Saying good-bye to breastfeeding

Nine days ago I became a new mother.

About this I am filled with happiness and fear and excitement and exhaustion and weepiness, but also with an emotion I did not expect:  intense grief.  Regarding breastfeeding.  Or my lack thereof.  Let me explain.

I assumed I would breastfeed my daughter, Sophia.  I've assumed since I was a little girl that I would one day do this for my child when I saw my mother breastfeeding my brothers.  I had visions of my child emerging from my body, wet and wriggling, and being placed upon my ample breasts already overflowing with milk and beginning to eat.  My motherly instincts would kick in as I held her to me and basked in the glow of fertility and womanhood. My assumption was so entrenched that while stocking up on baby necessities in the last few months, I didn't bother buying formula and a bunch of bottles:  my boobs would supply what I needed!  Baby feeding supplies?  Check and check. 

I heard people talk about how difficult breastfeeding is and I thought I had adequately braced myself.  I was ready to be patient with both my body and with Sophia.  I was ready for sore nipples and purchased lanolin ointment in preparation.  I bought expensive nursing bras after test-driving a couple.   I thought I was reasonably ready for the challenge.

I was wrong.

The first time I put my baby to my breast, I felt anxious anticipation.  Within a few seconds Sophia had figured out what was going on, and her little lips had eagerly enveloped my nipple and she began to suck.  I was thrilled!  My baby knew what to do, and soon when my milk "came in" from wherever it mysteriously was, I would be able to supply her with the food she needed.  Awash in motherly competence, I beamed with pride as the nurses in the Intensive Care Nursery (ICN) at UCSF exclaimed over how good her latch was and how well she sucked.

"You don't have to worry about those two," Nurse Sue knowlingly informed other nurses who worked in the ICN, "they're as good as anyone I've ever seen at breastfeeding."

Well, of course my child would figure it out quickly. She was her mother's daughter!  She was smart, and it was a sign of the overachievement to come.  She would be walking at 9 months and reading at  3 1/2 years.

These positive feelings lasted for approximately 48 hours.  While I was reflecting upon my good fortune that breastfeeding was practically in the bag, Sophia was being fed formula in a bottle with a nipple that was much easier to suck from and much more productive than mine and had grown impatient with our little suck-on-mom's-nipples-for-half-an-hour-to-get-colustrum-and-help-her-milk-come-in-BEFORE-you-can-eat song and dance.  Soon she preferred to go straight for the bottle when she was hungry.

Who could blame her?

But it felt awful.  At first I just felt a little let down and disappointed that my milk hadn't come in as quickly as I'd hoped.  But after a couple of feeding sessions' worth of watching my baby repeatedly make faces when she realized which nipple she was being given, I started to get upset in earnest.

I was reassured repeatedly by nurses.  This was not abnormal at all, they told me.  C-sections slow down the process, it was explained.  Premature babies may also slow down the process, I heard.  Just give it a couple more days and it will happen, I was promised.

A lactation consultant dropped by my room.  An electric, hospital-grade breast pump was delivered to my bedside so that I could get down to the business of hooking myself up to the machine and pumping every three hours.  The ICN pediatrician stopped by to offer breastfeeding tips.  Each time the nurses' shifts changed, I got advice from all of them all over again.  In front of a small, concerned audience, I was instructed how to "express" milk from my breasts and then subsequently failed to do so repeatedly.  Everyone around me was "Rah-rah-rah!" on the breastfeeding bandwagon and I felt left behind.

While everyone meant well, what it ultimately meant was that my every three hours feedings with my baby began to feel like work.  Work at which I was failing!  Along with other exhausted new mothers on the 15th floor, I shuffled zombie-like in my gown to the nursery around the clock, but I began to hate it. It was stressful and goal-oriented and frustrating.  When the telephone rang in my hospital room or my alarm went off signaling that it was time for the baby to eat, I groaned and cursed.

I felt dread about feeding my baby, and I started to cry every time it was time to feed her.

When I managed to survive another feeding, I went back to my room and fell into bed with relief, only to immediately begin eyeing the clock out of anxiety for the next feeding.

Eventually, my colustrum stopped showing up when I pumped.  It felt like I'd officially failed.  "Your negative emotions are probably affecting the process," I was informed.

Well, hell.

