Mums' stories

Hi. Congratulations on the birth of your son. I hope your older son is enjoying being a big brother. I have a 3 year old son and a 4 week old daughter. When I was pregnant with my son I fully intended to breastfeed as I believed it would be best for my child. Unfortunately due to a labour and birth that wasnt great and losing alot of blood following delivery, I was very anaemic, and found I was feeling too ill to breastfeed. I managed it for 2 days but eventually had to stop as I was so tired and weak I couldnt give it my full attention. I felt guilty from the start about stopping as I felt I had let my son down. Its something that played on my mind for along time afterwards and when I was diagnosed with postnatal depression when my son was 8 months old I realised that the guilt I felt was probably contributing to the feelings I had. Because of this, when I fell pregnant again I decided that I would try breastfeeding again but that if it didnt work I would change to bottlefeeding and wouldnt put myself under so much pressure. I didnt want to stress myself out when I felt that things would be hard enough with a new baby and a 3 year old without adding pressure. When my daughter was born I put her to the breat and she seemed to take to it straight away and know what she was doing, something that never seemed to have happened with my son. The only problem we had was that she was quite a big baby, 9lb 2 1/2 oz's when born, and for the 1st few hours of her life she was permanently attached to me. The thought did cross my mind that if she was always going to be like that I would never cope, but she did eventually settle after about 3hours of continuous feeding that 1st evening!! All was going well and when we got home I decided that I would carry on breastfeeding as she seemed to know what she was doing. The problem came on day 2 when my afterpains were getting really bad, and were worse when she was feeding. It got to the point where I was cutting short her feed because I was in too much pain to let her continue. I eventually realised that we couldnt carry on like that as I wasnt letting her satisfy her hunger so we started her on bottles instead. I wont say that I didnt feel slightly guilty because I did and I even tried to start breastfeeding again when she was about 2 and a half weeks old as my milk still hadnt dried up, but by that point she was used to the bottles and I wasnt successful. The difference is I havent let myself be consumed by guilt this time. I look at my son and he is thriving even though he was bottlefed from 2 days old and it hasnt done him any harm. I thought it was more important, with 2 children to look after, to be a relaxed mum who wasnt in pain all the time and I believe that both of my children are benefitting from me being able to give them both the attention they need. So anyway, all I wanted to say jo-jo, was dont feel guilty about stopping the breastfeeding, your children need you to be a happy, relaxed mum not one who is feeling stressed about feeding and in pain. You know your situation and your childrens needs better than anyone and im sure you made the right decision. Good luck for the future and enjoy your 2 beautiful children x