Baby Diary – Advice I wish I’d listened to

So, for everyone who has ever commented about how long my posts/emails/letters are – they’re getting a sharp cutting back! Snippets of time taken between feeding, pumping and sleeping – right now Zac is making stirring noises but not yet awake.

There is some advice which I wish I’d followed up on – I started to, but never got completed, and I had the luxury of knowing exactly when Zac was arriving.

Advice 1: Book a lactation consultant for your first week home.

I agreed this sounded good advice and started looking online for a lactation consultant, and then just never got to ringing someone and making the appointment. I think I was partly thinking, well, I’ll be getting support at the hospital at the time of learning it, so it’s not an “absolutely, must be done” item. Wrong. Support at the hospital was not what I’d hoped for – there seems to be staffing issues, creating communication breakdowns, small but enough to affect people. Also, it’s usual to be discharged before your milk is fully in. I assumed that with a 4 or 5 day stay, milk would be in around the 3 day mark and you would go home once confident in ability to breastfeed. Going home unable to breastfeed your baby only happened when turfed out of hospital earlier. Ha. My milk is just starting to come in properly, almost 2 weeks in, with a lot of work to encourage it, though still too early to tell if it will be enough and how much my breast reduction will affect supply capabilities. All week I have wanted to call and book a lactation consultant and haven’t been able to. It’s hard to describe exactly how that happens – it’s just a phone call, right? – but after a feed, I pump, then dash to bed, make myself sleep (sleeping is v. important for breast milk resupply), get up in time to feed, rinse repeat, with a few hours of watching Zac, doing tummy time, comforting him, holding him and some nappy changes, and each day passes without me opening my laptop, getting the numbers I’ve been recommended and calling them.

Today, trying to get Medela Symphony pump, on the phone, Rafe as well, for the better part of an hour whilst friends here, still no luck.

and time’s up for this post!

EDIT: And it only occurred to me as I picked Zac up that I should have used that 10 min to call some lactation consultants. le sigh. I’m not claiming to have much brain right now either.