Breastfeeding

Let’s talk about breastfeeding…

For the first two weeks of Clark’s life his nickname was Titty Terrorist. That’s right, I called my sweet little baby a titty terrorist. The boy latched on in the delivery room and didn’t let go until he was two weeks old, and then only for short snippets at a time.  The first time he latched on he made me bleed. For the following two weeks in order for him to latch on he felt the need to “bite” down on my nipple just to make sure that it was in his mouth prior to sucking. Had I not been determined to breast feed for the first year of his life, I think that those two weeks just might have broken my resolve. I truly understood why so many women give up on breast feeding. Just knowing that his scheduled feeding was around the corner on the clock would make me cringe, taking my breast out of my nursing bra struck pure dread in my mind, and as soon as my sweet little boy caught whiff of me and turned his little face to my breast I would tense up, curl my toes, and wince as he terrorized my chest to fulfill his need for food.

Luckily the pain of breastfeeding only lasted for a small amount of time. The pain was momentary in those first two weeks, after the initial “bite” the pain subsided, and after those two weeks the pain disappeared altogether.  Clark got better at latching on, I learned his hunger cues and together we got through it. I wouldn’t change it for the world. I think that breastfeeding was my first lesson in motherhood, my first tutorial in how to read my baby and his cues.  I cherish those first moments of his life.

Breastfeeding now gives me one on one time with Clark, it provides me the opportunity to turn the world off and stare into his sweet little face. Sure, there are moments that I absently feed him and I have to remind myself that these moments are fleeting, that he will soon enough be running around and absent from my lap, that snuggling mommy will be too much to ask of him and the world will be calling, and in those moments I am usually smart enough to take a break from my thoughts to just breath him in.

I am by no means a lactation specialist and I know that breastfeeding is not something that all mothers are able to do, there are some extenuating circumstances that make it impossible, but I truly wish for all mothers to be able to share this special bond with their babies. Even when those little bundles of joy are titty terrorists in the beginning.

Was your baby a mammary murderer?