The Loss of Breastfeeding - Guilt, Grief & Support Thread

[Wobbles]

Thread locked for review. There's been a lot said within this thread that simply wouldn't have been acceptable on others.

Please no PMs on this topic, they will be ignored. I will be reviewing the thread in the week when I have time. ATM its not a priority.

 

[Wobbles]

Please do not create new threads. We have closed this thread for a reason and so far we don't think duplicates of it are helpful. We are still discussing and reviewing the issues that have risen within this thread.

If we start a new I would like to see it start off again AFTER some cooling off time with no mention of this thread (which I have no doubt will be unstuck and even possibly removed from the public forum).

If you have any suggestions in the mean time please PM me.

 

[Wobbles]

This thread has been re-opened, I hope a chance to cool down has helped enough so this thread can move on and be what someone else said ... once a much needed, helpful and supportive thread. Members have expressed sadness in losing any valuable support that is already within thread which I have listened to and agree, it would a shame for it to drop off the pages because it's locked.

I don't think I have anything to add other than what the moderators have said on the previous few pages. I won't be clearing up the thread, it will soon get lost among the discussion.

Please let's not go backwards and discuss this any further ... let's just move on?

x

 

[Kage76]

we will be good girls wobbles *pinky swear* Thanks for listening- its greatly appreciated.

 

[andella95]

I was just wondering how many of you ladies dealt with PND/ppd during all of this? I was totally fine until I found out how low milk supply really was and had to start supplementing, then it hit me bad. I kept saying that the only thinking keeping me going was providing Breanna with my milk, and that it was the only thing I could do for her that was any good. I was put in Reglan which helped increase my supply, but it ended up making the depression so much worse. Completely stopping breastfeeding helped somewhat, but I still have bad days. Anyone else going through this, or has been through it?

 

[kanga]

Hi Andella. Yes I have

I never really got over the baby blues. I found the first weeks really tough, it was a combination of things. I had a very traumatic birth and the weeks leading up to it were bad too (I was ill, baby not thriving, hospital being useless) and so it was all the more important to me that I bf. I wanted to succeed at something because I considered that I had failed at being pregnant and giving birth. I consider myself to be an achiever - if I can't do something I work hard until I can do it and that is how I have always been. So when this theory didn't apply to bf I just felt like an even bigger failure and it became an obsession that I must bf my baby, which only lead to more disappointment.

What didn't help was that my friends (except one) were bf fine (maybe with some of the initial issues that can be resolved thrown in) and every time I had to take a bottle out of my bag I was reminded of my failure. I felt that my baby was rejecting me when he would thrash at the breast and not latch and the otehr stuff he did. It took a long while to bond with him, there was certainly no honeymoon period of all consuming love.

I digress. Yes I think that failing at bf and pnd can go hand in hand. I cried when I didn't have enough ebm to give my baby and had to use formula. I hated anyone else offering to give my baby a bottle and would sob my heart out - I wanted to feed my baby and that was that. I didn't (and still) don't understand why it didn't work out for me and I am so scared about having another baby in case it happens again because I know I will definitely get pnd again in that case.

My lo is 10m now and I have been having cbt and 'watch and discover' therapy since he was 6m old and I feel like the mist is clearing now and I am really coming out of the depression. It has been baby steps. I don't know how old your lo one is or if you are receiving therapy, but if you want to pm me I would be more than happy to listen (or post here).

IMO, with all the hormones going on in our pp bodies, and when you stop bf (or producing milk) a small amount of time after your baby is born, your body sort of grieves. As though thinking that you have lost the baby. Of course that is not the case, but I think there must be another big hormone shift to deal with the cessation of bf and this may lead to more depressed feelings. Just a theory of mine really based on a few things I have read on tinternet.

Sorry, that all got a bit rambly but hopefully some of it helped! xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

[andella95]

That did help, thank you!

I think in my case I had a pre-existing sense of feeling like a failure...like I couldn't do anything right...and then to find out that I was not feeding my little girl all those weeks...I felt like I couldn't even succeed as a mother doing the most basic tasks.

Since my milk dried up and I stopped I've had a lot of remaining hormonal issues. Mood swings, depression, and I've somehow gained 24 pounds since February 10th, and I'm sure a significant portion is water weight. When I was re-hospitalized with pulmonary edema a week postpartum, I had 30 pounds of excess fluid drained from me. Now I'm pretty much the same size as I was at 38 weeks pregnant. Talk about depressing! I'm just...a mess.

That's random as well, but everything seem to be interrelated and I just want to go on with my life but I can't.

