Crying over spilt milk

I gave the Little Lady formula today.

It broke my heart to do it. She's refused breast milk all day, and screamed herself hoarse when I've offered. She was starting to show signs of dehydration and she's not slept for longer than 40 mins at a time.

Now she's in her cot cooing to herself and slowly going to sleep, and I'm sat crying with breasts full of milk she doesn't want or seem to tolerate. And the only way to get rid of it is to use the bloody pump.

I don't know what to do now. I've eliminated dairy from my diet, but I'm only on the second day of that. Do I continue to try and give her breast milk knowing that it may be making her ill and causing her distress, or do I formula feed for a few days and freeze the milk I continue to pump for when she is older?

Or do I give up? I was prepared to pump if I had to. I was prepared to eliminate food from my diet if I had to. I wasn't prepared for both, nor for her simply refusing it. How far do I want to go when formula is a viable option?

Overwhelmed

I'm feeling a tad overwhelmed right now. To be honest, I think most of it stems from the pumping. I'm on the damn thing every two hours (when I can fit it in) in the day and at least twice during the night. I don't feel like I can give my best to the Little Lady by doing this for much longer - she's awake more in the day and pumping is not fun for her.

On top of that, the Little Lady has a recurrent skin infection that causes her pain when it flares. And she is starting to teeth. We also have her first round of jabs to look forward. All this means my previously content and happy baby is incredibly fractious.

My house is falling apart because I can't keep up with it being on the pump all day. I'm not being the pet owner I should either (and as you probably know, we have a stray that pretty much lives here now as well) and I barely get to see the Boy any more. He is on the verge of expulsion because he keeps escaping from school and I don't feel I'm helping him enough.

I go to a breastfeeding support group. I started crying in the middle of the meeting because everyone could breastfeed except me. I had to whip out my bottle instead. I'm scared I'll start to get annoyed with my own baby because she just won't latch on. There are some days I think I'm ok with it and can accept that I need to pump if I want her to have breast milk, and then clearly there are days that I am not. Today is a not and I cannot stomach the idea of giving her any formula.

I wanted to cloth nappy. I've managed one, and I've only just washed that. I just can't do much of anything if I want to keep up exclusively pumping. Which I do. I just wanted to cloth nappy as well.

And I go back to work in 8 weeks time. I don't want to, but we've had so many unexpected costs that I have to. We're now short on money as it is. We're not desperate, but we are shorter than we anticipated and so have to watch very carefully exactly what leaves our bank account.

Seven weeks old!

I've been dreadfully lax in keeping a record of the Little Lady's development. Finding the time is hard - between pumping, baby care, animal care, eating and just gazing at her I'm all but out of time. It makes me sad, because there is so much that I know I will forget and I don't want to forget any of it.

She's smiling a lot these days. She has the most beautiful smile that lights up her face, and lights up my heart. I can't believe she is here. A friend who also dealt with infertility was saying that it wasn't so much that she couldn't believe that her baby was hers, but that she couldn't believe that she was his. I completely understand what she means. I could love any baby that was placed in my arms, but I am Little Lady's and hers alone.

Her hair is really growing. Her head still feels like a soft fuzzy peach, but there is definite length at the nape of her sweet neck. I love just stroking her head and inhaling her scent. Sadly I can detect a faint whiff of maple syrup, which comes from the large amounts of fenugreek I'm taking for lactation support, but she has the most delectable baby smell.

She is currently battling a recurrent skin infection. We've just chased it out of her neck, but there are still a few spots behind her ears that look like they may flare again. I don't want to go down the antibiotic route again if we can help it because it was just so difficult getting them in to her.

