid feeding aversions etc. I feel so good every time I can help someone else. Like somehow a little piece of it was able to be turned into good!