For me breastfeeding has never been this easy, natural thing. With every baby, it’s been the hardest part.
With Nixon, he had a protein allergy and we did months on testing my milk and his feces to no avail. Finally after 5 months of weekly GI doc appointments he was put on Alimentum. I felt like such a failure.
With Hudson, my supply was a constant struggle. He was always hungry and I was pumping almost 12 times a day to keep up my supply and know how much he ate. (Little did I know, I wasn’t drinking enough water and I had started working out too early, both huge reasons my supply dropped.) I grew to hate pumping and hate breastfeeding so much because of the stress I caused myself that I was more than happy to quit when we went on vacation. He was 9 months.
With Poppy, it finally felt natural. She latched right away, she ate great, I drank double my weight in ounces everyday to keep my supply up and she was happy. Or so I thought. At 10 months, she still wasn’t sleeping through the night and when I went in she acted like she was starving. She pushed and fussed and kneaded and bit my breasts every time she ate. Looking back I see she was still hungry too but in the moment I just thought she was normal. In an effort to get her to sleep through the night and stop yelling at me 8 hours a day, I tried a bottle of formula. Previously she refused every bottle we gave her. Suddenly she took anything and everything we offered. That night she drank 8 ounces before bed and slept from 7pm-8am for the first time ever. Poor little thing was just hungry.
Over the last month and a half, she’s slowly been transitioning to prefer the bottle. She would still nurse but less and less time each day. She quickly refusing my left (slacker boob) and only ate from the right. Over the last week, she’s been pushing away after only a few minutes and looking for the bottle. I see the end of our breastfeeding journey is near. The end of breastfeeding for me forever.
Every emotion is so much more intense with your last baby. Every ‘last time’ is heartbreaking. I fight tears just thinking of the final days of having a baby in our house. She’ll be one in two weeks and I’m in total denial. Actually I am a mess but denial seems to be more appropriate.
So for at least a couple more days I’ll keep trying but I am so thankful to have these beautiful images of us to look back on. Thank you to my dear friend, Devyn of Devyn Leone Photography so snapping these for us. Now I’ll just go back to sobbing.
San Clemente Newborn Photographer
Poppy Lea Photography is a motherhood photographer in Orange County who specializes in maternity, newborn, baby, motherhood sessions and family photography in the Orange County area, including San Clemente, Dana Point, Laguna Beach, Newport Beach, Laguna Niguel, Irvine, Mission Viejo, Aliso Viejo, Rancho Mission Viejo and Costa Mesa.
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XO- Laurel