Breast Feeding Week 2018

Breast and Bottle Feeding Experience with My First and The Twins

  

• I was a feeding therapist working with NICU babies up to 3 year olds for the two years prior to having my twins. If there's one thing babies and parents taught me over the years it's that I'm not an expert by any means. But I worked closely with parents, nurses, and lactation consultants for babies on breast milk and formula, and it gave me a breadth of experiences and information to pull from going into having my twins. 
• Breast is best, fed is better. Breast milk is magical, it truly is, nature made something simply amazing. The health benefits and the simple breakdown of the breast milk in the infant's gut have just not been duplicated by any formula. However, formula also saves lives and provides great nutrition. Breast milk is nature miraculous gift and formula is a man made miracle as well. 
• In my own experience and one I observed very much working with new parents, I was pushed very hard to breast feed. It's so wonderful that we want to promote healthy nutrition and maternal bonds with breast milk, but as much as we want to normalize breast feeding, we should not shame or demonize formula. 
• With my first child, whether because I was induced or for just natural reasons, my breast milk did not come in for days. The advice I was given was not to do pacifiers, bottles, or to pump, but to put that baby to breast 24/7 to establish breast feeding. It was days of exhaustion and in hindsight a starving newborn. 
• Once I pumped and used the pacifier we were both happier, but my newborn was still starving and became quite jaundice. This is not everyone's experience and by no means the norm. That advice might work very well for most mother's. I however, regret not giving my newborn formula. Jaundice newborns and dehydrated babies can lead quickly to death. If I'd known then what I know now about all of that, I would have formula fed that baby so fast. I ended up having more than enough milk for him but found breast feeding exclusively seriously exhausting and at 3 months we slowly started formula. We were switched to all formula by 4 months. I cried, but they immediately after realized we both still loved each other and I was a better mom with more energy for my baby.

• Three years later I had my twins in a "baby friendly" hospital that I'd been working in. I snuck in pacifiers that go against the baby friendly policy and I had calmer newborns. I had been very anti-pacifier with my first and as I said, that did not last long, and I see it now as a very beneficial tool. 
• On the second day of my twins life I recognized the signs of hunger and that they were not getting enough. The "baby friendly" trained nurses were AMAZING guys, I do not want to bash these nurses. They helped me feed and nurse those twins SO WELL. 
• However, because of the "baby friendly" hospital policies they were not going to offer me a pump or bottles. I knew to ask for them. I knew all this only because I'd worked in that hospital as a feeding therapist. 
• When I asked for the bottles and donor breast milk, they weighed my newborns. They had in fact lost way more weight than they should have. When I pumped there was next to nothing. They were starving and we continue to breast feed and then offer donor milk via bottles at the hospital. 
• We went home on formula and just like with my first baby, my own milk came in days later. This is normal for many women but I was not producing sufficient colostrum for my babies either. 
• Formula was my life saver. I LOVE the invention of formula. We supplemented formula some days only 20% of the feedings but most days 50% in the beginning and then slowly more.
•  I LOVE my nurses for teaching me so much about getting my babies to latch and how to tandem feed. I just wish that the "baby friendly" policies were more mom-friendly. 
• I LOVED breast feeding my twins. It was just so hard sometimes and there was never enough milk. Tandem feeds were my preference but they were rarely the norm. I did not want to be feeding around the clock because it was exhausting so usually if I could not get them to tandem feed, I would breast feed one, and bottle feed the other, and switch off the next feeding. 
• My boy twin stopped breast feeding at 5 months, he was so hungry that he'd bite me (with his brand new teeth!) when there was not enough milk and a few times of that he was cut off! My girl twin breast fed until 8 months when her and I both realized that I'd just ran out of milk. There was no crying for me that time because I'd developed a healthy outlook on my mother-baby relationship and my relationship with breast feeding.
• Could I have tried harder and put them to breast more often and gotten up at night when they were sleeping to feed them or pump and have more milk? Yes, I could have pushed for that. Would I have been happy doing that? Hell no, I would have been miserable and exhausted. That would not have been a pleasant feeding my babies experience for me. Does it work for other moms? Of course it does!! Are they happy to do it? Yes! And that's wonderful, we can all do different things and still have loving happy relationships with our babies and be great moms! It's okay.

• Research shows that breast milk is better than formula. Common sense tells us that as well. Breast milk can do some really incredible things!! It's magical, it just is! However, more importantly, research shows that a mother's mood and overall happiness is the best indicator of a babies health. Whether or not you breast fed or formula fed is not on going on kindergarten enrollment forms, it's not on college applications, and certainly not an important question on a dating website. Motherhood is what is truly magical. So breast feed all you can and formula feed if you need/want. The baby is loved and a full happy belly makes for lots of sleepy cuddles!!