My breastfeeding experience

Whew. Breastfeeding is such a huge topic. I honestly hadn't given it much thought while pregnant. If people asked about it (and they did, surprisingly often!) I would just say that I planned to breastfeed but I wasn't going to go crazy doing it. I've seen the full gamut with my friends, from people who had it come really naturally to people who struggled desperately. But nothing really prepared me for the intense emotions that you get caught up in when you're in that zone.

{5 days old}

So I'll say it upfront. I don't really love breastfeeding. I hadn't given any thought to whether or not I'd enjoy it, I'd only considered whether or not I could physically do it. I assumed that if you were able to breastfeed without massive struggles, that it would be a lovely, bonding experience. And for lots of people it is, which is wonderful. But it's also okay to just .... not love it, or to feel a little trapped by it. Once we got over the initial hump (which is a very mild way to describe an incredible blend of tears and pain and guilt and frustration) and settled into a routine it became bearable and even sweet at times, but it's still not my favorite thing.

I feel guilty saying this, because so many people desperately want to breastfeed and can't. But there it is. My experience is probably colored by the fact that my baby doesn't seem to love it either. She's almost always all business, eating fairly quickly every 3 - 4 hours and then wanting to get on with doing something else (other than in the first few months, when cluster feeding was real).

I did struggle in the beginning and somehow I wasn't fully prepared for that. My colostrum came in the night before I went into labor (I was a week overdue, not sure if that has something to do with it) and my milk had come in by the second day, but I still struggled to get her to latch in the hospital. It hurt, so much. The hospital lactation consultant came by regularly to check on us, but she just kept saying that if it hurt it meant she wasn't latching right and so she'd pop the baby off and we'd try relatching, but no matter what position we tried it always hurt and I'd finally just say that it felt fine because I was so damn tired of trying. I ended up hand expressing in a tiny cup a few times and we tried to feed her that way. I cried a lot. After 48 hours I was so stressed about it that we called to make an appointment with an outside lactation consultant for the day after I was released. This ended up being a great decision. Seeing someone in a private setting felt really different from the hospital and for the first month she would call regularly to check in so we felt like we had support. She did pre- and post-feeding weights, checked the baby's latch, showed D how to help get the baby in position, and told me that my postpartum bra situation was an actual travesty that needed to be remedied ASAP (shockingly, the $10 bralette I purchased from Target was not cutting it). It was a splurge (about $200) but well worth it and it was FSA eligible.

I never did find a magical way to make it pain free right away or get the perfect latch, even with that help. There were a lot of tears in the beginning. And I didn't fully believe all the people who told me that it would get so much easier, if I could just hang in there. I told myself that my goal was to make it to six months, and then if I got that far I'd try for a year. I just kept trying and it did get easier and easier and around three months I noticed that it had become pretty effortless for us. She had gotten bigger and stronger and better at latching. The evening cluster feeding had started to ease off.

There have been lots of ups and downs since then, and things got really interesting around five months, when she started getting more easily distracted and we went through a long phase where I could only get her to eat by sitting in a silent, dark room. We struggled with weight gain, which took up a whoooole lot of my mental space for several months (discussed a bit here, the good news is that everything seems to have settled out - she was just taking longer to find her curve). But I also credit breastfeeding with really helping out her immunity during her first winter in daycare, which happened to also be a pretty vicious cold/flu season. And now that we're at 11 months it actually does feel fairly easy and sweet for us.

I'm not an expert but if you're in that place, where you're lucky enough that things are (mostly) working physically but the whole experience is feeling more challenging than you expected, here's what helped for me:

Get outside support. If you can afford an LC visit, that's amazing. A cheaper alternative can be a breastfeeding support group (I did this as well), or a good online community.

