Rasa's story: breastfeeding baby on demand
My son Mattias is 15 months now and he's still very much my breastfeeding baby. He still needs to get close to me and it's a special moment of affection for both of us.
When Mattias was born, I asked to leave him on my tummy for an hour, knowing how important the first skin-to-skin contact was. Meanwhile, I tried to make him taste the firsts drops of colostrum which I new was essential for his immunity. I tried to brush with my nipple over his lips, but Mattias seemed to be lazy even to open his mouth. After an hour he showed some interest in sucking. Then he went on to sleep all night long. He didn't eat much in the morning and soon I discovered what milk engorgement was. I felt pain in my breasts and it was getting worse so I desperately asked my husband to get me some cabbage leaves to put them cool on my breasts to ease the pain (I had read it should help:) and then I tried expressing breast milk and it seemed to work out for a couple of days.
The problem, however, remained as my son was not gaining weight. At the pediatrician's we found out that he managed to eat only 40 grammes of my milk in 40 minutes of eating! The solution the pediatrician gave me was formula milk. It was something inside me which was against the formula milk so I decided to find out some other way as I was determined to breastfeed my baby as long as I can, maybe even up to two-three years old. And I did. I realised that the problem was not breastfeeding baby on demand! I strictly followed the pattern: breastfeeding baby every 4 hours and not for more than half an hour at a time! It didn't work with my son, though. Following such schedule my breasts were aching and then there was too much milk for my son to be able to suck well.
So I started breastfeeding baby whenever he showed me he was hungry and sometimes even for continuous 60 minutes! I also started carrying him in the baby sling during the day which helped me a lot, and also I could breastfeed him discretely in public as I had to travel a lot at that time. It solved all the problems I had.
Now my son is a big, strong, healthy and vivid boy, which is also thanks, I'm sure, to my love I give him through my breast milk.
Created: November 23, 2009
