I'd never been afraid that I'd miss out on the nursing experience until I realized my boys would be preemies. I'd been able to have such good nursing experiences with my other children, I really didn't want the boys to miss out. Not to mention, if anyone needs all the bonuses of breast milk, it's preemies in the nicu.
At the same time, I knew I couldn't sacrifice the emotional health of my three other children. I had just been on three months of bed rest, out of state testing twice a week. I had to find a compromise to meet all of my children's needs and I was emotionally prepared to formula feed if I was spending to much time on the twins teaching them to nurse.
Oh did I stress, before they were born I stressed. While they were in the nicu I stressed. I know I can search and find posts in support forums begging for advice on how to teach those preemies to nurse. Just a word, it's not beneficial to panic. That really doesn't help much.
The twins started tube feedings at about three days old for Greg and four days old for David. Interestingly enough, Dave was always about one step behind Greg in the nicu. Every milestone Greg made, Dave was about twenty-four hours behind him. Even when we thought Dave was days behind, he'd surprise us over and over again with keeping up with his *cough* older by thirty seconds *cough* brother.
They started out by giving the boys two cc's of breast milk and added about two cc's a day. We learned that sucking pacifiers was excellent for our preemies because the pacifier sucking during tube feeding was helping them learn to associate sucking with feeling full. It also strengthened their jaw muscles, which are typically weak in preemies.
Some nicu's are very supportive of breastfeeding, our local nicu was just ok. I understand the need of rules for preemies, but sometimes those rules seem to interfere with a parents right to make decisions on behalf of their babies. Individual nurses expressing opinions on that don't reflect policy was downright disturbing to me. I had one nurse tell me to not bring in anymore breast milk. She said there was to much and I needed to wait until they needed it. I left in tears, I was livid and frustrated. I was trying to establish a milk supply for twins. How dare she say something discouraging to a mom trying to establish a supply.
It was easy to convince the nicu to let me try latching Greg on, as soon as he started to transition him to the bottle, I was able to start putting him on my breast. Granted, I was only able to put him on once a day. With the other children, it simply wasn't possible for me to go to the hospital more often. They wouldn't let me latch Dave on. It was really odd. So (big time confession) after we were cleared to take the boys into one of the family rooms, I covertly put Dave on my breast. Oh he didn't latch on, he didn't nurse, he mostly put his mouth on my nipple and the kid played around but I figured that was important. He was learning how I tasted and how I smelled. I called it nipple play.
I was on wic and I found out wic will help with industrial breast pump rentals. Would you believe I was interrogated as to why I needed a breast pump? Well why Mrs **** do you need a breast pump? Are you going back to work? Do you feel you're not making enough milk? Has your doctor been concerned about your child's weight gain. Oh HELLO, have you even looked at my chart? I have premature twins in the nicu. Do I have to explain why I need a breast pump? Aren't you suppose to make me want to nurse?
I don't remember how often I was pumping but by the time Greg came home, I was getting a lot of milk. Greg was three weeks old when he came home a whole five weeks before his due date. *grin* He was so good at latching on. I still couldn't get Dave latched on. We did more nipple play in the evening except the nurses now knew I was putting Dave to my breast. They can weigh before and after a feed to see how much they actually take in, I didn't see a point in weighing him for all three sucks he might get of my milk.
Four days after Greg came home, Dave joined us. Would you believe we now had seven bodies in our house???
I spent the next couple of weeks pumping/bottle feeding, occasionally latching on the boys. It was hard to get them on. It was hard to keep up on it. It was hard to keep pumping/breastfeeding straight.
Then it started to get really hard to pump. Like I was going to put my fist through the table and bite my lip off. After a week of raw and bleeding nipples I figured out I had a yeast infection. I told my husband I was quitting, he said I couldn't, I said, like hell, it's my body and if I want to quit, I'm quitting. So I made a decision, I gave myself four weeks, if I didn't have the boys nursing full time by four weeks, I was going to quit. Smartest thing I could have ever done. I stopped pumping that day and from then on I latched the boys. It got easier and easier. Finally when the boys were two months old, they were on the breast full time and my yeast infection was almost gone (it was still a bit painful but much better.)
Two months later my sleep deprived brain was so happy to discover that I could tandem nurse dem boys. Oh that made my sitting on my rear time so much less!!!
Good thing I had lots of milk because both boys projectile vomited for about four months and Dave an additional four months after that. I spent a lot of time stripping and washing clothes. Nurse, throw-up, strip, dress, nurse, throw-up, strip, dress... it was never ending.
My advice to anyone in the same boat, keep trying. Just keep trying.
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