Daniel is currently playing on the floor in front of me. He doesn't seem to mind but last night was his last taste of breast milk. The journey we have had from 12:05 on September 4th last year to now has been rocky, emotional, but honestly one of the most rewarding things I've ever done.
I wasn't a 'lactavist' before giving birth. I intended to breastfed and had read up on it and knew it was best for baby in so many ways. I'd read the Down's Syndrome Association's booklet on breastfeeding a baby with Down's. I knew for the health benefits first, the oral development second, and cost savings and convenience third, this baby would be breastfed if at all possible.
Roll on 24 hours after Daniel had been born, with an exceedingly unsupportive midwife overnight who wouldn't give him time at the breast (I had a Caesarean and was unable to get out of bed to fetch him) or let me hand express myself in order to syringe feed him the colostrum, and I had a seriously ill baby in the ICU separated from me. Suddenly giving my baby my milk was all I could do for him, I wasn't allowed to hold him, change his nappies - everything came down to pumping and providing him with every ml that I could get out. I spoke to my wonderful community midwife on the phone and she gave me a pumping schedule that involved my day looking like this:
0200 pump
0630 pump
0830 pump, decant expressed milk into ICU containers, get lift to hospital, hand milk over to Daniel's nurse for the day
1030 pump (in the family rooms in ICU during the day, they were freezing cold, and smelt funny. That's all I remember)
1230 pump
1430 pump
1630 pump, Colin would join me after work and we would sit by Daniel's incubator
1830 pump (at my mum and dads or wherever we went for dinner)
2030 pump
2300 pump
Daniel was discharged at 3 weeks old on bottles of expressed milk. Considering he'd been iv drip and then tube fed in hospital, the bottle feeding was a real development and we were delighted to just get him home and work on establishing breastfeeding then. It took another three weeks before he latched on, and about two more weeks for me to phase off the pumping and have him fully exclusively fed from the breast directly.
I can't describe how wonderful breastfeeding has been. His whole body cuddled into mine, his little hand reaching up to touch me, his milky smiles. All the stuff I read but could only identify with once it was my son and my own experience.
Breastfeeding wasn't easy though. Daniel has a hole in his heart, and two structural problems with his trachea and larynx which made him tire easily and feeds routinely took 1 1/2 hours. Those autumn and winter months were spent on my bum (eating chocolate and drinking tea) while Daniel slowly fed. By January he was so lethargic he only ate and slept. Surgery to relieve the obstructions in his airways was now desperately needed to help him put on weight and get more oxygen.
Within a few weeks, his feeds were quicker but certainly not the quick 5-10 minutes many of my friends' breastfed babies were doing. I always needed to watch the clock when he was due a feed, firstly as Daniel rarely alerted us to being hungry so my daily charts, based on those used in ICU, were vital, and secondly as once he started to feed I needed to be prepared to be there an hour later.
As the months went by, my enthusiasm for breastfeeding has increased. I don't believe there is enough support for mums. Breastfeeding is normal. The majority of women and babies can breastfeed yet here in Northern Ireland we have one of the lowest breastfeeding rates in the world. Too many healthcare professionals see breastfeeding as a tick box exercise and make mums keen to breastfed doubt themselves by suggesting topping up with formula, or pumping on top of breastfeeds to stimulate supply. Other people just aren't able to sacrifice the time and energy to breastfeeding, either because they have to return to work within a short period of time or because they want the freedom of using formula and not being tied to their baby's side. The fact remains that breastfeeding is amazing and should be the way most babies are fed, though I'm not sure that the tide will ever turn.
Then, while away camping at the end of August, aged 11 1/2 months Daniel started biting. His sixth tooth, and the fourth top tooth, was cutting, the other top teeth having come through a month earlier with no impact on his feeding. He seemed particularly struggling to feed on one side so we checked out his ears (they were fine), and then I decided to pump so that my supply wouldn't drop. He has only taken a few feeds from me since. He wasn't self weaning as he kept trying to feed, and he seemed very upset by not being able to feed. I tried all the tips for biting and nursing strikes to no avail, and do wonder if Daniel's learning disability played a part in him struggling to start breastfeeding again. I've been pumping 3-4 times a day for the last month and Daniel has had 2/3 bottles of expressed milk each day but my supply is clearly dropping and it's exhausting being back at work and trying to continue to pump and feed. I took the decision this week to reduce the pumps and start giving him cows milk.
I have very mixed feelings about all this. I've given my body and my freedom to my son for over a year. It's tied me to spending all my time with him and I can't lie I'm looking forward to not having to get up early every morning to feed him, or have to be around every early evening to do his late afternoon and before-bed feeds. I'm really looking forward to taking pain relief for the first time in 21 months-next time I get a migraine I'll be lost in a triptan induced daze for weeks as it's been so long since I took one! I also can't wait to dump those nursing bras! However, I'm also gutted. I am upset our breastfeeding journey ended just at the start of a winter bug season and I'm terrified he's going to get really sick as I know his immune system isn't great and the antibodies in my milk were giving him an important boost. I'm upset we won't have our special hours each day together for feeding. And I am sad that he won't remember any of it: the struggles, the sense of achievement, the warmth of each other, the early mornings, the late nights - but at least I have those memories and a few photos of him latched on looking very cute.
So here's to my little boy growing up, here's to the fact I fed him exclusively with my milk for six months and for another 7 months on top of that, here's to his health, his future and our mother-son relationship maturing and changing as he gets older!
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