Do what you need to do to get through it (especially the evening cluster feeding sessions). In the early days, I would watch Netflix and simultaneously play Candy Crush the whole time. My sister's (male) doctor told her that you won't properly bond with your baby if you multitask while breastfeeding, to which I say - spoken like someone who has never had to sit alone and feed a baby for 45 minutes out of every hour, for weeks on end. Also, fuck off, sir. In my (limited) experience, there are so many ways to bond with your baby. For me, breastfeeding was stressful, but babywearing was amazing. I spent hours every day wearing her in the Solly wrap and it was the sweetest experience. We bonded just fine, thank you.

Eyes on the prize. If you can do it without losing your mind, there are real benefits to breastfeeding that might make the initial struggle feel worth it. I mean, sure, the health benefits to baby and mom are the main thing, but you know what was more motivating to me in my post-baby state? Dishes. And time. Boobs do not need to be sanitized or scrubbed, beyond a shower. They do not need to be pulled out of the fridge and heated up in the middle of the night. By the time I went back to work and was dealing with the reality of bottles I was so grateful to be able to breastfeed at night, just because it was so much less work. And the immune benefits have definitely helped during this first winter in daycare. She recovers so much faster than I do from each cold we share, and that is amazing.

So here we are, just one month shy of my one year goal. I'm not 100% sure how things will transition in the next few months. I sometimes feel a pang when I feed her right before bed and realize that these days are numbered, but for the most part I feel pretty relieved that we're close to being done and that pretty soon I won't have to think about the pumping/feeding logistics. At this point, I plan to stop pumping at 12 months, but I'm going to try to follow her lead as far as breastfeeding goes. In my dream world we would just have a night and morning session, and then taper those off, but I'm willing to see how things progress.

{first Sunday at home}

Pumping and working

One of the biggest mysteries to me when I was planning to go back to work was how people handled pumping logistics. And of course it turns out people do whatever works for them, which varies widely depending on your work situation and your baby's needs, but I found reading about what everyone was doing helpful for me to get ideas so I'm sharing here (I took notes at each stage, otherwise there is no way in hell I would actually remember all this). This is a super long post, and will be incredibly boring if you aren't in the throes of pumping. Sorry!

I'm not going to really talk about breastfeeding here because that is it's own separate (long) post that I'll get up sometime soon.



First of all, I'm super lucky because I got to work from home for a bit, so I didn't need to start really pumping on a schedule until 5 months. During this time I was able to build a decent freezer stash by using the Haakaa silicone pump during my early morning feeding, when my supply was highest. Adrian pretty consistently only nursed on one side in the morning, so I'd feed her and just use the Haakaa on the other side at the same time and I'd generally collect 4 - 5 ounces with minimal effort that way, which just went into the freezer in storage bags. The Haakaa is amazing, I highly recommend it. We're at almost 11 months and I still use it almost every day. It's so low effort, and so easy to clean.

When I was ready to go back to work I was also lucky, because I was able to plan it out so that my first week back was a bit of a soft start. Adrian was in daycare but I had a flexible week at work where I knew it would be okay if I had to work fewer hours. That let me practice pumping at work without feeling super pressured or stressed, and I figured out what I needed in order to make it feel easier.

Pumping at work set up - supplies

Spectra S1 - Hugely thankful for my Spectra S1, which holds a very decent charge (about three hours!), so I can pump while I'm getting ready in the morning and not be chained to an outlet. I've also (many times) had to use it in a bathroom stall when I'm working away from my office. Do you know how hard it is to find a private space with a plug when you're out in public? I got this pump for free from a friend (I just replaced the tubing, flanges, valves, etc), but it would 100% have been worth the purchase price for me and I've heard that you can use the 20% off coupons at Buy, Buy, Baby which would help. The S2 is a little less expensive and doesn't hold a charge. If you're debating between the two I think the extra $40 for the S1 is beyond worth it. (Also, if you are using a Spectra I found this post super helpful)

Hands free pumping bra - I bought an attachment (Bravado pumping bra panel) that works with most nursing bras, rather than getting a pumping specific bra. I have two so I can rotate while they're in the laundry. For bras, I use the Bravado body silk yoga bra, which is more supportive and feels a little like a sports bra, and the Lively mesh trim maternity bralettes, which provide basically zero support but make me feel less claustrophobic. Both of these work with the pumping panel.

