Saturday, February 4, 2012

Conflicted

I am conflicted on the whole breastfeeding thing.  At first I was all gung ho and thought I could successfully breastfeed both girls but when Evy wouldn't latch that whole idea went out the window.  Then, I thought I could just BF Charlotte and pump for Evy..... and I did do that for a while.  I'm not sure how it exactly happened but I pretty much stopped BFing Char and just pumped for both girls (which worked okay since I could split what I did have evenly between them.)  I knew I would have to go back to work when they were three months so I guess I did know that I wouldn't be able to BF them for that long. 

When I went back to work I continued to pump while at work and I ended up pumping at 5:30am, 11:30am, 4:00pm and 8:00ish.  At first I was getting the same amount of milk that I had before I went back to work (approx. 24 oz in 24 hrs.) but slowly it has been going downhill.  Instead of making 10-12oz in the morning I am only making 6-7oz.   Instead of making 10oz between the two sessions at work I am getting maybe 6oz.  At night I get maybe another 4oz to equal a whopping 16oz/day if that.  They are drinking 6oz each feeding so they don't even get two full bottles of breastmilk each day. 

I really do want them to drink the BM for many reasons but I'm not sure that one bottle per day really makes it worth it.  Instead of getting up in the morning and taking care of the girls I wake up, pump, and then wake Brian up so that he can take care of them and I can get ready for work.  You may ask, "Well why don't you nurse in the morning instead of pumping?"  Well the answer is that neither of them really will nurse anymore.  Like I said before, Evy never did really nurse and now Charlotte doesn't really want to either.  Also, even if I did nurse them in the morning I would still have to pump and probably give them a bottle to supplement as well.  AND I would have to get up even earlier since that all takes time. 

I guess right now I have a couple of choices. 
1.) I can keep pumping and wait for the milk to dry up (which may be sooner rather than later)
2.) Call my OBGYN and see if I can get back on the Reglan to up my supply (the pills make me feel super super tired and very anxious)

I will probably have to stop BFing by April anyways which doesn't make the current decision any easier.  The reasoning for that will have to be in another post.... I am not ready to talk about it yet. =)

On a happy note, the girls will be 4 months old on Monday!!  They go for their 4 month checkup on Feb. 17th. 

2 comments:

Rachel said...

Congratulations on breastfeeding this long. My twins are 4 and a half months and it is soooooo stressful to worry about pumping at work. I can't keep up with how much they eat! They take like 30-40 oz while they are at daycare all day while I am only pumping maybe 20 oz while I'm at work. I just send them with frozen (thankfully I have a lot) but I don't know what I will do when I run out of frozen. I am thankful that my twins have a great latch, so I don't have to pump when I'm with them. Pumping is so hard, but I'm sure you will make the right choice for your situation.

Jessica Anne said...

Thanks Rachel! Glad I'm not the only one having problems since I have gone back to work. It must be normal. I think I am going to give it another week and if things don't improve I am going to call the OBGYN to see what my options are. =)