There are a lot of hoods: Adulthood, childhood, etc. but I would say out of all the hoods, Motherhood has been the most rewarding.
Some background…
I have two daughters, Lore, who is the eldest and is two years old, and Tele, who is six months. Breastfeeding both my daughters have been two completely different experiences which I’m happy to share. I’m hoping that this blog post encourages other new moms out there, no matter what stage they are at in their breastfeeding journey.
My experience as a first time mom and nursing with Lore was relatively smooth. She actually latched on immediately which was nice, as I’ve read online sometimes it takes some time for the babies to latch. However, though this was good, I would say the downside was that she actually ended up using me as a human pacifier. She would want to be on me constantly which got tiring very quickly. In fact, the first two nights she was home, I got barely any sleep as she was on me 24/7. In order to try and remedy this dilemma, I ended up getting her a pacifier. However, this ended up causing nipple confusion and she didn’t want to breastfeed. I ended up having to supplement feeding her breastmilk with formula early on as this, combined with me not producing that much supply in the first week, she was losing weight . I ended up supplementing with formula for six months before doing strictly formula. Additionally, with Lore, my milk didn’t come in until the sixth day as I was still producing colostrum. This was stressful initially as I put a lot of pressure on myself to produce milk, especially after seeing all the mom’s online who would have freezers filled with an abundant supply of milk. As a new mom, I would definitely say not to stress yourself out as your hormones and stress levels have an impact on your milk production. This was the case for me, I was putting a lot of unnecessary pressure on myself and comparing which just wasn’t healthy and had an impact on my milk production.
Nursing a newborn, but round 2 with Tele
After having Tele, I was able to reflect on my birthing experience and process with Lore. We ended up not giving Tele a pacifier at all which really helped as it avoided nipple confusion. Also, my milk came in on the third day, which was on time and my supply just got better and better as the weeks passed by.However, when I do supplement, I use Burt’s Bees baby formula. One recommendation I have when selected Baby formulas is making sure the formula is UTSA certified organic (Burt’s Bees is one good example). Burt’s Bees also helps with baby development as it has a lot of nutrients such as calcium, vitamin d, e, k, and Da for brain and eye development in babies. It has no preservatives, antibiotics, hormones, or genetic engineering; it’s basically the next best thing to breast milk.
One piece of advice I have for new moms out there is to not put too much stress on yourself. There are a lot of resources online about tips and tricks you can use to increase your supply if you’re low, but overall, try not to stress too much or put too much pressure on yourself.