Birth Revisited DD#1..Part 2 Booby trapped!

Lets see where we left off..

Oh yes, after a very disappointing birth experience I got to see my baby who did not want to eat.. a little formula was used on my nipple and I didn't even think about it I just gave in to their suggestions. What did they expect a champion nurser after that epidural? Back to my room I got wheeled in...

Being as Excited as I was I could not sleep, I had not slept in two days though and a couple of hours of tossing and turning inevitably turned to exhaustion and I started drifting off to sleep.... ah sleep... nice..cozy zzzzzzzzzzzzzz

RIIIINNG RIIINGG! what in the world oh! the phone
Hello? Hi this is the special care unit, it's time to feed your baby.. did you want to come or should we just give her formula.

Me: Starting to cry... could please just give her formula? I haven't slept in 2 days..I feel horrible but..

Nurse: Don't worry! Get some rest a little formula wont hurt her.

Me: ok...

MY daughter was in the special care unit with an IV in her little arm because they were scared she could develop an infection from my membranes being ruptured so long *rolls eyes. So I did not have the luxury of having my baby in the room with me.. I had to get up and get wheeled in to the special care unit, the next day I had to walk there because the nurse in one was or another pretty much called me lazy. I was swollen all over! My feed looked like they had Elephantitis! It was difficult to walk.

The next day I nursed, the lactation lady came and helped me get her latched properly etc etc.. You can even see her hand in the picture.

The next couple of feedings went ok but this is where it gets confusing I don't remember the conversations or anything like that but when she got discharged, she went home with formula, you know those little disposable bottle ones they have.

Nursing was great but the first night back home we had ourselves a fussy baby that was so fussy she wouldn't latch, then she would latch and scream bloody murder! Nervous and scared we deduced that she was hungry and that the colostrum wasn't enough and that We needed to go to the pharmacy fast! to get bottles and some formula so this baby could eat! So off we went, but that was an epic fail because she seemed to not be getting anything out of the bottle so we poked a hole in and and she nearly choked..

OMG! I thought this was all supposed to come naturally!!

We survived and my milk came in.. OH boy did it come in! Nobody told me I was going to feel like I was in hell! To me my milk coming in (<--happened both times) feels like I have the worst case of mastitis x 3!! I thought I was going to die!! Then I had milk leaking everywhere! So she nursed, but somehow (I now scratch my head as to how I was so naive) I felt formula was giving her more than me, She didn't seem full after I fed her because she always wanted to eat (what I now know is Cluster feeding to make you produce more milk!) So I would "supplement" with formula.

"A dietary supplement, also known as food supplement or nutritional supplement, is a preparation intended to supplement the diet and provide nutrients, such as vitamins, minerals, fiber, fatty acids, or amino acids, that may be missing or may not be consumed in sufficient quantities in a person's diet. Some countries define dietary supplements as foods, while in others they are defined as drugs or natural health products" 1*

You don't Supplement breast milk with formula! You Sabotage its production!
Man Oh Man was I naive!

After a while I had to go back to work, I felt embarrassed to pump there and I didn't have a fancy pump, also I have what I call "Pump stage fright" You know how some people can't go in a public restroom because other people are there? The sight of a pump inhibits my letdown..So I've never been a good "pumper".
Also the very little I would get I figured was indicative of what I was making.. what?? I only make an ounce? no wonder baby is hungry all the time...

Here is a great article from Kellymom.com on not pumping "enough milk" Man I wish I knew about Kellymom then...

After just three months, I gave up on breastfeeding.. It was hard! And then on mommy forums I became and enabler, I unknowingly helped sabotage breastfeeding for others by saying things like:

"it's ok.. breastfeeding is hard! Formulas is not the monster they make it out to be"
"Don't stress over it I am sure your baby would much rather you be happy"
"Nothing wrong with supplementing with a little formula"
"Hey you breastfed for 2 days! Awesome the fact that you tried was enough"

I often thought I was helping these women by warding off the "Breastfeeding Nazis"

"Breastfeeding worked our great for you? Awesome! We're not all as lucky"
"Give us a break we tried! Some women just can't breastfeed"
"Why can't we just agree to disagree"

I now would like to apologize those women I enabled, You know the term "misery loves company"? I think in enabling you I was justifying my own reasons for giving up.

I would also like to apologize to the breastfeeding advocates for calling them Nazis and making your job harder... however you were doing it the wrong way, attacking most of the time instead of being more gentle with the information.

But one true friend and lactivist "L.S" She was persistent, She was tough sometimes but she was also gentle with the info, she was sympathetic but to the point, I reached out to her after a while on trying to re lactate, a lot of people helped me! And I tried hard.. I tried so hard but by then my dear daughter was not interested anymore.