Baggu - I thought about getting a nice bag designed to hold a pump but ultimately couldn't handle the price tag on something I'd be using for less than a year. This is fine. If I had to travel more for work I would probably have decided to get the bag. I did try to DIY an insert with some dividers for it, using cut up insulated bags and some hot glue and it kind of worked? I mean, it's falling apart but at least there's a little cushioned spot for the pump to go.

Cloth produce bags (from Ecobags) - I already had these and I realized they are amazing for pumping. Instead of washing my pump parts between sessions I put them in the cloth bags and stick them in the fridge, then bring them home and wash them each night. Another option would be to use a plastic or glass tub and just wash it out each night but this takes up less space. I also use the bags for holding the clean, empty bottles I bring to work.

Bottles - It took us a while to find bottles the baby liked and we settled on the Nuk Simply Natural. I bring empty, clean bottles with me to work, fill them up after I pump, and then drop them off at daycare when I pick up the baby each day. They give me whatever she used that day and I wash them at home. Side note - if you're trying to get your baby to take a bottle we found that we had to try several different bottles but also had to test different temperatures. It turned out Adrian would only take a bottle if the milk was very warm (about 104 degrees, which is the max recommended temp) - she would reject the bottle over and over again if it was cool, but if we got it up to her preferred temp she'd happily down the entire thing very quickly. Babies are weird.

Storage bags - I prefer the Medela bags personally (less floppy than the Lasinoh bags) so I use those. I always keep a supply in my pump tote, because there are multiple days when I've forgotten to pack bottles. The Target ones are my runner up.

Masking tape - I label the bottles with a strip of masking tape with the date when I fill them. I also align the top edge of the tape with the liquid level of the bottle. This was a game changer for us, because we like to track how much she's drinking but it's really hard to remember to write down how many ounces are in a bottle before you give it to her, especially when she's hungry and you're just in a rush to get her fed.

Sharpie - For writing on the tape. I keep one in my drying rack at home and one in my tote.

Insulated lunch bag with freezer pack - For transporting bottles and pump parts back and forth. Maybe not strictly necessary if you're just going straight from work to daycare, but I like it for peace of mind. Also very handy for the days when I've had to work off site and need to keep stuff cold all day without a fridge. I don't have a specific one to recommend, I just grabbed something on sale from Target.

Bottle drying rack - We don't have a dishwasher, and I don't want her stuff jumbled up with our dishes. The Boon patch is cute and fits well on our small counter. I also have a couple of the accessories (started with the flower, ended up with the twig and cactus) to give me more drying space for small parts.

Bottle brush - I resisted this for months because it seemed unnecessary and I regret waiting so long. It works so much better than our little hipster wire scrub brush and makes bottle washing go way faster every night. I don't know that the brand matters, probably anything that is specifically designed for baby bottles works well. We have the Munchkin ones and I like them.

Pumping schedules: For reference, I go into work early so I usually pump at 6am at home because the baby doesn't consistently wake up (or eat quickly enough) for me to wait for her. I decided I'd rather pump than wake her up to eat at 5:30 and hope that she'd go back down. If I left later then I would just feed her instead of pumping first thing.

Schedule at 5 months (pumping 3x a day at work, feeding/pumping at least once per night). Note - for me this schedule would also have worked at 3 months, her eating habits didn't change all that much in that time period.

Pump at 6am, put the milk in a bottle, leave it on the counter for D to give the baby when she wakes up.

Pump at 9am, noon, and 3pm (ish for all these times, +/- 30 minutes). I set alarms on my phone to remind myself. At each session, I pumped for 10 - 15 minutes, transferred the milk to a bottle and labeled it, then put the pump parts (in a cloth bag) and the bottle in the fridge. At the end of the day I'd transfer all the bottles to my insulated bag. If I was working somewhere without a fridge for the day I'd just keep both the pump parts and the bottles in the insulated bag.

Feed the baby before putting her down (~6pm). In theory, I would have fed her at daycare pick up as well (~5) but she is way too distracted to even consider it. If she's there, she wants to play.

Feed on demand at night - at five months she would wake up once or twice a night to eat, depending on how much she would take in at daycare (usually about 9 ounces during the 8ish hours there, but as little as 5 oz and as much as 12 oz).

Dropping my middle of the night pumping: By one month in, it was clear that I was not cut out for this level of routine sleep deprivation. D wanted to help by giving her bottles at night but that didn't actually help because I would still have to wake up to pump if I didn't feed her. I had a breakdown at 6 months when I realized I hadn't slept for more than 4 hours at a time since her birth, and my average was more like 2 - 3 hours, once you factor in how long it takes me to fall asleep after being woken up (lifelong insomniac here). I decided I had to cut out the night pumping for my sanity, so that we could alternate night duties and I could actually sleep through. I wasn't sure how to do this so I just tried stretching out the night interval based on my comfort level. I'm very lucky and my boobs adjusted quickly. In the beginning I could go from 11pm to 5:30am, but within a few days I was able to stretch it out to 9:30pm to 6:00am (everyone is different! check with an LC if possible, and be careful because mastitis is definitely a risk when you're dropping feeds/pumps). Starting around 6.5 months, D and I alternated nights on duty*. This was a huge help because we were each guaranteed a full night of sleep every other night. I would pump right before I went to bed just in case she slept through the night. This almost never happened but the few times it did were pure bliss. Personally, I found that my supply wasn't really impacted by dropping the night feeds - if I'm on duty and feed her at night, I usually pump 4 - 5 ounces at 6am, whereas if I sleep through I pump 8 - 10 ounces at 6am - that's stayed pretty consistent even to this day (10.5 months). Storage capacity is hugely individual, though.

After that was well established I also decided to cut my work pumping down to twice a day. I felt comfortable doing this because I had a good freezer supply and Adrian had reduced her milk intake after starting solids at 6 months. By 7 months she would rarely eat more than 9 ounces per day at daycare, often less, and with three pumping sessions I was routinely pumping 12 ounces (plus pumping more in the morning and pre-bedtime sessions). I knew some days I'd fall short if I cut back but I was willing to take that risk for the payoff of fewer pumping sessions. Surprisingly, this didn't end up affecting my supply as much as I expected. I had a small dip in the beginning, but then my body adjusted and between the two pumping sessions I would produce 10 - 12 ounces, which is almost the same as what I was getting out of three pumping sessions.

Schedule at 7 months (pumping twice a day at work, sometimes skipping night feeds):
Pump at 6am, at home.
Pump at 10am and 2pm at work.
Feed at 6pm, at home.
Pump at 9:30pm and either sleep through the night, or take my turn getting up and feeding her.

We're at 9.5 months now and I'm still using this schedule. As we approach 10 months I think it's time to modify again. Adrian now eats less than 5 oz most days at daycare (although it varies! the day before yesterday she ate 2 oz and then yesterday she ate 12 oz, insert shrug emoji here), as her solid food intake has increased. I'm considering reducing down so that I'm only pumping once during the workday. The fear of losing supply is so real that I'm super nervous about doing it, even though realistically I know we have a good freezer stash and I'm routinely pumping over twice what she eats while I'm at work which is a clear indicator to me that we're out of sync. So I'm probably going to try the new schedule once we hit 10 months, I think I just talked myself into it. I'll report back.

UPDATE: I didn't get this posted when I planned to, and I did adjust my pumping schedule right before we hit 10 months. I'm three weeks in (four weeks in? who knows?) and this is what my schedule looks like.

