I am sad today.

I am increasingly coming to terms with the fact that, in my past, I did everything that I could. I made the only choices that I could, with the knowledge I had and the strength that I had with my inability to breastfeed my first boy and my ferocity at continuing despite all evidence that told me to stop. This is a wonderful feeling, to feel a sense of forgiveness creeping up on me, knowing that acceptance and moving forward with it all is right there. 

First time this has worked successfully, out of total desperation. Not easy, not in any way pain free, but absolute kryptonite to an overtired baby.

I have had to write a very long and complex assignment as part of my studies, where I discussed my own breastfeeding experience in an entirely factual manner (I chose this current one, not my first), followed by an assessment of a number of specific choices that I made (deciding to try again in the first place, deciding to use the supplemental nursing system, deciding to use donor milk, deciding to start taking domperidone, deciding that I will fix his tongue tie even though he was already almost six months old), a discussion of my rational and irrational feelings at particular points along the way and the parts of my personality that led to these, a reflection on those decisions and how these choices impacted myself, my baby and those around me, and how all of that can be applied when I am working with other mothers in the future.

You can imagine what a mammoth task that was for me.

I thought that I had written about all of that ad nauseam already right here, so I could just find points to copy and paste and change a little, fill in some gaps, etc. Nope.  Turns out not.

This might be the most obvious thing to everyone in the entire world that has ever met me, but I am starting to realise the extent to which I hold onto things, and the severe damage it does to me. I don’t really know how to fix that, really.  Becoming aware of it in the first place is a step. Choosing to just f*&$ing let it go with really tiny little things that happen throughout the day…. It’s hard for me. I am a moody gal, for sure, with not very much resilience: if my husband is in a bad mood, I pick up on it and by the time he is over it ten minutes later, I’m deep in his pit and stuck there. Same goes for my three year old, which is ridiculous. I want nothing more than to be an emotional anchor for my kids; to be a rock of stability where they feel safe to express any emotion whatsoever, and they will be loved and accepted and that they should never feel responsible for anything that I  am feeling. And so, I internalise.

Tough one.

There are a lot of things I am still holding onto. A lot of things that I need to let go of but can’t. I hold grudges like nothing on earth. I remember. Forever. Every single word that stung me, I remember. I remember the light at the time those words were said. I remember the smells, the background noise, the face that said them. I don’t know what has to happen for me to let go of those things. I always thought that time would be a healer, but it isn’t. I don’t know why I can’t let them go. I suppose there needs to be an exact point in time where I make the decision, and POOF it’s gone, let go of, forgiven.

When I was sixteen, I remember reading a personality analysis that I did in some silly teenage magazine. It said that I am the kind of girl who is deeply romantic, but who is susceptible to severe heartbreak, not because of the heartbreak itself, but because having a broken heart is very romantic. I think about that often; about how I hold onto things for some reason, to have some kind of story, to define myself in some way. Anja, my midwife, picked up on this very early on and said to me that feeding my little baby is about doing what is best for me and my baby, not about having the best story to tell. She also said that the milk blister I had for about four months was an example of how I hold onto things, ha.

Anyway. This is my random rambling blog post about not very much and very much all at the same time. It’s been a while since I have done one of those. What a treat for you all.