Razormouth
 

The other thing you can do is rent one from a surgical supply store. That way, you can try the different brands, and purchase the one that works best. I rented a few before taking the plunge on the industrial strength one.

Razormouth
 

To answer your question - yes..I nursed/pumped for two - not always easy, but doable...and don't worry, you will be able to nurse successfully. I think its only a very small number of women who are truly unsuccessful at nursing...it natural, BUT not EASY. Once you get the hang of it and your boobs toughen up - you'll be fine....

One piece of advice, start pumping early, after a feeding. even if you only get a half ounce, just freeze it. Pumping is a lot different than nursing so you'll have to figure out what will make your milk come down so you have a productive pump. With DS, I could just hook up and my milk flowed with no assitance. With DD, I had to bring one of her tee's with me, and her little baby smell did it for me...weird, I know but hey whatever works...

I had the medela and it was pretty good. I got the middle one and burned it out with DS. then I got the big (commercial grade)one and that was for DS and DD, but I had a LOT of success with this hand pump

http://www.dreamtimebaby.com/avismanbreat.html

so much so if I knew I would have had that good an experience I would have never bought the electric pumps at all....

a lot of successful pumping is thinking you will be successful at it, but stress interupts milk production/flow...so don't worry.

does you job have a lactaion room or someplace other than a bathroom where you can pump without interruption? Don't laugh - my old firm hired a partner with young kids...she has friggin reformed the place. When I was there, none of the female associates had kids..now the place is like baby central...

ml

DON'T READ THIS, ATTICUS

I can't remember if you've had the baby already or not, but I think you haven't. If you have had the baby (and perhaps even if you haven't), this will be irrelevant (for you), but maybe not for others:

Make sure your husband is prepared to be insistent with the doctor administering the epidural (if you're going that way). They will try to allow a resident to administer it if you're in a teaching hospital. While it's important that residents practice, they don't need to practice on you. This was especially true in my case, as my first child was born in early July (only a couple weeks after the new crop of residents start). Ask if the anaesthesiologist (that is almost certainly misspelled) is board certified, and if s/he isn't, make sure you get the attending.

My kids' father was mortified to be insistent, as he comes from a family of doctors, and it's vaguely insulting to the doctor not to be permitted to "treat" you. However, if you request a board-certified doctor, the hospital is required to provide you with one. When we told my brother-in-law that we insisted on the board-certified doctor, he was insulted on the resident's behalf, but fuck that. I didn't want some wet-behind-the-ears anaesthesiologist fussing with my spinal column, and wasn't really in a state to argue. You need an iron-willed proxy.

I literally had to YELL at the nurse in the hospital to not give my child a bottle--of course I made sure everyone in there knew I was a lawyer.....its funny how they suddenly stopped telling me what I should do and began asking what I wanted. That is the ONLY place i volunteer my status as a member of the bar.

Build your stash as early and fully as possible. My D had a problem with her latching that we thought we corrected and didn't discover that it wasn't properly corrected (even though she was guzzling) until her first tooth came in...tlk about razor mouth...But I was able to pump and with my stash I kept her on BM. And the small packs - 1/2 ounce, single ounce, are great not only for topping off, but also to make cereal etc when you introduce solids...

ml

to answer another question - with my first I only had 6 weeks and daycare was too far to go nurse at lunch time....and my son was a great sleeper so i would nurse at pickup, because he'd fall asleep in the car and stay asleep until he woke up for his 10 pm feeding, and then he was out til 5:30. with my d, i took 12 weeks - with both istarted pumping and introduced the bottle at 3 weeks. Don't forget to have a totally different person introduce the bottle. My son was just greedy, but D wouldn't take the bottle from me until she was much older....

ETA - I concur with have a board cert doc on the epi - my kid came too fast to get the epi - but i made sure the doc was board cert..until the said stop - this baby is coming out!!!! I was like DUH!!!!! Second was with a midwife, no drugs either and she was pro mommy/baby/BF so none of those issues like at the hospital.....

Ugh, I had to pump about 5x/day with the first. Before work, 2x at work, after work, middle of the night. In addition to doing 1-2 daytime + nighttime feedings. For over 6 months before it started to slow down. She nursed so often the supply was really up. Plus, I was stupid and didn't really get the hang of nursing/pumping at the same time or double pumping.

Second one didn't require as much and was much more regular, but then also it didn't last as long.

Side note - the different temperaments my kids showed as newborns, also reflected in their nursing/holding/sleeping needs, remain today. #1 is insistent, a little (!) bossy, needs me next to her so much while simultaneously headstrong and independent-minded, whereas #2 is easy to put to bed, has her needs fairly easily and simply met, agreeable, and though sometimes insistent on having me and only me with her (as is to be expected), for her age is mellower about it.

