This is one of the 1st milestones a mother has to face in her motherhood journey and no matter how easy it sounds, it’s not. Some pregnant mothers educate themselves about it by attending classes or visiting lactation consultants in their pregnancy period, while others like me, just sit back and enjoy being absolutely clueless about breastfeeding yet believing that they are the experts in it and its the easiest thing to do as every mother does it.
For all the pregnant women out there — you need to learn the art before you have a tiny little human looking at you with gleaming eyes, hungry yet full of love. Otherwise, you would be stressed that you are not lactating enough and start taking wrong advises from your folks at home and start eating everything that you don’t need to, in order to produce the liquid gold for your baby.
Stress is one of the biggest factors that hinder adequate breastmilk production. I got lucky and was overconfident that I could do it and did not let stress affect me inspite of an improper latch. Your body is undergoing an ocean of changes when you are pregnant and also when you deliver your baby. Most say natural birth is better as it signals your body faster that the baby is out and you lactate better but that wasn’t the case with me and I was lactating gallons. So please don’t believe whatever you are told and just believe in yourself.
Every mother produces that much milk that is sufficient to fill those tiny tummies, and breastfeeding is all about demand and supply. The more you feed, the more you lactate. The more you substitute with formula after your feed thinking that your milk hasn’t made the baby full, the lesser is the demand from you and its easier for the baby to drink from the bottle, so more are the chances of nipple confusion and breast aversion. Please do not give the bottle in the first 6 weeks of your baby’s birth if breastfeeding is something you want to do for a longer period of time.
Sometimes babies feed lots more especially when they are going through growth spurts and this happens even if they are drinking formula milk. Sometimes they feed more as they are cluster feeding and then they sleep for longer hours without feed. And sometimes they do it just because they want to be held by you and want your warmth and comfort. No matter how tired you are as a new mother please be patient, it’s just for 6 months and then it gets really easy as your baby starts eating solid food. Giving the little ones 6 months of your entire life isn’t too much at all. This 6 months will help them build their immunity towards various diseases, create a strong bond between you and your baby, decrease their risk of obesity in adulthood and improve cognitive development and believe me you will be proud about it later on in life.
