Been thinking about breastfeeding

For the last week or so I've been thinking a lot about breastfeeding - mainly because I'd always planned to breastfeed Natalie until she was 6 months old and now she's half way there it doesn't seem like I've got long left - I think I'll miss it when it ends, but also because a friend of mine with a 4 week old is struggling with feeding at the moment. It made me think about how difficult I found breastfeeding when Natalie was younger - how I'd put the 6 month cap on feeding because I hated doing it at first (it was so difficult!), but how easy it is now - I just whop her on and she's away!

In my opinion the majority of people have issues with breastfeeding - to different degrees of course. I know hardly any people who have found it really easy and pain free. However, before I'd had Natalie I'd been led to believe that it would be a breeze. At our antenatal class we were told that feeding is instinctual for babies, that they could find their way to the breast without any help, and I felt lulled into a false sense of security that Natalie would instantly know how to breastfeed and all I'd need to do is hold her in position. How wrong was I?! I remember days and nights where I'd be crying because I couldn't get Natalie latched on right, and she wasn't gaining weight because of the latching problem. I'd constantly refer back to the NCT leaflet showing how to breastfeed, and getting frustrated when Natalie wouldn't open her mouth as wide as the baby in the picture did, and when I brought her close to feed she'd begin to close her mouth anyway.

I also thought for ages that she didn't like me because she didn't look up at me like the baby in the picture did. I now realise that the baby in the picture was a much older baby, and that it's practically impossible for a really young baby to look you in the eye whilst feeding! Anyway, I eventually relaxed into it and decided that it was OK for Natalie to feed 'her way', I've come to realise that all babies are different and they wont all necessarily feed in the position the leaflets show you, I think you just need to try things out and see what works for you and your baby

I was so close to giving up because I thought it'd never get any easier and I was exhausted and sore, and then one day it just clicked! We did introduce a bottle of formula for the last feed of the day (7pm) just to give me a break, and we still do that now (I express afterwards to keep my milk supply up). I remember at our NCT breastfeeding session we were shown a graph of the difficulty of breastfeeding over time, and it started off semi-difficult at birth, then got really difficult by 3-4 weeks and then gradually started to get easier (I annoyingly cant remember when it got easy for me). I'm so glad I persevered, as now Natalie does look at me while she's feeding, and occasionally smiles at me which isn't so good as it makes her fall off the breast! Also, the amount of faff involved in formula feeding would have killed me if I did it for every feed - all that sterilising, boiling and cooling of water etc etc. I feel much more free to go out spontaneously because I know that when it gets to feeding time I have everything I need with me!