Breast & Bottle Feeding

I've breastfed three kids in my life so far. And with each kid, I learn a little more. As friends join me in this motherhood club, I'm occasionally asked for nursing advice. Most of the time I can keep it on topic, but sometimes I go off on a tangent of things I wish I would have known the first time. So here's a short list of my unsolicited breastfeeding advice ... Blue Powerade I’m not really sure there’s any science here, but this little bit of advice pops up on every breast feeding mommy group around! Maybe it’s just that blue Powerade is the best flavor out there. Or maybe because it’s easier to guzzle than water can be at...

Breast pumping … enjoyable? Not so much, but knowing what you are providing to a baby makes it worth it. I have exclusively breast pumped for 7 months. What does that mean? 3 hours after baby was born, I had a pump attached to me, and it hasn't stopped for 7 months. I started out and am now at 8 pumps a day to help build my supply. It’s very time consuming. Pumping every 2-3 hours for at least 30 minutes to make sure you are telling your body to make milk. Once my supply was built around 2-3 months, I started to drop a pump by extending my time in between pump sessions. I eventually got down to...

Disclosure: This post is part our series in observance of World Breastfeeding Week and is sponsored by Woman’s Hospital.  Extended Breastfeeding :: Why It Worked For My Family Breastfeeding was not something I thought about much during my first pregnancy. I took a class at Woman’s Hospital and learned the basics, and I hoped I would be able to successfully nurse my son, but I knew that for many women it is a real struggle. I told myself that if it didn’t work out, I wouldn’t beat myself up. Thankfully, my son William took to it. He was born an IUGR (Intrauterine Growth Restriction) baby and was born very small at four pounds, fourteen ounces at 39 weeks gestation. I was extremely stressed...

Disclosure: This post is part our series in observance of World Breastfeeding Week and is sponsored by Woman’s Hospital.  Gilmore Girls and Breastfeeding I had all these plans when I found out I was pregnant. I was going to have a medication free birth, in a birth tub, and I would rock it. I would breastfeed and my child will be well adjusted and sleep perfectly. All of these things seemed pretty reasonable.  The plan slowly unraveled. I remember coming out of the operating room, and between the zofran, epidural, and 43 hours of labor, I was stoned, and my nose itched, and my padookie (pony tail holder for future reference) was busted. I carried this perfect specimen in my arms as they pushed...

Disclosure: This post is part our series in observance of World Breastfeeding Week and is sponsored by Woman’s Hospital.  High Lipase and Bottle Refusal: The Part of Breastfeeding and Pumping No One Told Me About When I was pregnant with my first baby, Lillian, I intended to breastfeed from the get go. Like many new moms, I wanted to do everything "right" (spoiler alert: there is no one set "right" way to do things when it comes to raising children), so I read as much as I could get my hands on in relation to breastfeeding and joined a breastfeeding support group on Facebook ahead of time. One of the things that I kept reading over and over again and hearing in the...