The last week has been rough. Both of my boys and I are all very sick, my littlest boy the sickest, and we have been to the children’s hospital both last night and tonight to monitor his oxygen saturation and his breathing, after things became a little dodgy. I just returned home and need to do some writing to calm myself a little before I take my own sick self to bed for hopefully more than 45 minutes of sleep.
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| This is me. Tired. Sick. Worried. Coping. |
With regards to breastfeeding, this has been a whirlwind week too. Many things to write about, but this is what happened just now.
At the hospital this evening, he had lost some weight. They asked how often he is feeding, how long for, what is his usual, how much does he normally take, how much supplement how many times a day, etc etc etc. I was surprised at how much I couldn’t answer accurately, due to my goal of not being obsessed about numbers and timings this time around, which was probably incredibly unhelpful…
Then the lovely nurse suggested that she bring in a pump for me and that I try to give him a bottle, as he is really struggling to feed effectively right now.
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| My beautiful boy! Lucky we grow them so chubby when they are so little! |
Now. This exact situation shows me how far I have come. I didn’t stress about it. Ok, I said, let’s try it. I just figured that my bubba is sick and needs the least amount of stress possible to get healthy again. I showed her my SNS, which she hadn’t seen before (!), and she was happy to do whatever I liked, but I decided to try the bottle. Of course, if giving him a bottle will make him drink more this one time, and might allow him to get over the hump, then let’s try it. I don’t know if that is actually the case, but we needed to try something different. And I would try the pump. Eek. She originally suggested it as a way to ease the pressure in my boobs. As if.
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| There it is. The Pump. |
I held him in a similar way that I would if breastfeeding, and she gently put the bottle teat in his mouth. He was not interested. No way in hell was his mouth ever going to close around that thing. It was squirting milk into his mouth and that made him gag and cough. The nurse went next door to get a smaller size teat and when she came back he was on my boob like a champ, drinking better than he has in days. WOOT! So she said there was no need, he was doing great.
ANDmy other side was leaking!
So. How do I feel about all this. I am overjoyed that he prefers my breast to a bottle, and that he managed to have a good feed. That shows me that I am doing things that make him want to be there, which makes me feel all warm inside. The moment we tried a bottle with my older boy, after so much struggle, he jumped at the chance. I’m also glad I didn’t need to get within a metre of that hospital-grade pump on wheels, though I am getting curious about what it would produce.
Meanwhile, my littlest boy is still in struggle town, but I am keeping a close mama eye on him and he is going to be a-ok.
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| Checking Oxygen levels while we snuggle. |
