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I had two very different breastfeeding experiences. All three of my kids started out in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit), so none of them breastfeeding right after birth or even anytime in the first two weeks following birth. However, this does not determine the outcome, as I found out.

My first children were twins. They were born 9 weeks premature, at 31 weeks. The suck/swallow/breathe ability does not develop until 34 weeks gestation, so that was when we started feeding not via a tube. I would try to nurse and then also try to bottle feed. It was tough juggling the schedules of two babies in the NICU. The nurses want them on their determined schedule, but (as all Mommies know!) sometimes the schedule just doesn’t work out. Their schedule was 30 minutes apart, every 3 hours. So, first to one baby and then to the other. Oh, and then I would pump afterwards. And throughout the night at home, while they were bottle fed by the night NICU nurses. Exhausting. And then they came home! Anyway, it was truly amazing to see what happens to a baby who is nursing while hooked up to heart rate monitors and oxygen sensors. Especially with my son, everything would go perfect when he was nursing.

But…then we got home and my daughter was diagnosed with relflux. She loved to nurse, but wouldn’t actually get anything. She cried and cried. My son was addicted to that little plastic nipple shield and would become frantic without it. I hated that. I pumped and pumped and tried to nurse. My husband bottle fed on his shifts and pretty soon we drifted towards me mostly pumping and bottle feeding. At 6 months, I couldn’t take the pumping anymore and stopped. I felt immense guilt, but knew that it was best for my babies for me to be a happy mom, not a stressed out one.

My younger daughter was a surprise baby. We skipped the NICU tour at the hospital before she was born, because I did not have the preeclampsia that necessitated my very early twin delivery. She was born 10 days before her due date and everything was supposed to be fine. Minutes after birth, she started turning blue and was whisked away to the NICU for observation. Two days later, she was on extreme life support and was diagnosed with Persistent Pulmonary Hypertension in the Newborn (PPHN), a fairly rare illness that is extremely dangerous. She very nearly did not survive. Thankfully, she turned the corner on Mother’s Day, when she was 6 days old and made a full recovery, many scary weeks later. Although she was on full IV nutrition and did not ingest any type of milk until she was a few weeks old, she turned out to be a champion nurser. Maybe it was all she had been through…I don’t know. But her doctor at the Stanford NICU finally turned her loose to go home because she obviously ate very well while nursing and refused the bottles from the night NICU nurses. She nursed until she was 14 months old and would have gone longer if there had been more milk (my supply dropped dramatically once I instituted the Sleep Through the Night program at 10 months old - I really didn’t realize how much she was getting at night until then).

A really funny (funny weird, not funny ha-ha) thing was that, while I was always trying to increase my milk supply for the twins (taking Fenugeek and even some prescription medication as well, drinking tons of water, doing marathon pumping sessions, drinking Mother’s Milk tea), when I had my youngest baby and had to pump again since she was in the NICU, my body remembered pumping for twins and I had a HUGE supply. And it was actually a relief to me to be able to know how to do the pumping thing, which can be such a cause for stress when you have a very ill baby/babies in the NICU.

I am very proud of myself for pumping for 6 months for my twins and nursing for 14 months with my youngest. But when all is said and done, the thing I am most thankful for is that I have three very healthy and happy children, despite their rough start in this world.

Posted by Linsey K. (December 7, 2007) Crossposted at Silicon Valley Moms Blog for Babes and Boobs: Breastfeeding Topic Day on Silicon Valley Moms Blog and its sister sites)