Guest Post: Now that’s properfud!

Today’s breastfeeding guest post in honour of World Breastfeeding Week is from Jill, who writes Properfud, my favourite baby-led weaning blog. I posed a number of questions to her about her breastfeeding experience, and her responses tell her story. Thanks for sharing Jill!

Did you love breastfeeding?
Yes, i loved how my son seemed so content, and I was so pleased that I could do that for him – how we seemed to strike a good balance with each other most of the time, and the way it gave me time to chill out & do nothing else because i couldn’t. Though it wasn’t all indulgent smiles at him – in the early days I watched entire episodes of the Gilmore Girls while he fed, fed, fed. I would arm myself with the remote, my iPhone & a big mug of tea – and carefully settle down.

I have never been so hungry in my life as those first 6 months when I was breastfeeding loads. I ate all around me, and the pregnancy weight honestly did come off easily. I know that’s not always the case though – i was definitely lucky in that regard.

Did you hate it?
Never. I don’t think i ever got any more annoyed about breastfeeding that I would have about standing at the sink washing bottles. There’s work in feeding a baby either way. I found evenings cluster feeding hard, as I felt quite tied to the couch and numb-bummed by the end of it! My husband was there to help and all I wanted to do was go to bed and sleep soundly but he could do little but housework to help me out (that’ll do!). I didn’t mind night feeds after a while (good thing they went on til 9 months) I would feed on my side and fall asleep during it.

I hated leaking. That made me feel closer to the animal kingdom than I would have liked And by god did I love putting on a normal bra by the time i’d finished doing daytime feeds!

Did it come easy to you?
My son latched on well, though I was really paranoid and got someone to check where possible in the hospital that he was properly latched. There was initial discomfort, but no ongoing pain/damage. I was surprised at how readily formula was pushed on a confused, knackered 1st time mum in the hospital. I really did not realise how much he might suckle that second day/night. He had two top ups in there, but none after that as I was very determined to see it through at home and was lucky enough to do so. The biggest shock to me was when I got a bout of mastitis when we’d been going 8 months – woke up sore at 4am, was in a&e by lunchtime…I had thought i had it totally sussed by then!

Was it the “natural” experience you were led to believe it would be? Or the total opposite?
Yes, it was. I have two older sisters who’d fed their kids, but a mum who didn’t so I knew it wasn’t for everyone and is happily getting more common than it was when we were babies. Without having seen my sisters do it, it wouldn’t have seemed such a natural choice, and i don’t know who i’d have referred to apart from pro’s

Did you want to breastfeed for longer than you were able to?
No

Did you end up breastfeeding for longer than you intended to?
Yes. I thought i’d see how it went for 6 months. That sometimes seemed like an impossible goal. Then I fed him til he was a year. I kept up 2 feeds – morning & night when I went back to work when he was 9 months. That was tough in some ways, but I looked forward to those 15 mins of calm that bookended our day.

Did it teach you anything about yourself that you never intended to learn?
No. I was a stronger more determined woman than I knew, and felt more grown up than I had felt before but I can’t say that was a negative.

Did you exclusively breastfeed, did you pump and feed, or did you do as I did and combination feed?
Apart from a couple of formula top ups in the hospital (which although i was annoyed about, didn’t feel guilt over) I exclusively breastfed for 5 weeks, pumped once a day most days for a couple of months after that so my husband would do one night feed with that expressed breastmilk or build up our freezer supply. Between 3 and 6 months, my son has the occasional carton of formula because to be honest, I HATED pumping and I didn’t need to feed as many times at night anymore so it was more like when I wanted to go to the cinema or something. I started to regularly give one daytime formula bottle when my son was about 6.5 months. Happily we’d no issues switching between breastfeeding and formula feeding at all.

If you have a breastfeeding story of your own that you would like to share in honour of World Breastfeeding Week, please email me at lisa [at] mama.ie. Through the week, I will share any stories I receive here on Mama.ie.