When Breastfeeding Sucked Last Time
What to do When Breastfeeding Sucked Last Time:
Sometimes your breastfeeding journey doesn’t work out like you planned. Sometimes it feels like it was a giant traumatizing dumpster fire, and your hopes for having a different experience with your next child feel like an unachievable dream.
I’m here to tell you that doesn’t have to be the case. I can’t fix what happened with your last breastfeeding journey, but I can help you make sure it doesn’t happen the same way again. Here’s what we can do to help give you a better experience…
Ideally, we start working together about halfway (or earlier) through your pregnancy. In some cases, we start working together when you are thinking about getting pregnant again to help reduce your stress and anxiety around infant feeding. Do not wait, consultants book up with prenatal clients quickly.
During our initial consultation, we go over several things:
We do a comprehensive health history to find any underlying challenges or health concerns, and we recommend referrals for health care to support your lactation success.
We do a full case review to see what obstacles and challenges you had in your previous breastfeeding journeys. This allows us to identify why things were challenging and discuss what could have/should have been done to support you.
We identify and openly discuss the concerns that are likely to reoccur in your situation. Things like tongue ties, low supply, or other genetic conditions may happen with subsequent children. We may not have a way to prevent them, but knowledge is power, and a good plan can help manage even a complicated situation. I don’t shy away even when things may be hard to hear, I give you all of the information.
We talk through the strategies and options that exist for managing breastfeeding BEFORE you are in the heat of the moment so you can think about what you might want to consider. This gives you time to learn and get questions answered before you have to make a decision.
We talk about the various options along the spectrum of infant feeding, from exclusive feeding at the breast, donor milk, exclusively pumping, formula feeding and any combination of feeding options imaginable.
We talk about how pumping may be part of your infant feeding plan, and we measure your nipples to make sure you start off and stay in great flange sizes so that pumping is as effective and efficient as possible.
We make an initial plan for how you want to feed your baby, and we make it flexible enough to allow room for the unknown.
So how does this change your breastfeeding experience?
There are a handful of things that can derail breastfeeding, but almost all can be addressed while maintaining the breastfeeding relationship you desire if we find and address those issues early.
When you start with a prenatal consultation, you are setting yourself up for success. We already know what factors we are likely to encounter, you know what the warning signs of breastfeeding challenges are likely to look like for you, and if you need postpartum support, we are ready to go on a moment’s notice. It doesn’t guarantee you won’t have challenges, but it guarantees your challenges can be addressed quickly and efficiently.
So how does this help make your experience better if you may have to face challenges again?
The most traumatic part of breastfeeding when the situation fails to meet your original goals is the lack of support. It’s the dismissal by health care providers, it’s the push for bottles, pumping, or formula when those are not your goals. It’s finding out after the window of opportunity has closed that the professional you sought advice from did a crappy exam and missed obvious issues. It’s finding out your plan was based on misinformation.
Even if we encounter issues for which there are no viable solutions to address them in the moment, you will be supported. All of your options will be laid out for you to make the informed choices you are owed. We can make sure you aren’t left with the what if’s and feelings of maybe there was something missed. That can provide for a sense of peace even in a complicated situation.
So, if you want a different experience this time around, schedule your prenatal consultation and get the support you deserve. In the meantime, read about one of my favorite success stories after an unsuccessful first try.
Since proper education about breastfeeding should ideally occur before birth, check out our virtual prenatal video classes On-Demand™.
