Monday, March 23, 2009

no one should guilt you into breastfeeding, there is already enough guilt associated with motherhood as it is. But if you do want to breastfeed and are having a hard time getting started here are a couple thing that helped me......

  1. Talk to a lactation consultant. She may not be able to slove the problem but she will be able to elimnate possible problems and give you some solutions for getting started.
  2. I pumped all the time, usually 4-6 hours a day.
  3. I used nipple shields for a while. They helped the babies to latch on, but they made it harder for the babies to get as much milk. As soon as the babies did a better job of latching on I stopped using them.
  4. I feed the babies on schedule, when they were wide awake, after taking a nap. If I waited until the babies were tired or extreamly hungry then they would not even try to breastfeed.
  5. When I was worn out I gave myself a free pass to not even try to make the babies breastfeed. At night I just bottle feed the babies and them pumped. When I was stressed did the same.
  6. Even after the babies were finally breastfeeding I kept them on one bottle a day, right before they went to sleep at night. This ensured that the babies got a full meal before they went to sleep and it helped the babies maintain the ability to bottle feed.