I’m really very lucky this time around. Evelyn is a champion nurser. I worried during those last weeks of pregnancy if I would be able to breastfeed at all. My experience with Liam had quite simply robbed me of all confidence that I could, after all. For those of you who are just tuning in and weren’t around after Liam was born, I was unable to breastfeed him. For one thing, he was a tiny baby, weighing only 4lbs, 15oz. There wasn’t a lot of time to wait around and see if he would get better at nursing. We needed to get weight on him and pronto. We even had to give him formula in the hospital because if he lost too much before it was time to go home, he would have to stay behind. I certainly didn’t want that.
Plus, we found out when he was about a month old that he had a pretty severe tongue tie. That’s where a the little scrap of tissue under your tongue that connects the bottom side the bottom of your mouth actually prohibits the movement of the tongue. His connected from the very tip of the underside of his tongue to the edge of his gums. His tongue was going NOWHERE. Now, without good tongue movement, nursing is pretty much impossible. And, as it would happen, by the time we got it all sorted out and fixed, he was having nothing of breastfeeding. Of course, knowing Liam now, it comes as no surprise to us that he was picky enough to prefer a bottle by that time. He is, quite possibly, the pickiest child on the planet. Not only did he want to drink out of a bottle, but he wanted to drink out of a Dr. Brown’s bottle. None other would do. Goofy kid.
Anyhow, that little history lesson aside, you can hopefully see why I would be concerned about being able to nurse another baby. But Evie is a natural. She, quite honestly, picked it up quicker than I did when we were in the hospital. Her latch is spot-on and she just simply adores it. So much so, in fact, that she would like nothing more than to just attach herself to my breasts 24/7. And on the rare occasions that Kile tries to feed her a bottle, well, she HATES it. She’ll do it, if she’s hungry enough. but she HATES it. Which is good. And bad (for those times that we need to give her a bottle instead). But mostly good.
She’s still a little weird about nursing laying down. She just won’t do it half the time. Which is weird because the other half of the time, she’ll do it just fine. And she’s more likely to decide she can’t nurse laying down around 3 o’clock in the morning. Drives me nuts. But on the other hand, I’m just SO GLAD she nurses.
There are certain things I miss about bottle-feeding though. For one thing, when you pump, it’s a LOT easier to pump when you’re doing it exclusively than to nurse and pump as well. With Liam, I had it down to a science. It didn’t matter how much he was eating, it mattered how much I was pumping. So I always controlled the amount of milk on hand. And there was always PLENTY. We had gallons of the stuff in our deep freeze before it was all said and done.
Another thing I miss is that it was rather convenient, in a way. Kile could feed Liam just as easily as I could. I never had to worry about finding a place to go nurse when out in public. Shoot, if we were really desperate, as he got older, we would prop the bottle in his car seat when out and about. This time it’s a lot harder. Finding places to nurse besides the car or a bathroom is just laughable, most of the time. I’ve gotten to where I love going to babies R us, simply because of their “Mother’s Room” with the couches and gliders and privacy.
That’s closely related to another thing that is different, and not in a good way. Right now, Evie is very much all about ME. You hate to admit it, but she definitely does prefer me over pretty much everyone else. Including Kile. It hurts me to pass her to him, for him to hold her and enjoy her, only to have her start to fuss and cry, wanting to be back in my arms. He wants badly, I can tell, for her to acknowledge him. And I know she will, in time. After all, Harry was breastfed and he and Kile got to be thick as thieves after a while. Still, it doesn’t make these early weeks any easier for him.
Still, I am entirely relieved that Evie nurses so well. Even on days like today where she nurses not just well but ALL THE TIME. (I wish I were exaggerating.) Hopefully, we’ll be able to keep this up for months and months to come. Everything else will work itself out in time.