 

[kickass_MOM]

me tonly mine I am very sure has to do with the loss of a breastfeeding relationship.I am also the type that likes to more often than not be the norm rather than the exception.you know the types that always feel judged and want to do what is accepted of them.That aside, I really wanted to breastfeed.I had a natural birth that was over in just 2 hours contractions et al.I was fine until then.Since then, I have been having constant mood swings.With all the external pressure (read husband and MIL) to breastfeed I was extremely rude and irritable.I still am and for some strange reason , my mom seems to be at the receiving end of it.She is taking everything personally and is getting quite affected by it.I know I am being unreasonable and I really love her and promise myself I won't be nasty again,but before I know it I have messed it up again.
Small things trigger me and make me fly off the handle even though I am ok with formula feeding now and don't think it is bad.
One of my PPD quirks: Its been 4 months since I FF and I have made every friggin bottle of formula myself and fed my LO every single time not letting anyone do it.Obsessed?perhaps!
and I am still expressing 2 measly ounces of BM and feel on top of the world If this ain't depressing behaviour what is?

 

[kanga]

...I felt like I couldn't even succeed as a mother doing the most basic tasks.

Couldn't have put it better myself. Re the fluid, I had LOADS too! I have always been 'small' and I put on almost 50% of my pre-pregnancy body weight while pregnant. I was mahoosive and it depressed me no end. Esp seeing how little it went down after labour! Rest assured though, it fell off after 4 months. I exercised (a bit too obsessively) and severely limited my food intake (again, a bit obsessively and I have done this in the past too). But I am back on track now and back to normal behaviour. The weight was just one more thing to get me down.

Kickass - i can so relate to what you have said too! My mood swings (down to pnd) were awful and I would just flip. I was so so angry inside and would snap at people I loved and friends I had just met. I had a massive barny with a lady at the childrens centre too which was totally out of character. Things like that are a sign of pnd and that its time to get help.

Excellent work with the expressing. I found it a chore and bore and a tie to the house/pump. But, given my time again, I would keep one pump a day going and give my baby whatever I got, however little. I think you will look back and be glad you have kept that up xx

Loving that I have found some people who think like me, maybe I am not crazy!!

 

[Starry Night]

I didn't get depressed but I nearly did because of my problems with BF. The thought of another feeding coming up made me feel literally ill with anxiety. I worried so much about DS not thriving and being dehydrated. I was putting his diaper to my nose to sniff whether or not there was pee in it. There often wasn't. And yet he fought and screamed each time he came to the breast. Or worse, he'd latch on beautifully and promptly fall asleep. Nothing I did could wake him up. I was crying all day. Expressing made things worse as I'd pump for 40 minutes and get 20 measly mL.

Switching to ff actually made me feel so much better. Maybe because I switched right away and didn't fight it. I don't know. But I do feel oodles of guilt. Especially as DS had lots of ongoing colds over the winter. They didn't go away until he got his flu shot. But I keep telling myself there is no way of knowing if he would have been just as congested if he had been BF. I just won't ever know. And he was always thriving and happy so what more can a mom do?

I do feel like my body is a baby failure though. Nothing went right with my pregnancy (I became very well acquainted with the ER) and I've had a hard time getting back from it. I've just now lost my baby weight and it's been 10 months. I guess the bF failure was just one more thing so I didn't feel it as much as I might have otherwise. And I had promised myself while pregnant that I wouldn't beat myself up about it. It's hard though.

So in short, not sad about FF but definitely feeling the guilt.

 

[pinksapphire]

I'm coming to join you ladies again. I failed with feeding my eldest daughter and only managed 2 weeks with her before switching to formula so i was determined to breastfeed my second child as it took me along time to except it.
My second daughter was born in January following a text book pregnancy and delivery which after a 3 day induction and gestational diabetes with my eldest was bliss.
She was a pro at feeding from the start and had latched on within an hour of being born. She latched well and i had no pain, i admit i was ecstatic and was planning on feeding her until i returned to work 12 months later. Then she was weighed! she had lost 5% off her birth weight which i was fine with as thought that as she was feeding lots she would regain it quickly. 3 days later she had gained but then she lost what she had put on and by 2 weeks she was still not back to her birth weight. This is when i was told i had a week to get her back to her birth weight or i would need to think about top ups.
We had her weighed the following week and she had gained 3oz but was still 1 oz off her birth weight and i was told i needed to top up for a while.
This is where i wish i could turn back the clock!
I decided that i would express and top her up that way as i didn't want my milk supply to be affected. I was lucky and could express what she neededto be topped up with and a week later she had put on 5oz and they were happy. However she was becoming less interested in breastfeeding as she knew she would be getting a bottle until finally she refused my breast completely. i tried to pump but couldn't keep up with demand so gave some formula so we have combi fed until this week where i can no longer pump very much and was resenting pumping as it took me away from enjoying my 2 beautiful children so we have now switched to formula.
I am very bitter about all of this as my daughter is a small baby and only weighs 10lbs 5oz at 14 weeks.she also has reflux. I feel that all she needed was a few more weeks to establish herself as she was gaining but only small amounts.
I feel that after a fantastic start i have been robbed and i am angry with myself for listening to the HV and not following my own instints.
I don't feel guilty about giving her formula as my eldest is a very healthy child who has met all of her milestones early and i have the same bond with both of them.
I was at peace with my decision until i met a friend for lunch who is breastfeeding (i'm happy for her that its going well and hope that she continues for as long as she wants) however we were talking about my daughter not wanting to latch and said 'oh, my son loves his mummys breasts and breastmilk' i have no doubt she did not mean to upset me but i nearly cried as it has made me feel that once agian my breasts have failed me and couldn't do what they were meant to. I have been in tears for the past few days and what makes it worse is that we are going on holiday together next week and i really don't want to have to have those comments made to me.
Thank you for reading as writing it out has already helped.

