It's all about the boobs (The Aftermath)

Because of the cesarean our stay in the hospital was four days.  We had lots of visitors who brought gifts and snacks and loved meeting Anderson.  This stay, however, was far from a four star experience.  Sure, we had fantastic nurses (I cannot say enough about the nurses), but no one really let you rest.  The first day I was still hooked up to a lot of equipment so it was constantly checking this, that, and the other, taking medicines, and making sure Baby A was eating EVERY THREE HOURS!

So let's talk about this...

My plan all along was to breast feed.  We knew it was the best, healthiest option for the baby and well, it's free.  But, I had a feeling all throughout my pregnancy that breast feeding was not going to come easy.  First of all, my boobs didn't really grow throughout my pregnancy.  In fact, I never bought a new bra or really outgrew my bras.  And then I kept thinking I would "leak" something at some point and I never did.  But, when it came time to feed the baby things seemed to happen naturally.  He was able to latch on no problem and it appeared that he was being nourished.  By the end of our stay in the hospital, however, Anderson had dropped 11% of his weight and the nurses were concerned.  The baby was not sleeping, was quite fussy, and the nurses were now pressuring us to feed the baby every two hours.  With the hormones, the not sleeping, and the fact I missed two days of my Prozac, I was a flipping mess.  I was just crying and crying over the fact that my baby was not eating and I could not provide for him.  Finally, we made the decision to just supplement with a little bit of formula so I knew he was getting something, anything.  Wow!  What a difference.  He was content and sleeping like a rock.  Something was definitely not working with the breast feeding.

About two days before we were discharged, I started feeling a little off.  The nurses noticed my temperature was elevated but not enough to alarm anyone.  I would wake up in the middle of the night, though, drenched in sweat yet shivering as if I had been out in the snow.  I figured this was just hormones or whatnot so I didn't say anything to anyone.  When I got home, though, I started to feel worse.  The sweats and chills continued and I was a bit delirious, feverish, and just overall not feeling well.  The breast feeding was still not going well; Dave was pressuring me to continue with it; and my mom and my sister were at my house trying to be helpful while continuously telling me how hungry the baby was.  All I could do was cry and cry and cry.  My sister finally convinced me to call the doctor about how I was feeling.  The doctor thought it was not normal and that I probably had an infection.  She called in a prescription and within 24 hours I was feeling better.

Back to the breast feeding.  Dave's aunt is a lactation consultant and we called her to ask her some questions.  She gave us a few suggestions which we tried, but we continued to feed Anderson formula to make sure he was eating.  When we took Anderson to the doctor just shy of one week since his birth he was back up to 8 pounds.  Eleven days post baby I still hadn't gotten my milk and stopped trying all the things I was doing like pumping or having the baby latch on.  My milk was not coming in (and still hasn't).  Even though we would have preferred Anderson be breast fed, he is being formula fed and that's okay by us.

The first week was rough, I'm not going to lie.  I knew it would be but I didn't expect a cesarean followed by an infection followed by not being able to breast feed my child.  Every day it gets a little easier.