Hello!

[brittany.m.hall]

Hello. My name is Brittany. I have 2 sons. Tristan is 3 1/2 and Ethan is 1 month. Ethan was born at 33.5 weeks. I spent 4 weeks on bedrest in the hospital and still had him early. He was in the NICU for 3.5 weeks. He was born at 5lbs 11 oz and his last weight was 7 lbs. I am just trying to adjust to a newborn and a rudy toddler. I am also trying to exclusively breastfeed but it is hard since I have been pumping since Ethan was born and its hard to transfer from 3 to 4 times a day breastfeeding and the rest bottles. I just wish it was a little easier. Hoping to make some good friends in here.

[ZZsMom]

Welcome to the group. My son was born at 34 weeks and weighed 5lbs. He spent two weeks in the hospital and his only real issue was feeding. That made breastfeeding tough. I pumped but also tried to nurse. Then I switched to basically exclusively nursing. I thought I could push him into it. That backfired. He was incredibly fussy and up for hours in the middle of the night nursing. Looking back, I think that maybe he wasn't very good at expressing the milk and he was hungry. That, in turn, led to a decrease in my supply. By the time I thought I knew what was going on, the obstacles just seemed insurmountable. And, for the record, I breastfed my daughter til she was 15 months old so it's not like I was inexperienced or giving up easily. I fought my way into it with him and, at the end of the day, it just wasn't the right thing. We were both miserable and bringing my supply back up would have been like a full time job. I gave in and gave up when he was three months old. I tell you this for two reasons: 1) to suggest that you make a very gradual transition from pumping to full time nursing and 2) to let you know that if you reach the point that I did, you shouldn't feel guilty about letting it go. I wish I had been able to nurse him for longer. I loved it with my daughter. But, he's seven months old now, he's healthy and weighs about 18lbs. It didn't work out as I'd planned but it wasn't the end of the world either.