No baby yet. Our childbirth class is this weekend and I still have a little ways to go. Thanks so much for the advice.

As for the nurses disregarding your wishes... In theory, the hospital's practice (assuming no need for NICU or other emergency newborn care) is to let the mother have the baby for the first 45 mins to an hour for skin to skin contact and to allow for that first nursing attempt (which is recommended to occur within the first hour after birth). Then they take the kid to be weighed, measured, tested, etc. with the father watching, and then you can either have the baby in the nursery or room in. They recommended rooming in to better establish BFing, and I plan to do so. Am I overly optimistic that this will remedy some of the problems?

(BTW, the Center for Missing and Expolited Children has some tips for the hospital to keep your child from being abducted that really freaked me out. OTOH, I don't know that I'm going to be getting that much sleep anyway if the kid is going to be attached avery 2 hrs or so anyway.)

After I yelled at them about not giving him a bottle, I let him stay in the nursery...I'd get as much rest as you can during those two days..... you'll be missing rest soon enough, and babies aren't really hungry during the first two days, its more the need to suck and get the colostrum.....

sending you good nursing vibes...

ml

I hesitate to venture into this area, but I note that when our first child was born, my wife got similar static while she was in the hospital before the milk came in and the feeding started to work.

The nurses really wanted to be able to give the baby some formula overnight, but my wife stuck to her guns, despite feeding visits every 90 minutes or so with crying infant and a "You're starving your baby" comment. The kid did not perish, and is still going strong.

Funny part is my wife switched to formula full-time after about 6 months, both due to production issues and because it was a pain in the butt.

In fairness to the nurses, the crew caring for the child post-partum (at least in our hospital) were not the OB-GYN nurses who cared for my wife. They were a separate crew whose job was to care for the newborn babies -- so that was their prioirity.

Incentives. If the baby dies from malnourishment during the first few days, the hospital gets sued. If the baby's IQ is a few points lower and has a less developed relationship with her mom, good luck proving the hospital is to blame 18 years later.

The nurses would not let me let #1 stay in the nursery overnight, because I would not let them bottlefeed her, and she was crying.

Geez, when were you going to stop breast feeding? Kids get teazed if they are still breastfeeding at little league games.

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/HEALTH/...troversy.otsc/

Spree: story about psycho moms nursing kids 8 and 10 years old.

That is crap. (The "correlation" b/n long-term bonding and breastfeeding.)

Making it even harder to win damages!

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.

No - incentives from Johnson & Johnson etc...get the mom to supplement, which will in the end decrease her milk supply due less nursing and then she will have to use formula...money in J & J et al pockets....

babies are not being starved nor will they within the 2 days - breasmilk doesn't even come in until like the second day...babies are constantly nourished in utero...they don't even know what it is to feel hungry for a few hours....


whether one nurses or not is a personal decision...while i am personally pro-nursing, it doesn't mean a mom who opts not to is a bad mom, but i hate that your starving your baby crap...you must ha skipped that class in nursing school. It always helps to have info as ammo when they start that crapola...

ml
ml

Most of the kid-care "industry" in NYC is pro-BF (annoyingly so, imo), and my pediatrician and all the hospital nurses were very encouraging of BF. I'm so surprised to hear so many of you have had the "You're starving your baby" BS. The baby would have to go for weeks before starving.

Make sure policy and practice are the same. I had an emergency c-section but not a complicated one, and they did not bring me the baby for about 3 hours until I got out of recovery and into my room. They kept saying they were bringing the baby but just never got around to it. They wanted to wait until I could move my legs, or my chills subsided, or my pain meds kicked in, or until they gave the baby a bath (???!!!) but since I was feeling rather crappy it was hard to put up an effective fuss or to keep track of time.

And this is a hospital with a mom holds the baby within an hour policy.

I'm really not bitter! Just frustrated by all of it -- not the way I expected things to go. Next time I'll take more charge of things - or have hubby prepared to do it.

I'm surprised you weren't more insistent in telling them that you gotta see the baby.

There are policies about this? With both my kids, I held them within the first few minutes. They had to work on the first one for a minute, but the second one, as soon as he wasn't so gooey (maybe 90 seconds?) he was in my lap.

I'll have to use that one next time - I might get a laugh from my L&D nurse. I can do a mean Long Island accent.

Oh, and SEC Chick -- I have the Medela PIS Advanced and it works quite well. I'm at home till baby's six months old and I try to pump 1x day now just to get a little supply in the freezer for when we have to take a car trip or go to a party or something.

