Packing Up the Pump

This post may be more than you bargained for.  So for the faint of heart, you may want to skip this.  But for mommies, I feel that this topic is important.

It's a new year and with it comes the end of old habits or routines.  On Saturday the 7th, the journey with my "pump" ended.  In case you are scratching your head about what I mean by my "pump", here is a picture.

We have been working together for the past four months.  It was the most expensive item on my baby registry.  I knew that I had wanted to give breastfeeding a whirl.  It is the recommended (best) way to feed a baby.  But JT had other plans.  He came three weeks and 5 days early.  He showed up weighing 3 pounds and 7 ozs.  All the doctors kept saying was how tiny he was, oh he is fine but he is sooo small.  As happy and as pain free as all the drugs could make me, I was sad.  I vowed in my loopy state do everything I could to make sure he was big and strong.

Then later that evening John was med-evaced to the NICU.  I felt helpless.  I could barely sit up for all the pain and the incision from the emergency C-section.  I talked with the lactation consultant and they got me set up with a pump.  It was the only thing that I could do in my condition to help my son.  I threw all of what little energy I had into it.  I think my husband thought I went nuts with it.  I was so happy to send what little I had "pumped" to the NICU for John.  After 48 hours, I was released from the hospital.  I was not going anywhere fast - but I could still pump.

I finally managed to get out to the NICU and talk with the doctors there.  They had tried to feed John formula, but his little tummy did not respond well to it.  So continued use of my "pump" was essential.  For the next 10 days, I pumped like crazy.  John would have all the milk he wanted so that he could be big and strong to come home.  Twelve days after being admitted to the NICU we finally got to take him home.

I could try breastfeeding again - slowly.  After nearly a month of frustration, appointments with lactation consultants, waiting hours at the emergency room, and a bout of mastitis (not fun), I decided to stop breastfeeding.  I told myself I would continue on with my "pump" to get John what he needed.  The experience everyone says they have when breastfeeding there child - was not there for me.

Once I switched over to solely pumping and bottle-feeding that milk to my son, we finally got a chance to enjoy ourselves.  It was fantastic.  It felt so much easier.  I did this routine for another month.  John was not eating nearly as much as I was pumping.  So our deep freeze became home to all of John's food.  It was over flowing really.

So I decided I would take my time and cut off my access to the pump.  Every week we spent less time together.  In the mean time, I slowly introduced John to formula again.  In this way, I could make the milk last longer and JT would still be able to receive it's positive effects even after I stop pumping.

That day came.  It was bittersweet almost.  But I am glad to close that chapter.  I now have the ability to spend the entire day with my son as he starts to crawl and discover the world around him.  No more time lost to "pumping".  Yet, I am so thankful for it.  Without it, who knows how much longer my son would have spent at the NICU.

A New Year and I am ready to spend as much of it with my son as I can.