I then eventually learned to let it go. I knew I tried, I was comfortable in knowing that and I stopped feeling attacked for my choices, when I did that I opened my heart for information and I listened! I listened to what was really going on in the parenting world, how easily we are misguided and are pushed into making poor choices thinking we are doing good. How big profit is to be made out of compromising our children and our health.

Many things have changed since my first, I made many mistakes int he beginning with her, we got off to a rough start but I am happy to report she is doing fine, at least kids are a work in progress never really completed until they start making their own choices..

As for now I am gentle with my choices, the choices I make for them are not my right, they are a privilege! And it is our responsibility as parents to "proceed with caution" and "handle with care" .

RESEARCH! Do not be afraid to be proven wrong.. I was booby trapped and I booby trapped others but I did not make the same mistakes!

"Whenever a warrior decides to do something, he must go all the way, but he must take responsibility for what he does. No matter what he does, he must know first why he is doing it, and then he must proceed with his actions without having doubts or remorse about them."
Carlos Castaneda


I'd like to dedicate this post to L.S! Hey you! Lactivist! you made a change! <3 size="1">
1* Source: Wikipedia.com

I am lazy therefore I Breastfeed...

I have been meaning to write about this for a while.. but alas I am lazy and I am a procrastinator.

It's true 10 months later I am still breastfeeding and though I am mentally "over it" at times, I know I will keep doing it like a bad habit.

See forget the benefits of breast milk, forget the fact that it's natural..With exception of the first couple of weeks roller coaster, It has got to be the most uncomplicated thing in my life, baby+boob= bliss for her and sometimes for me.

*Sure when they can drink their own bottle it's nice to have your arms free, but you gotta hold them lovingly once in a while right? Bam! I got that darn cuddling out of the way WHILE feeding her AND while spending time on facebook now that is some multitasking!I absolutely LOVE using it as an excuse to get hubby to fetch stuff for me, bunny (that's what I call my hubby) can you get me glass of water? Bunny can you give me the remote? Bunny can you get me a blanket? Bunny can you get me some crackers? After all I can't move, the baby is sleeping on me :D Bunny can you put the dishes away? I meant to do it right now but darn baby decided to nurse! Who can say no to a breastfeeding mother?

*When she's hungry and I don't feel like making her something BAM! here have some boob! (I remember Jessica from the leaky boob blogging about how sometimes she wished feeding her whole family were that easy..I agree)

* When it's time to go to bed there's no drama, no fuss, she nurses herself to sleep next to me, she gets hungry in the middle of the night? I don't have to get up and make her a bottle inf act I don't have to wake up she just finds a boob and helps herself!

*I can use her as an excuse to get out of talking to people when the convo gets boring at family events,, sorry gotta go nurse be back in a bit (even though I've been known to whip 'em out before heheh.

*I don't have to lug around a huge diaper bag, just put a couple of diaper inserts in my purse with some wipes and spray bottle and I'm good to go.

I can go on and on...Really it's not a lie.. breastfeeding is easy may not start that way for some but it gets easier...I am NOT ready to give that up no way baby! I don't care that you're turning a year! suck it up! (pun intended) because Mommy is too lazy not to feed you the good stuff oh and she'd be too jealous of the cows feeding you.

Are you a lazy breast feeder too?

Instinctive Parenting.

What does it mean to be an Instinctive Mother. I am not the one to coin this phrase, it's been used in the natural, attachment, granola parenting community, however it stuck with me.

Just the other day I heard of the term AP Lite for the first time, it means do everything AP except cloth diaper, but I'll come back to that in a bit.

I learned a lot with my first daughter, as a matter of fact I was all mainstream! My intentions were good but I didn't have all of the information and I thought things we supposed to be done certain ways.. (feed every 2 hours, my milk hasn't came in go get formula!, Cloth diapers are disgusting and waste more water by having to constantly wash them, boys are supposed to be circumcised to look like daddy, We got vaxed and we were fine!, Curse those breastfeeding Nazis and their plan to take over the world with their weapons of Mass production, Yaay my 9 month old is 20 lbs can she forward face now? I want to be able to see her!, How dare you judge my parenting..etc etc etc..)

However not even with my first daughter did I want to give birth in a hospital, but I ended up in one. My second daughter was a home birth and then I got the virus! The Crunchy Virus and it started spreading Home birthing lead to breastfeeding, which lead to delaying and skipping some vax, which lead to cloth diapering, which lead to being more "green", which lead to reaching out to others which lead to learning more about baby wearing, and EC, and Gentle parenting etc etc.. the Virus has spread... I have the crunchies.

Most of this came from my instincts! It just felt right.. take vaccines for example you can read my thoughts on them on my post The gray area of Vax debate. THAT was a perfect example on how my instincts came to play... I did what my instincts told me.. maybe yours tell you to fully vax, maybe yours tell you you'll be happier not using cloth but you are gunge-ho about everything else! Maybe you are just learning about it.

the bottom line is to listen with your heart...