These feelings were not okay with me.  I started electing to skip the attempts to get my baby to suck from my own breasts and began going straight to the bottle when I fed her.  I wanted back the moments we had previously shared when Sophie had her belly full and we would rock in the chair together and snuggle.  My nursery breastfeeding boycott was very controversial.  Nurses confronted me while I was feeding my baby about why I was doing what I was doing.  Had I thought about the implications of this decision?  Her doctor came to talk to me.  A second and much-lauded lactation consultant was sent in to get to the bottom of my situation.  A social worker came to have a little heart-to-heart with me about my feelings.  One nurse took it upon herself to call the lactation specialists and inform them whenever I fed the baby without putting her to my breast so that they could call me on the phone in my room later and ask my why I hadn't put the baby to my breast at her last feeding--why was I stopping breastfeeding?  I felt spied on and harassed, and that was the last straw. 

I desperately wanted to take my baby and go home and away from the eyes of all the doctors and nurses and the other mothers breastfeeding in the nursery.  An identical electric breast pump was scheduled to be delivered to my house the day I brought the baby home.  I looked forward to my own private attempts to feed and bond with my baby.  Then an address mix-up and the approaching weekend delayed the delivery by several days.  Now, even my hopes of succeeding at home were fading away, and I felt miserable.  I cried my first night home when I desperately needed sleep to be ready for her next feeding and changing.  "I'm not going to be able to breastfeed our baby," I moaned to my partner.  "I feel like a bad mom."

The next morning Aurelia, a home care nurse, arrived at my house to give Sophie her first check-up.  She was kind and soft-spoken and filled with questions and advice.  I knew in advance I couldn't bear another conversation about breastfeeding, and I prepared to put on a brave face about how it was going.  We sat down in the living room with Sophie and my mother, and Aurelia got down to business.  "I'm hear to check the baby, of course," she said, "but I really want to start with asking you about breastfeeding."  I broke down into a weeping mess and blubbered out the whole situation to her.  Fat, hot tears rolled down my cheeks and I felt embarrassed, but there was nothing I can do to control them.  It was heart-wrenching.

Aurelia was caring and empathic.  She listened to my story and said, "You are not required to do this.  You did your best.  You gave your baby the colustrum that would give her the antibodies that she needed.  That's the most important part.  They are very pro-breastfeeding at UCSF and there's a lot of pressure.  You can't beat yourself up about this. You know, not breastfeeding is a choice, too."

This was a new idea.  I wasn't sure I liked it.

Aurelia kindly helped me by making the phone call necessary to track dow the wayward breastpump that was supposed to be delivered to me, and assured me that it was not too late.  "Your hormones are very active for a couple of weeks.  If you decide you want to breastfeed, there's still time."  My relief was incredible.

Today while laying with Sophia on the bed, one of the lactation consultants from UCSF called me to check in.  I felt my stress level rise immediately.  How was breastfeeding going? she wanted to know.  Have you tried this?  And that?  What about this combined with that?  Predictably, I started to cry.  I explained to her that I felt that the pressure around breastfeeding was affecting my bonding with Sophia.  She softened. 

"Honey, if it doesn't work it's not the end of the world.  She will still grow into a wonderful young woman.  She will still be happy and healthy.  When you feed her formula, hold her skin-to-skin.  Your baby deserves to feel you against her--she deserves that contact and so do you.  Stroke her arms and hands.  It will be fine.  If breastfeeding is not working then don't let it affect your relationship."

I was surprised by what I was hearing, but grateful.  This active breastfeeding proponent was assuring me it was okay if it didn't work for me, and that I had nothing to feel guilty about.  I started letting myself off the hook.

Tomorrow the breast pump is supposed to be delivered to my house.  I still plan to work on breastfeeding at my own pace.  I don't know if it will work.  It may have already slipped through my fingers, and that still hurts me.  But I no longer feel like a bad mom.

My/our temple

It is a very strange thing to find that your body has been taken over by another being.  And strange to be a container carrying precious cargo that everyone else has an opinion about and an interest in and my god they are going to let you know!

Before I was pregnant, when I needed mental health assistance it could be very, very difficult to get the help I needed.  Endless phone calls and waits and unreturned messages and frustration and confusion for which I just didn't have the energy.  So it was strange to become pregnant and suddenly find that everyone could not help me fast enough.  My baby's health and well-being are important enough to complete strangers that they want to bend over backwards (to the extent that their budgets allow) to connect me with services. 

