Guest Post: Breastfeeding After Reduction - A Personal Journey

My name is Losing Brownies and I’m a BFAR mom.

I’m also the author of Losing the baby weight…one brownie at a time. I often write about my life as a SAHM to The Boy and usually I include my husband, Gadget Guy, in these adventures, mishaps, and antics.  Sometimes I write just about myself or things that are going on in my mind. You really don’t know what you’ll find there on any given day!

Today I’m writing about BFARing.

After writing my post Boobies!, Audra asked me to guest post on this topic. If you read that entry, don’t worry, this isn’t one of those copy and paste deals.

First things first… BFAR stands for Breast Feeding After Reduction.

There is a whole community of us out there who have had life altering surgeries to better our physical and mental health, but still strive to naturally feed our children. BFAR is not exclusive to those who had actual breast reductions. It’s also for women who have had any type of breast/nipple surgery. There is even a section for moms who haven’t had surgery, but just suffer with low milk supply.

Before The Boy was even a thought in my mind I struggled with large breasts.

Women on both my mom’s and my dad’s side of the family were large busted. 

I was given the dubious pleasure of bra shopping when I was in the second grade. I was 7 when I started wearing an A cup and they just continued to grow.

I was teased for having breasts before my peers. I received negative attention from boys and girls alike. I even had a box of milk dumped on me in the fifth grade to see if I would deflate.

By the time I was in high school, I had to have bras custom made. At that time I had to go to the same store my grandmother bought her prosthetic breasts. Let me tell you, those types of bras were not attractive. I longed to be able to buy cute bras from Target.

That wasn’t even the worst of my problems. I had crippling migraines from the stress of the weight and my spine started to curve. When I was 19 I decided to see a specialist about it. His options were have a breast reduction now, or face back surgery to correct my spine in a few years.

I took the breast reduction option, and I felt great afterwards. The doctor removed a combined total of 8 pounds of tissue and I was left with a high C.  I had a few years of physical therapy to help repair the damage that had been done and I could finally wear those cute Target bras.

I knew that when I had children I might not be able to breast feed at all. When I fell pregnant last fall this fact was at the forefront of my mind. I did a lot of research and was very hopeful when my breast started making changes. The most exciting of these was leaking colostrum.

The Boy was born via emergency c-section in mid May. Complications caused him to be on I.V. antibiotics, so he wasn’t able to stay in room with me. Gadget Guy wheeled me down to him every two hours to attempt breast feeding.

I didn’t know what to expect, but knew for a fact that there was colostrum, so on the breast he went. It hurt. I had three different lactation consultants come talk to me while I was in the hospital. Each of them had different pieces of advice.

I was told that with my surgery there might be a low production of milk. The consultants advised me that I might need to use a Supplemental Nursing System and/or cup feeding. They even helped show me how to use such devices.

I did really well with two of the consultants. They were very understanding and willing to help me. The third was a Boob Nazi and told me I was selfish for having a breast reduction before I had children and that I was depriving my child of the best. She berated me and made me feel worthless and guilty. She even went as far as to tell me that my child wouldn’t have the developmental advantages of breast fed babies if I supplemented.

My postpartum nurse was so supportive though and she was very patient with me and helped me as The Boy cried and made my nipples crack and bleed. She told the Boob Nazi that a new mother didn’t need to hear that and made sure she was not allowed to see me again while I was in the hospital.

My nurse gave me the name of a pediatrician through the hospital that specialized in breast feeding. She encouraged me to call her.

Five days after birth my milk came in, but The Boy’s weight drastically dropped and his pediatrician said that we needed to supplement and get his weight back up. That is when I called Dr. Breast Helper. She was amazing.

In our first appointment she weighed The Boy before and after feeding and we found that he was only getting two ounces a feed. I was going to have to supplement. Dr. Breast Helper pointed out that when my surgery was done my nipples must have been reattached upside down, because the nipple were pointed upward and The Boy literally had to climb up on them for a decent latch. For positioning she suggested not using the Boppy pillow because it was too soft and wouldn’t give the support he needed to reach the nipple. She also gave me nipple shields to help with the pain.

She helped Gadget Guy and me as we set up the SNS and gave me a list of supplements I could take to naturally boost my milk supply. Our first appointment was over 2 hours long and we were set up for another in a week, and once a week for the next month.

When we left both Gadget Guy and I were feeling confident that The Boy would be able to breast feed, even if it was with a little help.

We immediately bought a copy of Defining Your Own Success, a Brest Friend Pillow for proper positioning and I started taking herbal galactagogues including fenugreek, alfalfa, blessed thistle, shatavari, goat’s rue, and Motherlove More Milk Plus. I was taking roughly 100 herbal pills a day and it caused me to smell strongly of maple syrup.

When The Boy wasn’t on the breast I was pumping to increase production. It was to the point that I was baby, pump, baby, pump all day long. I was even pumping in the middle of the night after his feeds.

We carried on like this and battled reoccurring thrush and a case of mastitis on top of a uterine infection that caused me to be back in the hospital. Oh, and I had brutal PPD.

He was about a month old when he started crying on the breast and refused to stay latched on, with or without the shield. I was in tears every time he was on the breast. When the breast wouldn’t work, I tried cup feeding and finger feeding, but he wasn’t interested in that either.

Dr. Breast Helper suggested it was the lack of flow. I was heartbroken. I didn’t want it to be over yet. My goal was to BFAR until The Boy was at least 3 months, and if that went well then to 6 months and beyond.

With Dr. Breast Helper’s support and the mantra “some breast milk is better than none” I continued to pump and chart my results. We switched to BreastFlow Bottles so that he would still have the breast compression sensation when eating.

I pumped on average 8-9 oz of breast milk a day.

At first, we mixed the breast milk with the formula since he was use to that with the SNS. Then we found that if he had one breast milk bottle before bed and another in the middle of the night he slept much better. Of course, as The Boy grew he ate more in a session so at two months he was taking the full 8 oz before bed. That is also when I started seeing a drop in my production.

I was slowly losing my supply. I tried more supplements, but that didn’t help. I even considered ordering Domperidone from Canada. Domperidone is not a FDA approved drug, but BFAR moms all over the world saw a huge increase of milk supply with it. Gadget Guy was not on board and Dr. Breast Helper didn’t think it was a good idea for me personally, because of my PPD.

I continued on though because I wanted The Boy to have the best. I had mastitis two more times before my milk supply dried up completely, a week after he turned 3 months.

While I did my best, I had a difficult time. I felt guilty for not being able to do more for him. I had lots of supportive people around me, but for every ten supportive people there would be one judgey mommy, like the Boob Nazi, who would bring me down.

The Boy is nearly 5 months old and he is no different developmentally than any other 5 month old boy. He is healthy and well fed. He is completely formula fed now, but you know what, there is nothing wrong with that.

I envy moms who can breast feed with no problems, and my heart breaks for moms who struggle and can’t do it. Formula is there for a reason. It’s made for women who can’t breast feed and for those who choose not to. We are fortunate that we have something like that out there and that babies can thrive on it.

Regardless of what you choose to do, or what life chooses for you, you do the best you can for your child. There are resources like BFAR and Low Milk Supply out there; you just have to reach out to them. Good luck and happy feeding! 

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Thank you, Losing Brownies, for being so open with us all about your struggles!  You are such an encouragement to so many.  Now, Let's show her some comment love!  Click over and visit Losing Brownie's blog!