8 Oct 2012

An emotional 24 hours...

In my hopes of turning Pippa into a true 'Gina Ford' baby one day I thought I'd attempt to get her used to a bottle so that Husband (or any other willing devotee) can theoretically do the evening feed,  thus allowing me an extra few hours in bed.  Getting little Pip 'onto the bottle' would also make extravagant (and presently unimaginable) excursions to places such as the hair dressers or going out for a run / wheeze around the park possible.  Now, I would like to emphasise the one day part of my first sentence.  I am not in any particular rush to achieve the heavenly state of Gina-dom and am very aware that Pippa is still very small.  But I didn't think that giving it a go this once could hurt and I know many girls who have got their babies onto the bottle very early on and had no problems doing bottle and boob side-by-side.


Pippa's first bottle....and probably her last for a few weeks yet!


So,  after expressing the required milk (sorry boys) which, incidentally, does make you feel exactly like a cow being milked (and with the very undignified sound effects of the electric breast pump to boot),  we set about introducing Pippa to the joys of silicone.  At first she seemed rather shocked and bewildered by the speed and ease at which the milk came out - it took a few minutes to get her used to it.  But she soon got the hang of it and proceeded to polish off the three ounces in under 10 minutes!

Naturally,  I wanted to witness her first ever bottle feed and so I didn't use the time to get an extra couple of hours' sleep, as intended for future bottle feeds.  This was a mistake.

She next woke at about 3am and off we trotted to the nursery.  I have become very accustomed to (and content with) the fact that most feeds take about an hour - once you factor in the mid-feed milk coma, the 10 minutes spent trying to reawaken her from said coma, a nappy change and burping time.  However, on this occasion it took 3 hours.  Yes, three hours.  It turns out that Pippa really enjoyed her bottle feed and discovered that it was, in fact, far easier and less taxing than getting milk from me.  We battled and fought for the whole time - Pippa being infuriatingly half-hearted about latching on and then getting hysterical when no milk appeared (over and over and over again) and me trying to remain calm and composed whilst enduring the shooting pain that accompanied each and every latch attempt and dealing with a crimson-faced screaming darling.  Oh, and the three nappy changes required as a result of all the stress and frustration!

I crawled back into bed at about 6.30am.  Unfortunately the next 6 feeds ( taking me through until the following morning ) all followed the same pattern,  meaning that I literally had about half an hour to 45 minutes inbetween feeds before Pippa started to tell me it was time to resume battle!

Thankfully, by the next morning she seemed to have worn herself out and forgotten the lazy delights of the bottle.  We are now back on track with the feeding and doing very well  ( if not a bit too enthusiastically, with all the cluster feeding! )  and I can confidently say that I shall be waiting a good few more weeks before we attempt to reintroduce the bottle.   


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