Want to take a jewelry-making class with other moms-to-be?  Here's a pamphlet!

Care to try prenatal acupuncture?  Come to our free clinic!

Feel like you want support when you bring your newborn home?  Let us sign you up for a few visits from a home health nurse!

Compared to what I had gotten used to, it has been rather dazzling. 

I am trying to take advantage of every service and opportunity I can manage while it is available, especially now as I'm reaching the end and being pregnant has become very, very difficult.  I was aware that it might, but never would I have been able to imagine how.

At the beginning of my second pregnancy, I was warned that miscarriage, pregnancy, and birth can all being very challenging experiences for women who've experienced sexual trauma.  When I thought about it, it made sense.  I was glad to be warned and I filed this knowledge away with the idea that knowing was half the battle and now that I knew I would be fine.

How I was wrong.

(To be continued.)

Introducing...Dear Frijole

Did I mention I was having a baby? 

I've been discussing this topic elsewhere for privacy.  Now I'm ready to share. 

http://dearfrijole.blogspot.com

Praise you

You have no idea I'm writing this.  In fact, it's entirely possible you'll never read it unless I purposefully send you to this blog entry.  We have been together nearly 1 3/4 years, and god knows we have had some turbulent times when I didn't think we could or would make it.  We are working so hard on our relationship because we love each other and we want to make it.  I try to make a point of telling you the things I appreciate about you, and here are some things that I am incredibly grateful for that you deserve to hear.  I probably couldn't say them aloud without my voice breaking.

1.  When I make something for you to eat, be it a can of soup or a stew I worked on for hours, you never fail to earnestly thank me for it.

2.  Every single day you are at work you call me to hear my voice, even just for a minute.

3.  You love my birdies and are good to them.

4.  Nearly every day you tell me that I am beautiful, even if I just woke up and I know perfectly well my hair is sticking out in all directions.

5.  After we lost our first baby and I was devastated, I was angry at everything.  Even when I was irrationally furious with you for having a healthy child when I did not, you didn't get mad at me.  You held me.

6.  You pour me a cup of coffee every morning even though I am perfectly capable of doing it myself.

7.  When you taste something delicious, your first reaction is to share it with me.

8.  You tell me your dreams when you wake up, and you listen to mine.

9.  Sometimes you fall asleep holding my hand.

10.  You never make me feel bad for the seemingly endless things I feel unable to do at the moment.  Instead, you reassure me and walk around all the things left undone.  This is a constant source of relief.

- end of sap -

The spotless mind

Joel: I can't see anything that I don't like about you.
Clementine: But you will! But you will. You know, you will think of things. And I'll get bored with you and feel trapped because that's what happens with me.
Joel: Okay.
Clementine: [pauses] Okay.

What Mrs. J's class saw

I still dream about my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. J.  She loved me because I was quiet and got good grades and made 100% on all my spelling tests that year.  But I hated her.  She got mad and lost her temper easily, and when she did she said nasty, mocking things to her students.  This volatility was an anxious kid like me's worst nightmare.

One of the students that Mrs. J's wrath was regularly directed to was Robbie V.  Robbie was a naughty boy who was usually causing trouble, but even worse was the fast that he smelled like mothballs.  The rumor around school was that Robbie's parents were mean to him and made him put his clothes in mothballs as punishment.  I have no idea what the actual situation was, but I identified with Robbie because my home life was unhappy, too.  I tried to be nice to him, and I didn't complain if I had to sit next to him at lunch like everyone else did.

One day in class, Mrs. J. was fed up with Robbie, and she placed his desk in front of hers so she could keep an eye on him.  She was in an exceptionally bad mood that day, and I watched her warily as I tried to draw as little attention to myself as possible. 

At one point she got so irritated that she said, "Robbie, you smell.  I'm sick of smelling mothballs.  Stand up."  Robbie slowly did as he was told.  Mrs. J. grabbed her can of Lysol off the bookshelf behind her, directed him to hold his arms up and turn around slowly, and then proceeded to spray him up and down. 

