All The Things…

 Hey mamas! Well, I promised you a birth story and I didn’t even get to writing a blog for Monday. The reason is…this…

Nowadays my hands are pretty full. My baby is having trouble gaining weight, which has been the story with all my babies, so I am activity working on getting my milk supply up. I thought I was doing pretty well by the end of last week, then things seemed to slide during the weekend and I am back at it hard core. 

I am doing all the things: drinking the tea, eating oats twice a day, adding flax to my smoothies, making sure I have enough protein and hydration, rubbing on the essential oils, and spending most of my time skin to skin with my baby.

And then there is the pumping. Baby is not the most efficient nurser, so in order to encourage my supply to build, my feeding routine looks something like this:

1. Attach baby to right side and silicon pump to left side. 

2. Once baby has slowed nursing, attach baby to left side and machine pump right side.

3. Once baby has slowed down nursing, attach machine pump to left side and feed baby milk from right side with a medicine dropper and then feed baby milk from left side.

Step three is a messy step, but I don’t want my baby to get nipple confusion by using a bottle so feeding with a dropper is a good way to get milk in that the baby doesn’t have to burn any calories to obtain, the pumps have done all the work. Well, the pumps and me. 😅 I’m hoping when we weigh in tomorrow we will see some progress! 

I’m sure you can see how exhausting this all is. Last night I had a good little cry about it all. It is discouraging that I have to go through this with every baby.

But after I cried I thought about my five other children. They are all healthy and beautiful, and I was able to nurse them all. With each one I made it past the challenging newborn-milk-building-phase and had successful breastfeeding journeys. 

Are you struggling right now, mama? Are you fighting a hard fight? I want to challenge you (and myself!) to think about the things that God has brought you through in the past. All the things He has done for you. And know that He sees what is going on in your life right now and has a good plan for your future. I know He has plans for your to prosper. Trust in Him. 

Lots of love, mamas!

Lee

P.S. Coming back the next day to report that my baby gained three ounces in three days, so we are making progress!!!