Catching up; this is from Friday, March 18th - also, lots of information about breastfeeding, so if it's not your thing... stop reading now!
Well, I thought we were doing great, especially after meeting with lactation and the 5 oz gain in 2 days last week (went from 7lb 4 oz last Wed to 7 lb 9 oz last Fri). Yesterday she started doing those cluster feeds around 4.30pm until about 11pm where she was nursing every 20 mins to hour, but I was knowing she's in that 10day growth spurt range so figured that was it. Was not feeling great yesterday, got real achey / chills and around 7pm realized it was those same mastitis symptoms from Lalon and around 7pm saw that on breast was red / inflamed on the surface. So I broke out the books and read up on what to do to keep it at bay... did all of those things and this morning felt better, but still had the red skin - basically have gotten the mastitis most likely from bacteria that would have gotten in from the "traumatized / cracked" nipples from last week's poor latching. Although, we had corrected that and they have actually been healing, although not back to "normal". Called my dr this afternoon and have started antibiotics to treat the mastitis.
So this afternoon was her check up. Other than the mastitis, which was really my problem, I was truly feeling confident about my nursing - no bottles, feeling let down, hear her swallowing, I'm thinking we've got this. Well, the nurse weighed her in at 7lbs 7 oz (was 7lbs, 9 oz a week ago), so she should have been way more, or at the very worst, had maintained last week's weight. So, dr comes in, we talk - she's not been pooping very much - and he says, let's weigh her again just in case we hit the wrong button on the scale and maybe you can meet with lactation again... we go to the scales, put her on, she's peed and weighs in at 7 lbs 4.5 oz. BOO.
Dr Artman then sends me to the Raleigh office to meet with the lactation lady again and says I need to come back over the weekend for a weight check. Go through all this info again with lactation and so then she watches me nurse - sees we're doing everything right. She then sets me up with that SNS thing where they put the formula through a tube next to your breast - I hate those things - anyway, we did that for what seemed like forever to make sure she consumed at least 2 ounces of formula plus the breast milk. After 2 ounces of formula that we watched her take in, lactation lady goes to weigh her... she should weigh at least 7lbs 6.5 oz maybe more with the breast milk she should have gotten. No, she only weighed in at 7 lbs 5 oz, which the lactation then says she's "greatly dehydrated". She wants us to now make sure she gets at least 2 oz of formula or breast milk every 2 hrs. This should help with weight gain obviously and also making sure she poops... guess there's not enough in her to poop anything out right now.
Been sticking to the regime since we've been home, go back in the morning at 10:15 to have her weight checked and then supposed to go back Monday morning too...
Came home and tried to have a beer, but when I was going outside to enjoy it while watching kids play it fell over and spilled out all over me and the couch... not sure if I wanted to cry or grab the liquor! I can certainly take the gold medal on getting pregnant and having a baby, but my body just can't / won't do the breastfeeding deal. She's still 10 times healthier than the other two put together at this stage of the game, so it isn't the end of the world, just really thought we had it going this time around. Brian is taking over, I'm going to bed and going to start fresh tomorrow. Oh well... tomorrow is another day.
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