The class was surprised and looked around at each other for cues on what to do.  Some stifled giggles behind their hands clamped over their mouths.  I was horrified and started to cry.  I can still remember the look of shame and humiliation on Robbie's face as he stood in front of the class with his arms out.  And I still dream about it to this day.

Tiny, tiny people

Our cat is being neutered next week. 

This evening I attempted to gently explain to five year old Darius what "neuter" means using words he already knows.  I said, "Just like you, Freddy has a penis and balls.  We'll take him to the doctor and he will perform a surgery that removes Freddy's balls.  That way, he won't be able to make baby kitties if he meets a girl cat."

I was trying to tread carefully here, as he is not my child and it is not my place to have his first birds and bees talk with him.

"Why doesn't he want to make baby kitties?" he asked.

"Well, I don't know if he wants to or not, but we don't want him to.  That's why we are taking him to the doctor," I answered.

He looked thoughtfully at Freddy's rear end.  "His balls let him make baby kitties?"

"Yes," I explained.  "Just like humans can make baby people, cats can make baby kitties."

His eyes widened.  He reached down to his Batman costume pants, lifted up his own testicles, and said, "You mean there's tiny people in here?"

Two brown eyes

I had one of those moments. One of those moments where it's a certain kind of day and you're in a certain kind of mood and a certain kind of song comes on. Suddenly, you're 15 years old again and in the middle of the frantic 5 minutes between 5th and 6th period and you seek out those two brown eyes. Those brown eyes that--on the rare occasions when they catch yours--have the power to warm you to your toes. For a moment you are lost.  And then the stoplight changes to green and it's time to go but your eyes have misted over and you've been punched in the gut. All because of the memory of two brown eyes.

Where I went and why I stayed

I imagine most people think they know how they would react in a given situation.  I know I did.  I always had a bit of feistiness in me that led me to believe I would fight an attacker tooth and nail.  Plus, I was smart.  I was educated in sexuality and gender issues.  I taught classes on those subjects fer chrissakes.

In the back of my mind lately--in spite of all the other things I have going on--I have been processing some of the issues that kept me from fighting back, from speaking up.  The list is incomplete.

1.  Though I struggled, I didn't scream while it was happening because I didn't want to make a scene.  I get made fun of for being overly dramatic; I always have.  And when I reported a molestation to a trusted adult as a child, I was told that I had misunderstood what had happened, and that it had not happened the way I said it did.  Because I misunderstood.

I thought maybe I was misunderstanding this time, too.

2.  Admitting to myself what was happening put me in danger of panic.  And if panic set in I felt like I would lose all control. 

Better to keep quiet and calm and alert.

3.  He didn't beat me up.  Didn't pull a weapon on me.  Didn't even say a word, in fact.  He just held me down with his own weight.  Despite the pain and the powerlessness, I kept telling myself, "It's just sex.  That's all it boils down to.  I've had sex plenty of times.  I can survive this."  Though I couldn't even allow myself to think about the word "rape" at the time, looking back I know I felt I wasn't "raped enough" (i.e., raped violently enough) as others I knew had been in order to be seen as having been "legitimately" raped by others. 

They wouldn't believe me--wouldn't take me seriously.

4.  I know you're not supposed to shower.  I've seen enough Law & Order episodes to know.  But the idea of going to a doctor or a police officer dirty and unwashed was unthinkable to me.  I just wanted to wash his presence off and forget. 

The shame and humilation were unbearable.

Sine curve

"Go put on your brave face and do all that stuff that you do. This day will fade into the next and then again into the next. Just pretend you're a machine."

Note:  This was not written by me and is not my current state.  But I loved it because it accurately describes so many of mine for the past 3 years.

Oomp diggy diggy oomp bow bow

I posted this months ago on Facebook, but I found myself drawn back to it today.  It's footage taken from a subway ride in NYC and the video is lovely, but it is the song that really makes me incredibly, inexplicably, indescribably happy.

SubWaltz from Andrea Allen on Vimeo.

Music:  "A Bastard Waltz" by People Like Us and Ergo Phizmiz 

I can smell October on the east coast

October is my favorite month.

I suddenly had weird deja vu of reading T.S. Eliot. I digress. I have no particularly strong feelings about April.