A blog I really admire called PhD in Parenting (actually they are the reason I started blogging) posted an article by Diana West from IBCLC called There is No Doctrine for Attachment Parenting: Being AP is a Frame of Mind! reprinted on Kellymom.comin it she explains how you don't have to follow AP to a T and maybe you even physically can't but basically:

"An AP parent is one who wholeheartedly believes that children are inherently good and that by fostering an atmosphere of complete trust and intimacy, a bond is created that provides those children with the foundation and security to become their best selves. It really has little to do with the tools we use to be Attachment parents. All that is important to qualify us to be an Attachment Parent is simply that we parent from an Attachment Parenting frame of mind"

So AP lites! you are fully AP! if you don't cloth diaper it doesn't make you less of a parent! You follow your heart! You follow your instincts.. Read the whole article it made me feel so good when I did.

Mothering has no instruction manual, society and mainstream websites, programs, stores have created one for us to dictate what we should buy or consume (think unnecessary baby gadgets and formula, or even unnecessary medical procedures and Meds) It all boils down to money. We instinctual mothers know that if all hell breaks loose.. our babies will still have everything they got their mommas breasts and their mommas arms and ladies and gentlemen that is ALL a baby needs to thrive.But dads, partners, relatives don't get me wrong... when all hell breaks loose for us, which is pretty much everyday all mommy needs is your support so she can support her baby.i

t takes a village!

So you see I am an instinctual mother I listen to my baby and I would love to spread how easier life really does get when you stop giving into big company rubbish of what a happy baby is.

DUDE! where's my leaky b@@b?...

What a shock it was today to get a text from my friend Christy telling me that our beloved page, "The Leaky b@@b" had been deleted from facebook.

Back in August another breastfeeding related page shared a cute blog post called "oh My Gosh..I'm a LACTIVIST!" the post made me smile and made me realize that I too was a lactivist.. someone who with DD#1 I had previously misunderstood. I now was one, and I was delighted to realize it.. I read other posts by her and immediately "liked" the page for the blog on facebook.

What was different about the page is that people actively participated, Jessica the author of the blog interacted with it's followers on a daily basis, engaging in conversations, giving advice, making us laugh, supporting us. The page was not hostile, was not preachy, we all had a sense of camaraderie whether we breastfed, used to, planned to or couldn't. The page was really for support. I quickly felt at home and made many friends, it became my haven, my sanity not just for breastfeeding but for many of motherhood's challenges.

And with that text came shock! It was gone! but....
not for long! Bring back the leaky boob was created and 12 hours into its creation the page had 4000 followers, the leakies moved quickly and TLB spport was created for support and questions which is what the leaky boob was about.

Why was the leaky boob removed? Breastfeeding pictures... sweet pictures of cherubic faces being nurtured and showing no more skin than you would see in a bikini, which by the way you can find lots off on Sports illustrated swimsuit on facebook. Does that seem fair to you?

Facebook is punishing the wrong people while catering to others.. we need pages like the leaky boob!

what can you do?

if you are in the Palo Alto area there will be a nurse-in at facebook's headquarters Friday January 7th 2011 at 12:30pm

1601 S. California Ave. Palo Alto, CA 94304



write to your local news...

write to the Today show myself and others have done this if they get enough emails it might work.. if you want me to make a letter you can copy and paste let me know..

Tell Marc Zuckerberg how you feel on this discussion (be nice!).

change your profile picture

BUT most important.. stick together, please stop by and spread the word about TLB support because the most important thing is that leakies that need support, advice, encouragement and answers receive it!

They can take away the page but they can't take away our spirit of helping!

Breastfeeding Rocks!!

A recent article by Nursing Freedom "Marketing Breastfeeding: your ideas" asked the following:

"How would you give breastfeeding a makeover so that women view it as glamorous, sexy, essential? Or fill in your adjective - what attributes do you think we can emphasize to make breastfeeding more acceptable, appealing, desirable to more women?"



First of all, think about the women who are having these babies?

They're women in their 20's who were born during the 80's grew up in the 90's

They are part of the Generation Y or MTV generation.



I remember seeing this image and thought oh yaay, breastfeeding rocks!

It's an Image of Jerry Hall nursing her baby and looking stunning!

I think Billboards or more magazine ads with musicians nursing their babies would be so effective, what if we would have had Gwen Stefani or Britney Spears doing nursing campaigns? Unfortunately Celebrities are a big influence in our generation and they know that! more of them should step up and encourage the general public.

We also know how successful MTV's "Teen Mom" has become, I wish some of those girls would have breastfed. Why not add a documentary about the teen moms who did choose to breastfeed.

The Bottom line is we need to have breastfeeding in the media , in more fashion magazines, more talk shows, more sitcoms. We need more Kourtney Kardashians, more Salma Hayeks, more Bethenny Frankels, More Gisele Bundchens out there!

Because Breastfeeding Rocks!