I’m not sure what the world’s obsession is with asking moms why they are formula feeding. I can’t wrap my mind around is why anyone feels like they have a right to ask a new mom “Are you breastfeeding?”
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It is none of your business.
I’m going to say it again.
It. Is. None. Of. Your. Business.
Are you the mom in question? No. Are you the baby? No. Then it is none of your business if a mom is formula feeding or not.
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My daughter was born via emergency c-section. Typically, a baby is directly placed on mom right after birth for something called the golden hour. This is an hour directly after birth for mom and baby to bond and this is when the first breastfeeding session typically occurs.
I didn’t get that.
Didn’t see my baby until over 27 hours after birth.
I heard her cry and that was it. I didn’t even get to look at her.
My doctors were too preoccupied trying to keep me alive because my blood pressure was rising by the second. My body was pumped full of drugs. After the surgery, I only remember the world being so dizzy. I also remember my husband showing me a picture of our baby, but I still wasn’t coherent enough to really realize that it was my baby.
I was hooked up to magnesium 24/7 and only ate liquid foods like jello and plain chicken broth. If you have never been pumped full of magnesium, consider yourself very lucky. Magnesium makes you feel like you have the flu on steroids. You get hot and cold flashes. You feel so hot and gross. All you can do is sleep through your body aches.
Meanwhile, a location consultant, would come in and teach me how to use a breast pump and how to power pump. Session after session, nothing would come out. My body’s main concern was keeping me alive, not producing breastmilk. I felt like a failure because I couldn’t do the one thing I was supposed to be able to do. I also thought that if I could at least pump breastmilk for Cora, it would make up for the fact that I had to deliver her 5 weeks early and she came out so small.
Once I saw her for the first time in the NICU and was able to actually meet and hold my baby, it was a little easier. My body seemed to remember that I had a baby and I was able to produce. I was also starting to get better because my blood pressure was lowering (still high though).
Even though I could finally produce breastmilk, I still wasn’t producing enough.
My baby was so small and premature that her doctor prescribed her a high-calorie formula, so even when I was able to provide breastmilk, my breastmilk had to be fortified. Fortifying my breastmilk meant that a teaspoon of high-calorie formula feeding needed to be added to the breastmilk to make the breastmilk a higher calorie. Even if I wanted to try and nurse I couldn’t because of all the calories she needed.
I was able to pump while she was in the NICU because all my husband and I did for those few weeks was spend all day and most of the night in the NICU. Didn’t have to worry about anything else. I also had my husband help me with anything I needed. In order for me to pump 50 milliliters of breastmilk, I needed to be hooked to the pump for at least an hour. After pumping I then needed to wash and sanitize the pump parts (another 15 minutes). This process then started again another 2 hours later.
Once my daughter got discharged and my husband went back to work it was hard to keep up. I didn’t have him or a nurse to help me. When I had to pump I just had to let her cry in her bassinet because I couldn’t hold the breast pump and her at the same time. When I had to sanitize the parts, I also had to leave her crying. She then started wanting more to eat, and I couldn’t produce enough. She had formula feeding constantly in order to keep her full.
I would wake up three or four times a night to pump for an hour to try and get ANYTHING out. Then, I started to dry up with all the stress, the exhaustion, and all the medication I was put on to keep me alive.
I felt tremendous guilt.
Why couldn’t I have carried her for those last 5 weeks?
Why couldn’t my body produce milk like it was supposed to?
This guilt started to feed into my postpartum depression and anxiety. If you want to read more about my journey with postpartum anxiety I talk about it in this post. I started to sincerely hate myself. I really thought that my husband and baby would be better off if I wasn’t around. Multiple instances I looked at my husband and said “I wish I never survived”. After all, I couldn’t breastfeed, what was supposed to be the most natural thing in the world for a mom to give to her baby.
After I visited my doctor for another one of my check-ups, I brought these feelings up and I was set up with a therapist. I spent months in therapy working through all of these feelings and my traumatic experience. In fact, nearly 2 years later I still see a therapist. Trauma doesn’t go away and I will carry that traumatic experience with me for the rest of my life. After a few months in therapy, I was able to start to accept that formula feeding was alright and I was still a good mom.