Anyway, there is just nothing like fall from, say, the mid-Atlantic states up through New England. ("They are so a state! They have a football team!") October days--no matter where I am--make me think of leaves and wood smoke and homecoming parades and Monument Ave. and driving through the mountains. They make me think of still new school years and crisp sheets of notebook paper and fresh starts and good intentions.

While San Francisco has some pretty spectacular days in October, it will always belong to the east coast in my heart.

I can remember one October, in particular. 2003? 2004? I was so filled with joy and hope that I pledged to my friend Kelli that I would do something new and strange every day. Paint my nails blue! Shout sweeping proclamations off my balcony! Howl at the moon! Now that I think about it, my pledges involved mostly me being loud. But I wanted to share my ecstasy!

Actually, I am feeling that way now. But it is far too soon to spill any beans. I'm workin' on some changes. Comin' up with a plan. And I get more excited with each passing hour.

P.S. My friend Mary is far away and going through a rough time right now, and I want her to know I love her. 

Unbirthday

Today was my baby's due date, and I have been sad all day.

But I tried so hard

(A song that made me happy today.)

Still in effect

I have been having lots of random memories lately, and this morning is this one:

When we were still teenagers, Chris and I made a pact about haunting. I had always believed in ghosts and was terrified of them, and he did not believe but really wanted to. There were several stories in my own family (and a couple in his) about deceased relatives coming back to visit the living.

I suggested that if I died before he did, I would do everything in my spiritual power to come back and appear before him, rattle some chains, give him a ghostly message, etc. On the other hand if he died before I did, he was under firm instruction not to haunt me in any way. (I didn't buy all the bullshit my family said about not feeling afraid but rather comforted. Screw that. I would drop dead on the spot. And then where would we be?) I did make one concession that he could, like, let me know in a dream or something that he was okay if he could manage that. He agreed to this proposal.

One night years later--in 2005, to be exact--we were living in San Francisco and had gone to see "The Exorcism of Emily Rose" at the Metreon earlier in the evening. It wasn't that great, but parts of it had stayed with me enough to make me a little nervous in the dark for a couple of days. We lay in bed later that night listening to the foghorns and talking about the movie, evil, and demonic possession. When he had to get up in the dark to go down the hall to the bathroom, I didn't like it one bit. "Hurry up!" I called, nervously eyeing the darkness around me and making sure none of my limbs were hanging over the bed for demons to grab. When he returned, I mentioned "the pact."

"What are you talking about?" he asked.

Aghast that he could forget such an important and long-term agreement, I reminded him about who should haunt who upon one of our deaths. I'm sure he rolled his eyes in the darkness when he scoffed, "But we said that like a decade ago!"

"It's still binding!" I cried, "Until death!"

I wonder if he knows I consider this verbal contract still valid.

What it's like

In September of 2008, I was raped on a date. I never told anyone. I mean I never told ANYONE. Not a doctor, or a therapist, or a best friend. No one. I was so embarrassed and ashamed this had happened to me, and I felt so stupid that I had not kept myself safe. I felt like all that money for all those fucking degrees ought to have been good for something, and here I couldn't even take care of myself. Normally so forthcoming and expansive, I kept my mouth shut. I didn't want to be told what to do or who to talk to. I didn't want to be asked any questions. I didn't want to explain. I just wanted to forget. Up until that point I felt like I'd been a fairly healthy woman with a fairly healthy sex life, and I was convinced I could maintain that through sheer will.

By the end of the same month, I had started to completely fall apart.

Anxiety seemed to ooze from my pores. I couldn't relax. I had recently started my first job and bought a car and suddenly I felt like I was losing control of everything. I couldn't sleep. I would be awake for three days straight. Not just awake, really, but AWAKE! I needed to talk, I needed to write, I needed to make things. Things to say were erupting out of me and I was unable to control them. I made greeting cards and little boxes. I started writing. I wrote all over my walls, in fact, and pounded out long missives on my computer in ALL CAPS because I WAS RUNNING OUT OF SPACE INSIDE TO PUT ALL OF THIS SHIT.

The lack of sleep made me wild-eyed and crazed, and the long commute to work (not to mention actual work) because impossible. The panic attacks started in earnest around this time, and they made me feel desperate and doomed and frantic. I had them everywhere--in my office, in my car, alone in my bed, in the shower. No place was safe.