Schedule at 10 months (pumping ONCE a day at work, sometimes skipping night feeds):
Pump at 6am, at home.
Pump at noon at work.
Feed at 6:30pm, at home.
Pump at 8:30pm and either sleep through the night, or take my turn getting up and feeding her. We've split up our nights differently now, since she usually only wakes up once and goes back down easily. If she wakes up before midnight then D handles feedings (since I just pumped) and if she wakes up after midnight I handle feedings. Most nights she wakes up once but there are nights where she sleeps through, which is lovely.

Reducing down to one pumping session has lowered my supply for sure - I usually get 5 - 6 ounces during that one session (whereas I was getting 10 - 12 over two). But actually I think this is a good thing for me! My supply and her demand are better synced up so we have fewer frustrating weekend days where my boobs are dying and she isn't interested in eating - I rarely pump on the weekends anymore, other than my pre-bedtime session. I've also found that with a lower supply I can stretch out my night time a little more, so I pump at 8:30pm and can make it until 6:30am if need be (goal is to get to the point where I can just go from her last feeding until morning without needing to pump and we're getting closer). It's tough figuring out how to adjust to match her needs when we aren't together most of the day, but we're fumbling towards it.

Right now my plan is to stop pumping at 12 months but continue to feed on demand until she's ready to wean (hopefully within a few more months but I'm happy to follow her lead on that). As I mentioned, I'll also post about our breastfeeding experience, which was not really what I expected (spoiler - I feel like an evil person admitting it but I just don't love breastfeeding).

UPDATE! I intended to stop pumping at exactly one year, and I was so excited about it, but it ended up taking me a couple weeks and it was bumpier than expected. I thought that since dropping down to one pumping session wasn't a big deal that dropping that last pumping session would be easy-peasy. It was not. The first day I gleefully left my pump at home I was brutally uncomfortable by 3pm and I was frantically texting daycare and asking them not to feed her so that I could feed her the second I picked her up (early, because I was dying). So I backed off and starting pumping again. At first I was going to gradually reduce the time but my body was so accustomed to the pump that even reducing to 5 minutes didn't change my output much (which really made me feel like I'd been wasting time with my 10 - 15 minute sessions). So I would set a timer and pump for just 1 - 2 minutes, watching to make sure I was only getting a couple ounces, juuuust enough to take the edge off. I did this for a week, then the next week we went on vacation so I was feeding on demand, and then the following week I quit pumping but still brought my pump to work every day, just in case. Driving home on Friday after my first full week with no pumping I realized I was feeling ragey/weepy/anxious for no apparent reason (other than the fact that the political world was a dumpster fire). I think I was having a hormonal adjustment, and I felt a little like I was losing my mind for a couple days. For me, it cleared up quickly and I felt back to normal the next week. I decided to keep breastfeeding on demand and allow A to set her own pace for weaning, and we ended up breastfeeding until 14.5 months(ish). I think my supply took a massive hit when I stopped pumping and within a couple months there just wasn't enough milk at our morning and evening sessions for her to be interested. She weaned gradually, cutting down to one session per day on her own, and then she started going a few days at a time without asking, and then it was the last time (which of course I didn't realize, at some point I thought about it and it had been nearly a week since she'd asked and I was like, whoa, I guess we're done). I'm glad that it was gradual and comfortable and felt natural for both of us.


* This post is already sooooo long, but I feel the need to insert this here because it drives me nuts. Inevitably, if I say that D and I alternate nights someone will tell me how lucky I am (and I understand that! I'm not mad at the people who say it, just at the weird cultural norm that dads get to sleep more or are somehow less responsible for baby care). And my stance on this is that I am NOT lucky that my partner, with whom I jointly made the decision to have a baby, takes responsibility for caring for that baby. I mean, D is amazing and he's a wonderful partner for so many reasons and I feel lucky that he's in my life, but honestly, I think taking care of OUR baby should be a default, not something extra special and nice that he does for me. It blows my mind that there is some expectation that one partner will do all the night wake ups when both people work full time jobs, have the same sleep needs, and the baby is okay taking a bottle. Okay, rant over.