A few weeks once I accepted that I was still a good mom for my baby even though I couldn’t breastfeed, my husband had some members of his family come up and visit us. While they were there I had a man who kept asking me if I breastfed. The first few times it didn’t bother me because I learned that is just a question that people ask. But after the fourth time asked the same man, it was really bothering me.
This man then proceeded to read me and my husband all the ingredients on the formula can and make comments about it.
I couldn’t believe it.
This man knew NOTHING about what I went through and the lengths I went to try and breastfeed was judging me for feeding my child a formula that was PRESCRIBED to her. This man wasn’t even someone who had any sort of right to tell me how my daughter should be fed (like a doctor). All I could do was listen. And I watched his wife just silently agree and not even try to stop her husband from making comments about my breasts. My mind went blank and my body was tense. Every single feeling I worked through with my therapist came back.
I was shamed for formula feeding. I was shamed for feeding her ingredients that were unfamiliar to this man and woman. Shamed for providing my child formula as her only way to eat.
I was violated because this man was so weirdly obsessed with how my daughter was fed and if it was through my breasts are not.
The next day when I saw this man and woman again I somehow worked up the courage to tell them how inappropriate their comments were. Honestly, a lot of it was because my husband felt the same as me. He was disgusted that someone, particularly this person in his family, would act that way. It was so disgusting the way this man read every single ingredient on that formula can to prove his point. With the encouragement of my husband I looked at this man straight in the eye and said,
“My boobs. My business. My boobs have absolutely nothing to do with you.”
To sum up the end of this experience, this man was greatly offended by me and my husband calling him out on his actions. Myself, ever since I stood up for myself I have gained greater confidence in my parenting choices and decisions. I have also started caring less about what others thought about me and what I chose to do. Because it isn’t their child, it isn’t their breasts, why care so much about mine? You have your own to worry about.
Who cares how a child is fed if the child is happy and healthy?
When it isn’t your child, you have absolutely no right to have ANY opinion on the way they are fed. There are so many factors that will dictate a mom to make the decision to do formula feeding instead of breastfeeding. For me, it was mainly because I physically could not produce breastmilk. And so many factors made that physically impossible. The traumatic and premature delivery of my child and I didn’t get to hold and meet my baby until she was over 27 hours old.
Since I developed preeclampsia with severe features, my body was starting to shut down during delivery. Producing breastmilk was the last thing my body was worried about. It was more concerned with getting the fluid out of my lungs, lowering my blood pressure (I was constantly over the 200s/100s), healing my c-section incision, and many other factors.
Mentally and emotionally, I was in a very unhealthy state. I constantly was telling my husband and family that I wished I didn’t survive. That my husband and my newborn baby would be better off if I wasn’t around. I never had a plan to commit suicide, I just wish I could disappear. Every time I pumped, I felt terrible. It reminded me that I failed and I couldn’t breastfeed like I planned and wanted to. I wanted that experience and I wanted to be able to bond with my newborn baby.
I wanted to share this experience so other women knew they weren’t alone. You aren’t alone if you wanted to breastfeed and you couldn’t. You aren’t alone if you were shamed for formula feeding instead of breastfeeding. Your baby has a happy and healthy mom is much more important than breastfeeding.
If you are breastfeeding, great. If you formula feeding, great. You are doing some combination of both? Great.
You are a great mom.
You are giving your child food.
If you are the one shaming mothers, STOP IT. You have no idea what they went through to make that decision. It isn’t an easy decision. The shaming needs to stop.
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If you are a preeclampsia survivor or HELLP syndrome survivor and would like to share your story, please contact me through email at courtney@knockonmotherhood.com. I would love to share your birth story and keep spreading awareness. I am trying to gather as many preeclampsia survivors’ birth stories as possible to spread awareness.
If you are a preemie mom, I would also love to share your story. Please contact me through email at courtney@knockonmotherhood.com.
My kids are grown now but back when they were babies I always said “Fed is what is best for my baby”. However that needed to happen didn’t matter to me. Good for you for standing up for yourself and I’m so sorry you went through that. People really have a lot of nerve. I know this post is older but I wanted to comment and tell you I stand with you.
Thank you, I appreciate that.