I can remember driving home from work, my fingers clutching the steering wheel for dear life. I rocked back and forth furiously chanting:

"I'm sorry," she said, "I have nothing left to give."
"I'm sorry," she said, "I have nothing left to give."
"I'm sorry," she said, "I have nothing left to give."

One day on the drive home I felt so terrified to go home and be alone that I phoned ahead to Nannette and pleaded for her to let me come over as soon as I was back in the city. She told me I was welcome to come, and I fiercely held onto that as I drove. But by the time I got back to San Francisco, I was frantic again and couldn't bear to be around anyone. To her confusion, I told her I couldn't come.

Some nights she let me sleep on her couch because I didn't want to be alone.

I became obsessed with the Golden Gate Bridge. I needed to look at that bridge! I needed to see it, to drive on it, to read about it, and watch videos of people jumping off of it. I needed to know just how deep it was in the bay underneath. It felt important to know just how far down there was to go. I read, "San Francisco Bay is relatively shallow but reaches depths of 100 feet in some places." I had dreams about it. I dreamed of what it felt like when my feet left the side, and I dreamed of what I saw on the way down. I dreamed of the sound my back made when it broke upon hitting the water, and I dreamed of the light disappearing above me. I decided that the exact point at which I would jump off would be 98 feet deep, and I needed to keep that number in my head constantly. I wrote the number 98. I cut the corners out of books that showed page 98. I made a box I called "98 feet deep."

The awful part about it was that I didn't WANT to jump off. I didn't want to! It terrified and horrified me to think about it. But I was obsessed with it. My brain wouldn't leave it alone.

The days without sleep were punctuated by complete crashes. Depression and sobbing and apathy, days I called off work because I just could not function. After Nannette pleaded with me to see someone, I sent my doctor an email. All I could think to say was, "I'm going down fast." On my 32nd birthday, she had me come in for an appointment.

My doctor is wonderful, and she urged me to apply for disability and to see a psychiatrist as well as a therapist. I was getting in deeper and deeper shit at work, but I insisted to her that I could still work--didn't need the time off. I regret deeply that I didn't take her advice, but I was determined to hold on to the balls I was trying to juggle by the skin of my teeth.

Eventually, I got fired. I lost a lot of friends when they didn't understand what was going on or the decisions I made. I made a mess of relationships. I lost my baby.

These days I struggle with leaving the house, with seeing people. It feels like the only place I can be remotely safe is in my apartment, because the outside world is much too scary and unpredictable. The last time I tried to have brunch with a friend, I had to force myself to go. I threatened and begged and cajoled myself to go, and when I got home, my beloved bird was dead. A voice inside of me whispered, "I knew this would happen." It is a lonely existence.

I am taking medication now--slowly--and I have told exactly four people what happened to me. It honestly didn't occur to me until a couple months ago how all these things might be tied together. I'm sure I've told portions of my story in this venue before as I recounted my struggles with mental illness, but it has never been told in this complete fashion. I feel somewhat horrified as I type these words that now it will be OUT THERE and PEOPLE WILL KNOW and I CAN'T TAKE IT BACK.

But I needed to tell my story.

Anywhere you want to go

Yesterday I got out of the house for a few hours. I mainly had to run boring errands, but it was nice because I FELT like running those boring errands. My final stop of the day was an appointment with my therapist, Yuan-Lin, who I have really grown to love. I was a little early, so I walked the last few blocks and took my time. I meandered and swung my bag back and forth, lost in thought.

At the corner of 34th and Balboa, a guy about my age interrupted my reverie. "Do taxis run out here?" he asked, leaning against a building.

I frowned and shook my head. "No, sorry," I replied. "You won't really see them out here. If you were to see one it would be down around 36th where all the business are, but we're a little too far out."

He nooded and said, "Right on. Thanks." And then he proceeded to quickly walk ahead of me in the direction of 36th Ave. I continued my slow trek.

When I got to the corner of 36th and Balboa, I noticed the same guy again. "Hey, good luck," I told him as I walked past.

He laughed and suggested, "Maybe you could just take me with you?"

I laughed too, and called over my shoulder, "I'm not going anywhere you want to go!"

"I doubt that!" he called back.

Who I really am

Now and later

Wordy

You may only have two or three feelings, but I have millions, and I am going to talk about them forever.