This coupled with a VERY aggressive eater and all the hormones have me in tears 24/7 almost!
It's so ironic that I've told my NICU Moms millions of times to not put pressure on themselves and to not feel guilty if they have supply issues, but that's EXACTLY what I'm doing to myself!
Parker is 7 days old today. From day 1 he has latched in well and sucked aggressively. In the hospital he wanted to eat every 1-2 hours. Fine.
We get home and he decides he wants to BF EVERY hour - nonstop preferably. He was SO hungry and his bilirubin levels were high (home phototherapy) and he was losing SO much weight - over the 10% they expect. So my ped (who is very pro-BF) told me I needed to supplement with formula. Ok - I know this from the NICU. Yeah, he needed the additional fluids to get rif of the bilirubin and I hadn't started producing much milk yet. Top that off with cracked, bleeing nipples from the constant breastfeeding and I did slack off a little on the BF to let me nipples heal. I did pump about every 4-5 hours while he got bottles.
We went to our first peds appointment a couple of days ago - DOL 5 and he's gaining back weight, bilirubin is down, but my milk supply still isn't good. My ped wants me to breastfeed every 2-3 hours (on Parker's schedule) for 10-15 min per side with a nipple shield then offer a bottle and finish pumping my breasts. I started that yesterday.
Parker's supplemental bottle is usually around 2 oz. I put whatever I pump into the bottles, so he is getting SOME breastmilk with every feed. After he feeds and I pump, I'm usually getting an additional 15 ml per side. I jsut feel like I'm never going to be able to supply all the milk he needs. I'm trying to drink a lot more fluids and start some mother's milk tea as well.
I jsut feel like a failure with the entire breastfeeding issue. He latches on great and REALLY loves to suck. And my nipples are slowly healing. We also found out in the hospital that I am TRULY allergic to lanolin after my breast broke out in hives from the stuff the lactation consultant had me try (she didn't feel "comfortable" having me use the nipple butter with open cracks on my nipples). Yeah, well you almost gave me an anaphylactic reaction!
Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks!