We've had a lot of good thus far as I have mentioned in my previous posts.
We've had a few "bad" days, as will be the case in new adventure.
Unfortunately we have also had a handful of ugly days! I hesitated writing this post as I am not one to complain about things and I hate being a downer, but as I have mentioned these things to ladies I have come to discover that they are quite common. It had really made me wish that I had known that sooner so I could of asked them for advice or even just for support. I felt like I was alone on this and battling through something that very few have. So I am writing this to let others ladies know that they aren't alone and that I am more than happy to answer any questions or be of help in any way that I can.
So here we go:
A couple weeks into this whole being a mama gig, I developed mastitis, I won't go into what it is as it can be a bit TMI. So you can read more about what it is here. I started to feel really yucky and have flu-like symptoms, then it got to the point that it was so painful when I would feed Zeke that I would just cry (this hurt way worse than labor!). At first I didn't really know what the deal was, as I didn't know what mastitis was (which also means that I didn't know what to do to prevent it). So I super googled it and realized that my symptoms matched up perfectly. I researched natural ways to combat it and started to improve, but then the next day it got way worse and so Mike and my mom ganged up on me and made me go in and get it checked out. They gave me an antibiotic (which I am so not a fan of at all) and something for pain (which I am also not a fan of so I never ended up using them) and told me to REST (which is hard for me)! It took a bit but it finally did start to clear up, but in the mean time they said that I should pump if it was too painful to feed. Then shortly after that I was still having a lot of pain but with different symptoms and so I super googled again and figured out that I probably had thrush. It is a common occurrence when you are on antibiotics (stuff like this is why I dislike medications and antibiotics, though I understand there is a time a place for it). Again you can read about that here. Thrush is easily passed between mom and baby while breastfeeding, but thankfully since Zeke was being bottle fed at the time he never got it. So I got some cream and some more medication (I don't think I have had so many prescriptions combined during my whole life as I have had in the past month) and now thankfully I am coming out of it and hope to be done with all of this crazy stuff soon!
I am anxious to get this all officially behind us and start breastfeeding Zeke again. I am a bit nervous that he might have nipple confusion once we start again, so I am really praying that he takes back to it. I never really got the opportunity to enjoy the experience, I know a lot of ladies talk about it being one of their favorite things. So I really hope to be able to experience that yet. Pumping has been quite time consuming and is making it tricky to get things done around the house since Zeke has been cluster feeding during the day. So I pretty much will bottle feed him, play, do diaper changes, put him down to sleep, pump, try to quick grab something to eat and then start everything over again. Though we are getting good sleep at night, so I try not tot complain too much.
My brother asked me today if having a baby was what I thought it would be and as I have said before the baby part of everything has been way easier than I thought it would be. But the "me" part of everything has been harder than I thought it would be, it made it a bit harder too because I was feeling so good the first couple of weeks until I was hit with these things. I just try to remember the saying " Your biggest struggle will be your greatest victory!" So that just means that this will start to get easy for us here soon!
I just want any ladies out there that is fighting either of these things now or in the future to feel free to get in touch with me if you have any questions or just want some support and want to talk about it. I totally understand that its really painful and can be hard to deal with on top of the lack of sleep and emotional state that we are in. It was also really hard for me to switch to just bottle feeding as I felt like a bad mom and that I was failing, but I had to remember that I couldn't properly take care of Z or my family if I wasn't taking care of myself first. Also to those new moms or about to be new moms out there, read up on these and do your best to prevent them from effecting you. I really wish I would of known before hand how common they were because then I definitely would of researched them and found out how to do my best to keep them from hitting me.
I had to stop breast feeding Ethan when he was only two-months old, and it was the hardest decision I had yet to make as a mother. It's true that you feel like a bad mom, like you're failing your son (those are perfect descriptive words of how I felt), and unfortunately I didn't find out until a LONG time later that it was likely caused because of his food allergies.
ReplyDeleteAll of this to say that you really are a wonderful mother. You are never failing your child when you take time to take care of yourself. It's extremely necessary. Throughout motherhood (especially right in the beginning) we experience lots of road blocks and have to take many detours ... this is one of them for you. Praying that you will find that connection with your sweet baby when the time is right and that God will hold your heart as you wait.