done day (i think)

I think I'm stopping breastfeeding today. I say "I think" because I was going to stop last night and ended up feeding her in the night. It's way harder then I thought it would be (on me, the baby doesn't seem to give a rip - she just loves to eat, clearly). I have terrible knots in my stomach and I feel like the worst mom - I'm sure for the first of many times. I wrote a post a couple of weeks ago about how terrible and unnatural breastfeeding felt to me. The thing is, I don't feel like that anymore. It's much easier, I enjoy the bonding and it breaks my heart to stop. I just feel like it will be too difficult when I go back to work. I don't think office pumping is realistic (and that's when we're in the office, not out at meetings or traveling). We've been giving the baby a couple of bottles of formula a day, and she takes it really well. After her bedtime bottle, she actually makes these full baby sounds while she's falling asleep. Soft little coos instead of the grunts and squirms she makes in her sleep after I feed her. I swear, she also spits up less after formula feedings. But, whatever. The truth of it is I am a control freak and want to have a couple of weeks to get her on a schedule that will be similar to what she'll be on when I'm back at work. I want to have some idea of how many ounces of formula she eats in a day. So "I think" this is the right decision, I just didn't know it would feel so awful.

struggling

I have to be honest, as I close in on my first full month as a mother, I am still struggling with breastfeeding. It's hard to explain, it just doesn't feel how I thought it would. I feel like a buffet most of the time, like I can't comfort the baby well because all she wants is food from me. I don't like the unpredictability of the feeding schedule, I don't like not knowing if she's getting enough to eat. For something so natural, it still doesn't feel natural to me. It feels cumbersome and messy. Whenever I know there's a feeding coming up, I get bad anxiety and I dread it. Despite cuddling and talking during feeding time, I still don't feel like I'm nourishing or nurturing my daughter, I feel like I'm disappointing her, like she can sense my apprehension. I'm a textbook over-analyzer, so coupled with sleep deprivation I'm sure that is greatly responsible for my negativity. But whatever the reason, sometimes I think that negativity is impeding on both of our enjoyment of the very short window of exclusive time I have home with the baby before going back to work.

Then there's the internets. If half of new mothers bottlefeed from the start, why can I only find pro-breastfeeding information online? I understand there are benefits to breastfeeding, but I can't find the actual studies. I did find one article that explores the link between wealthier, more-educated women and the benefits of exclusive breastfeeding. True, their babies were overall healthier, with higher IQs - but these women also tended to have higher IQs, and provided more stimulating and healthier prenatal and home environments. Once the wealth/education factor was removed from the study, the benefits shown from exclusive breastfeeding disappeared. The I think of two of my friends who breastfed exclusively - one for 6 months, the other for a year. The former has had three ear infections and RSV in the last two months. The latter has asthma and allergies. So I'm not sure about the claim that breastfeeding is a magic bullet.

Speak of the devil, duty calls and I will gladly oblige. But I definitely have more thinking to do.