The fact that the hospital has a policy on the issue would make me suspicious.

:mad:

I wouldn't argue with him. He probably has masters theses to back up his point.

It's painfully obvious that Johnson & Johnson coopted her, and she's justifying her own desire for doughn . . . er I mean decision not to breastfeed.

Your employer probably has a policy on sexual harassment.

You probably advise clients (or others here do) to adopt policies left and right, including forcing formula on babies who won't breastfeed to reduce the chances of a lawsuit for malnutrition.

If you breastfeed, you can't eat donuts?

Good thing I'm not planning to breed.

Are you here? I'll be damned - I had no idea. No, one of the Methodists. I have heard good things about Womens from most but not all - apparently it depends which nurses you get.

Babies are born puffy and full of fluid to make up for the first couple of days of little to no food/liquid. If a couple of days of very little food was harmful, the human race would have died out long ago, because (and the nurses seem to forget this) there hasn't always been formula to "supplement" with and millions of babies have thrived without it.

With unplanned, but not emergency c-s #1 they took the baby away and didn't bring him back for I don't know, a couple hours at least. I was pretty upset, but due to the fact that they "clipped" my artery and I was really low on blood, I was really too tired to complain. With the second one, I saw him after 5hours - I kept calling and calling and calling and they kept telling me he had fluid in his lungs still so they had to keep an eye on him. It was very upsetting and I'm not sure if they were even telling me the truth. And of course they wanted to give him formula while he was there.....if you have a large baby, they bring on the threat that the baby might have low blood sugar as an excuse to feed him.

Explain this...
 

Why does SEC_Chick not have a "send PM" button on her posts? How can I effectively stalk people without being able to PM them?

I can and I will. Where did you say they were? Mmmmm.....

Explain this...
 

It seems my PM option somehow got turned off in my profile. It may work now.

One of Mr. Lex's ex-interns (now ful-fledged lawyer) stopped by last night while Mr. was still at work. He stayed for a few minutes and then left. Before leaving he called me "Mrs." Lex. This guy can't be more than 5yrs younger than me. He made me feel really old. Why?

a) He was trying to be respectful since Mr. was his old boss.
b) He forgot my name and that was the next best thing he could come up with.
c) He confused me with Mr. Lex's mother.
d) Other:

Was "Mrs. Lex" preceded by "are you trying to seduce me"?

It's like you were there.

Maybe he was . . .

Then he should damn well be polite enough to call beforehand so I will have time to change the poopy toddler before he arrives and feed the baby so he's* not starving and gnawing on my arm the whole time.

I hope you are taking notes, Burger.







*The baby, not the lawyer.

Although I'm sorry this happened to you too, it makes me feel better knowing this happened to you, too. It makes me feel less guilty/stupid/whatever.

Damn, I hate hospitals.

Breastfeeding stuff
 

I don't have much to add (since I never pumped), except to echo what others have already said about breastfeeding being difficult for almost everyone, and doable for almost everyone (I did have one friend with "insufficient glandular tissue" who found out her baby was crying all the time because he was hungry).

With Magnus (and I've probably posted about this before here), he acted like I was trying to kill him and refused to latch on for his first week. I had to pump and feed him with a syringe. He finally did latch on, but for another few weeks only forcibly (I had to use the football hold with my hand on the back of his head to keep him on). Breastfeeding was only easy after about three months, but then we kept it up until 16 months (gradually eliminating feedings starting at a year--I would plan on not going cold turkey if I were you).

With Thor, it's been much much easier from the get-go. His latch isn't perfect (I have a really fast flow on one side, so he tries to pull back so it comes out slower), and now he's getting to that distractable age that results in my nipples being stretched in uncomfortable ways as he tries to look around while still attached, but overall it's been much easier (except for yeast and reflux issues, but those are whole other stories).

Part of the reason I think it's been so different is because of very different birth experiences, which I've also posted about here. For us, shorter labor + really short pushing stage + no epidural = happy baby who nurses and sleeps well.

As for the pushy nurses, I may be experiencing a geographic difference, because I never had them ask to give either of my kids anything. But then the babies basically never left my room (they're both uncirc'ed), and there weren't any complications that required separation. Do you have a birth plan? That might help.

Feel free to PM me with any other questions.

tm

For the record, it happened with me too. Planned c-section. They brought her over to me while I was being sewn up so that I could see her, but I certainly did not hold her. At least an hour more went by until they brought her to me in recovery.

That it happened to me probably does nothing to alleviate the guilt/stupidity/whatever.