Learning To Relax With Breastfeeding

Jan 11, 2011 by Aly Hodge

This week’s guest post is from Lisa ‘The Mummy Whisperer’ who blog’s tagline is ‘from a contented mummy grows a family full of potential’ .


So my story is about how ‘doing everything wrong’ (according to some people), still all works out.I hope that it will set some Mum’s minds at rest and help them find their own route through their feeding journey.I didn’t have any plans about feeding.I was 36, two months pregnant, with no clue about children or babies having been told at 19 that I couldn’t have children.So I heard it could be difficult, but worthwhile, and I thought I’d give it a go until 6 weeks, and then 6 months and then see how it went.I also rather fancied the idea of routines, baby sitters and ‘getting your life back’; yep that wasn’t quite the way it went LoL ;o)


I have this funny belief that our babies are often the barometers of our life, and giving us little signals about what directions would work for us.My Curly Headed Boy was an avid feeder, and he would feed for HOURS and HOURS, often every couple of weeks having a ‘sit in’ for a whole afternoon.It was stressful initially, because I was such a ‘doer’, and I could ‘do’ nothing, especially as the rest of the time he wanted to be held for the first 3 months, or interacted with as he got older.I survived the lack of sleep, painful nipples and let-down pain of the first 6 weeks, and just kept going.  I never remembered when the last feed was, or how long each one was, and would feel really worried when interrogated by health visitors or doctors.But soon I learnt not to proffer any information and dodge successfully.


What I didn’t realise was how all this sitting down (I didn’t get the hang of slings for housework, just shopping trips), was helping me to rest and just ‘BE’ for a while. I really needed it, as during my pregnancy my Mum died, we moved house/town and my husband lost his job when Curly Headed Boy was 6 weeks old.  I was stressed!  But ‘being’ for a few months gave me a chance to recuperate and gradually gain confidence in who I was as a Mum.


I was very gentle on my little boy about sleeping because he was a rubbish sleeper, but I felt that he had a real need that wasn’t being met, so I didn’t use any stricter sleep routines.In the end at 6 months old I started to co-sleep because he was waking every 20 mins and I was struggling.At last, I just listened to myself and ignored the ‘right’ way to do it, like the HV who suggested I could wean him at 6 months, or the people who said that he would never be able to go to sleep on his own if I fed him to sleep.Soon I stopped mentioning that I was still feeding as it tended to pre-empt the question ‘Oh, how long are you going to?’ and honestly I didn’t have a clue and was tempted to say ‘What’s it to you anyway?!’.


I’m sure many people thought I was going to end up with a spoilt, dependant little boy, who was still asking for ‘bitty’ at 20yrs old and still sleeping in my bed, unable to get to sleep without either me breast feeding him, or lying next to him.  I know that one person assumed that hubby and I were separated, just because he has a nice quiet little bedroom all to himself that hums full of computer equipment, where he can get sleep (I think that their imagination required sex to always be in the bedroom, so they were a bit bemused when I fell pregnant again!).But I believed in my little boy, believed in myself and believed in the family.I was sure that I wasn’t doing it to keep hold of him, just because it worked for us both.


I can’t remember when I cut down the feeds, but I can remember how I did it.I had 5 basic rules which I followed:
1) Don’t keep doing something that was too much for me: so if I needed to cut back on the number of feeds a day, then I would.
2)  Bear in mind curly headed boy’s needs: so I didn’t stop altogether, just cut back if that’s all he could do
3) Ignore the ‘shoulds’ coming at me from other sources
4) Keep my eye on the internet for more valid sources of info like the WHO
5) Count my blessings every day for the little blighter keeping me awake, because he was such a gift.


These 5 rules, have now transformed into an equation I teach Mums to follow to help them navigate the daily ups and downs of Mumdom:
Mums Needs
+ Children’s Needs
– Brain Noise + Mum’s Intuition
+ Reality Check
+ Gratitude for how life is
= the right choices for your family


He didn’t ask me to feed him in public from the moment he could walk at 11 months.Funny little chap must have known I was uncomfortable feeding a toddler.Overnight, once I knew he could understand, I started to refuse every other feed to encourage him to last 3-4 hours a go.Then one day I created the ’5 o’clock rule’, which was no milk until 5am or until after 5pm.  Eventually we were down to a morning feed and an evening one, which went on for some time.


I was amazed when he managed to drop the morning one, as it seemed the most tricky, but it was great as it made nursery much easier to get to.But the evening one kept going.Even though he was broody for a year and I explained I might not be able to get pregnant if I was feeding him, and even though he could survive if I went out and his nursery teacher baby sat, he couldn’t give up the evening feed.


Then one day I was just coming up for 40 and had been feeding Curly Headed Boy for 3.5yrs (shhhhhh, that’s the first time I’ve admi
tted to that in public!), and I peed on a stick.He was the first person I told, and he was over the moon.We had a little chat, and agreed that I would stop feeding him to save my milk for the baby.I know that many Mums are amazing and are able to keep going for both, but I was tired, and I knew I needed a little time off.He didn’t cry, but was a little unsettled for a week, and we substituted me lying next to him and giving him reiki to get him to sleep (Reiki is a simple form of hands on healing, which is great for Mums to use with their kids.  I used to teach it years ago, but just use it on my family now a days).  It was quite a nice rest for me, either giving me a quick snooze before hubby got home, or ending up in me falling fast asleep!


I’d always worried that he would be jealous of me feeding Little Dimples when she arrived and wondered how I would get him to sleep.But as always, I just followed his cues and it all worked out.After a couple of weeks, there came the night that I couldn’t lie next to him, so he bravely said that he would try falling asleep on his own.Over the next couple of weeks we created a new regime, with a new bed in the same room for him, a bath for them both, counting his blessings for the day (the 3 things he could say ‘thank you’ for), a story and 3 lullabies.  Three minutes later he’s fast asleep.There are no demands for water, or sneaking out of the bedroom.None of the problems that other poor parents have to cope with.Cross fingers, it’s all worked out pretty well.


I’m also lucky because Little Dimples feeds really quickly, so although sometimes inconvenient for him, it’s not a massive limitation.She too is a rubbish sleeper.I think that they both teethed early and what with that and colds they feed a lot at night.I suspect massively that she will give up feeding MUCH earlier than Curly Headed Boy, but she’s 10 months at the moment and still very happy.Yesterday Curly Headed Boy asked for 2 more children (OMG, there is no way, my poor body is too old and knackered!), despite sometimes worrying that we’ll love her more.He told me a few weeks ago that he doesn’t remember feeding or what it tasted like, which I was surprised about, but actually quite relieved.However, he still strokes my tummy for comfort, just as Little Dimples strokes my boobs, and I suspect that a general comfort with skin and nudity will keep going for them both.It’s nice to have someone who thinks your body is just perfect!


So, I love breast feeding.It worked for me, and it worked for the kids.But, I don’t think that formula feeding is the work of the devil.If it works for the Mum and the child and is an informed decision, then it’s the right one, whatever the choice.I feel for the Mums who really wanted to make it work, and couldn’t, but I honestly believe that their guilt is unnecessary, and that without the guilt they can find a way to balance the lost of the breast-feeding with something else.There are pro’s and con’s to everything in this world, and there can never be one rule for everyone.


Oooh and by the way.Curly Headed Boy is a bright, independent, very social and chatty little boy, so ‘they’ were definitely wrong.Plus, I’ve kept the breast feeding boobs so far, so it doesn’t always wreck them, but it didn’t help me lose weight, so that’s not totally true either, heh ho, I prefer the boobs than being skinny ;o)