We've even had a couple of giggles out of her. The Baron spends the evening dancing and singing for her, and she adores it. It makes me laugh too :)

She reached 9 lbs at her weight check on Thursday. I'm still exclusively pumping for her, and it was such a boost to see what progress we're making. Pumping is hard work. I'm proud to say that we've got 4 feeds in the fridge ready for her and there are approximately 80oz in the freezer now. It isn't a lot, but it is a start. I'm taking More Milk Plus, fenugreek, agnus castus and domperidone to help with supply. Sometimes I feel like I should rattle with all the tablets I take....

We still haven't moved to the cloth nappies. I really want to, but I can't find the time to wash our clothes as it is so I'm loathe to add even more to my washing pile. I suspect that I'll have to save cloth nappying until I wean or if we are lucky enough to have a second child.

I thought my period returned at 5 weeks. I'm not so sure - I think the pumping is not quite enough to suppress them totally, but enough to prevent a clear return. The next few months should be interesting! Neither of us mind conceiving again soon, but I would like a little more time to recover from pregnancy and enjoy my little newborn.

My pump is beckoning. Again.

One month old

Time is flying by.

Little Lady is chunking up beautifully, and it is solely down to Mummy's Magical Milking Machine and the Boobie Juice. She has cheek and leg chub now!

I'm still pumping every two hours for her. I had a few days off for mental reasons and sore nipples, but I'm back on track. We have eight feeds in the fridge now, and today I froze my first bag of milk.

Bath time is a very popular time of day here. We always have bubbles, and today, we amused ourselves by giving her bubble hair and taking pictures.



She didn't care, as she likes nothing better than to lean back in the warm water and relax. She takes after her Mum there. The farting is all her Dad, however.

We're still waking every three to four hours in the night. I'm a little more used to it, and I find myself waking up just before she does. It gives me time to prepare her bottle and have a quick drink before she launches into full on crying. I've managed to get feeding her, changing her and settling her down to under half an hour now, which means I can then pump and be back in the Land of Nod in around an hour.

We went to our first breastfeeding support group. I didn't want to go, since I'm pumping and not actually breastfeeding, but my Health Visitor talked me into it. I'm glad we went - the ladies were really supportive of my decision to pump and it was nice to get out and about. Little Lady slept through most of it, and didn't seem particularly enamoured with the other babies. The little boy next to us seemed to like her, however....

She is so alert now. She tracks people across the room, and is starting to reach out for things that interest her. She loves her flashing star that plays music, and she likes her caterpillar rattle as well. She isn't so fond of the characters on her travel cot, but she watches them when the wind blows them.

I can hear stirrings from her cot. I feel a cuddle coming on....

Three weeks old!

Little Lady is in the midst of a growing spurt. She was weighed yesterday by the Health Visitor, and came in at a whopping seven pounds and five ounces!

I'm still pumping. Whilst she doesn't reject my breast immediately, the best we've managed to date is one minute of breastfeeding in one go followed by some grizzling. It is an improvement on her spitting my nipple out immediately and screaming the house down, so I still have some hope that I can persuade her to take some meals from the tap. I don't mind if she takes some bottles, but I'd love to experience some breastfeeding.

The pumping is hard work. Right now, I'm pumping every two hours whilst awake and whenever she wakes in the night (thankfully she usually only wakes the once), and I've managed to get two feeds ahead of her since I got my new electric double pump.

I had been using a manual pump, which was working reasonably well but was hard work and time consuming. Now I can get more milk in half the time, so it was a worthwhile investment for me. I'm hoping I will be in a position to start creating a freezer stash of milk in the near future, but that will take some time given the amount she is eating right now.

She can hold her head up briefly already and rolls to her side with relative ease. She is a very content baby, and just loves to watch the world go by - more so from someone's arms, but she is quite happy in her cot as well.

The dogs love her. Both have to have a sniff and a lick of her in the morning when we come down, and Lila in particular watches over her. She sits next to her cot most of the day, and when Little Lady has a rare cry, Lila runs around crying herself until I've soothed the baby.

The Baron and I are really loving having her. Parenthood is everything we'd hoped it would be and we've never been happier.