 

[Leopard]

Pink

 

[kanga]

pinksapphire. It's so sad when the health professionals that we rely on and put our trust in give us duff advice at our most vulnerable moments. And they end up messing our journeys up because our babies didn't want to follow their growth charts and set rules.

I hope you have a lovely time on holiday. Just think positive thought if your friend says anything else and try to turn your sorrow into happiness! You could always have a heart to heart with her on the sunloungers, about how you are sad that your bf journey was messed up this time round and that although you love seeing other people bf, it does remind you that you are not. Where are you off on holiday? I'm going to Greece in 2 weeks and can't wait!

 

[pinksapphire]

Thanks ladies. I spoke to my HV about how I regret topping up as I feel it wasn't needed and she has admitted that my daughter will probably always be a slow gainer and in hindsight they could have left me to it. But they were worried that she had dropped from 25th to 2nd centile. I wish they had measured her length at the time as she is now measuring just under the 2nd centile for length too.

We're only going to Devon (so no sunbeds with this weather lol) but there is 12 adults, 2 toddlers and 2 babies so we should have lots of fun. If my friend says anything again I will tell her how I'm feeling but she is a very sensitive, nervous person (oh, the irony! i have seen her cry when she spilt a glass of coke) so I don't want to come across as criticising her as she is finding being a mum really difficult.
I hope you have a lovely time in Greece, its such a beautiful country. I can't wait to go abroad later in the year.

 

[Kage76]

i think all of us have a moment where we wish we could go back and change something- in fact in my case i had myself convinced that if i just pumped more or was more committed to breastfeeding i would have found the time to pump more and we would have finally breastfed. In reality, the one thing that really put paid to my BF dream is that i had a sick daughter. And the definition of a mother is putting them first- so when faced with a choice FF or your daughter remains in ICU and has to have yet another drip put in- formula won. Do i regret it- logically no- but my heart does. But when I really *really* think about what putting BF in front of my daughters best interests meant (more needles more pain no food only glucose solution) I know i did the right thing. You did the right thing for your girl- its too easy to look back at the past with rose tinted glasses- you may have been able to BF- but you don't know that for sure- you made the best decision for your daughter at the time. Don't beat yourself up for it.

 

[kanga]

Cornwall is so nice, you will have a fab time with such a big group. We wanted to go to Cornwall but found it rather expensive, esp compared to the lovely bargain Greece deal I found. Not looking forward to the 7am flight though!

 

[Kage76]

im very jealous of you you UK girls - you have so many exotic locations within a hop skip and a jump- bloody takes me a 5 hour flight just to get out of Australia!

 

[Leopard]

Australia is more exotic than nearly anywhere in the world.

 

[andella95]

I wanted to post this here just because I'd brought it up earlier in the thread (somewhat).

We finally switched our baby to Alimentum, which stopped the excessive diarrhea. but still had pretty major issues with spit up. We ended up getting some ready-to-feed today - and no more spit up!!!

A pediatrician acted like we were stupid when I mentioned before that my son didn't tolerate the powdered Alimentum, only the RTF. He said that the only difference was water...but that's not true!! The first ingredient in the powder is Corn Maltodextrin - and there is NONE in the RTF.

My babies couldn't tolerate mlilk protein OR the corn products.

ETA- RTF Alimentumn is $10/quart, and I doubt we'll be able to stay on it.

 

[Kage76]

im glad that you are finally getting somewhere with a formula that suits you LO- why on earth do they put corn solids in the powdered stuff and not the RTF stuff- seems crazy-