Quote:
Originally posted by TexLex
I don't know what sort of jollies they get in the hospital from trying to ply the baby with formula against your wishes, but we had that problem both times. I won't go into it, just be prepared and have your hubby prepared to say no - you may not feel up to arguing about it when the times comes, so make sure hubby knows what you want and why you want it.
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Supply - not eating enough good quality protein or enough calories, low iron, sheer exhaustion and lack of sleep, pain, stress, dehydration, and PP depression can all kill supply, so be sure to take preemptive measures where you can.
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I will third or fourth that don't let the nurses talk you into formula bullshit. I ended up giving my little one about 50 ml total via syringe over the course of 10 hours because some total bitch of a nurse had me convinced at 2 AM that the baby was hungry and dehydrated (hungry, yes, but absolutely notdeyhdrated) after the other nurses on other shifts kept bugging me that the baby had lost (exactly) 10% of birthweight and they were worried and the baby had to gain weight, etc etc. I still feel guilty and angry about that. Going in, I was absolutely committed to exclusive breastfeeding, and after an emergency c-section and hospital-stay-induced exhaustion (let me fucking sleep, please!) I gave in, because I thought the biggest concern was nipple confusion, without knowing that exposure to formula is less than ideal with respect to the baby's GI tract. And my milk was really slow to come in (it took 6 days) despite the ginormity of my boobs (all the conditions TL listed were present except PP Depression, despite alll the hospital bullshit I was really happy and upbeat) so I thought I had no choice. Only afterward did I found out that even the hospital Ped didn't think formula was necessary - the nurses made me think he did.
I wish I had known going in that I had to hold firm against the neurosis-inspiring statements of the nurses. They are overworked, surely, and they just want to get things taken care of as easily as they can. They want you to BF but also think supplementing with formula is the greatest thing since sliced bread, and they convinced two exhausted parents that the baby needed it.
Next time I will put a card on the baby's bassinet that says "I'm breastfeeding, please no bottles, pacifiers, water, or formula!" And I will have the baby room in with me every night. I let them take baby to the nursery the first night, and some idiot gave baby a pacifier! (I was shocked.) Luckily (at least it was lucky then), the baby latched on well right away (if painfully) and never developed a preference for a rubber nipple.
As I've stated here before, I'm not so much into the pregnancy and child care books, but
That's What They're For by Janet Tamaro is actually pretty useful, despite the goofy title, and is a quick read.
Sorry, just had to vent there. I'm still pretty irritated about many aspects of my hospital stay.
P.S. Percocet and abdominal surgery and iron supplements are extremely constipating. FYI.
P.P.S. My residual anger over the formula issue is not due to the fact that I am currently constipated.
