Pump It!

I never thought I’d be this excited about a breast pump – but I am! My breast pump came in the mail today! See, here’s the thing. I just thought that my boobs would produce milk naturally and I’d be able to feed Jack and the world would just be wonderful. Well, reality check, it doesn’t always happen like that. Without going into too much detail, I’m not producing a ton of milk, so we have to supplement with formula; however, I am committed to giving him as much breast milk as possible, because the benefits are so good for him, so pump about six times a day. The lactation consultant at Northside said part of the reason for the lack of breast milk may be that I didn’t get to breastfeed with the hour after Jack was born since he was in the transitions nursery. In fact, I didn’t even try to breastfeed Jack until he was almost 18 hours old. This is apparently a big no-no. You really should try to breastfeed in the first hour and every hour to two after that for the first day or so. The reason I didn’t was because, since the cord was wrapping around his neck, they had to overfeed him formula in the transitions nursery to make sure the cord didn’t do any damage with his swallowing and spitting up. Basically, they feed him between 30 – 60 ml (about 1 to 2 oz) and made him spit it up. He did great, but that also made him not want to nurse, which was a signal to my body that it didn’t need to produce milk. (It’s truly amazing the way a woman’s body works after having a baby.) ANYWAY, for the past six weeks, I’ve been renting the mother of all breast pumps from the hospital. This, by the way, is totally safe. It’s a special pump that is made for multiple users. You should never share a regular breast pump because your milk can be contaminated. I ordered my own pump over a week ago. It’s supposed to be a really good one (Medela Pump in Style) and it finally got here today. Isn’t it funny how, a year ago, a breast pump would have been the last thing I was excited about, but today, when the FedEx guy rang the doorbell, I jumped up and ran to the door like it was freaking Santa Claus! Oh man, I am OLD! :)