The Rules of Breastfeeding: Some are Worth Breaking

For every mother I’ve ever talked to over the years, one of the important things I’ve learned is every journey to motherhood is different. It’s never, ever as simple as “Woman meets man and they have a child”.

Every breastfeeding relationship is unique. So, how can there be rules? I would rather call them guidelines, hints, philosophies, and experience of other unique breastfeeding relationships. Without them, it would be hard to get started on breastfeeding and find your own unique way. Later in your breastfeeding “career”, I guess it is actually the rule that you break the guidelines and form your own experience.
Unfortunately, breastfeeding books and websites are often full of rules.
The answer is…there is no one answer for every mother/baby pair. Every nursing day is unique. You already know that your baby is unique. So are you. You can search the world and still not find a book that was written about you and your baby. It’s just not possible.
I know you want to know the “right” way to breastfeed. You want to know whether to nurse with both breasts or one. You want to know how many minutes on each side. Here is my best answer: Watch the baby.

You can’t take what ANYONE says about breastfeeding to be the gospel. That’s one set of rules that YOU get to make for yourself.
7 Ways to Keep and Break the Babywise Rules:

1. My Favourite advice from someone I know was to drink loads of milk, she thought that would help my body generate more. And thanks to my pediatrician who told me,” Cows don’t drink milk.Do they? But they still end up producing enough “. This is funny , you need not drink cartons of milk when you are breastfeeding .
2. Lactation consultants warn you that nipple shields are equivalent to sawing off a unicorn’s horn and you shouldn’t use them. I didn’t even know what they were until a nurse in the hospital told me about it when I was whining to her about how much pain feeding was. I couldn’t get over just how much it hurt to breastfeed. I bought two nipple shields from  a medical store and when they came in {pre-sterilized} I put it on,  and felt no pain at all. I was FINALLY able to breastfeed without pain.
3. Experts say to breastfeed as soon as the baby is out of your uterus. Well I can’t remember exactly but I think it was two or three hours after my baby came out before she learned how to get her food . I had a c-section, I was in recovery, and there was nothing I could do about it. The nurses assured me that she wouldn’t be hungry since she was eating 24/7 until she came out.
4. The next rule that I found completely annoying was “If you are breastfeeding right, it shouldn’t hurt.” WRONG. Just wrong. Granted, I was still learning . Guess what? It WILL hurt until your body adjusts to what you are doing. Both WHERE your baby directly feeds from and your uterus may hurt like heck for a couple of weeks. Saying that breastfeeding won’t hurt unless you are doing it wrong is as dumb as saying new shoes should never hurt you. Does that mean you are wearing them wrong?
5.   Another rule I threw out the window? “Keep the baby on a strict schedule of feedings.” I nursed on demand . NO WAY I would have ever woken up a sleeping baby, especially at night. It makes sense to nurse them when they were hungry, as their little bodies were getting on their own natural schedules, which was OUR schedule as a family.
6. Put your baby down into their crib awake, when possible, Key words are when possible. In those early days, your baby will sleep all the time. As a first time mom, this concerned me. It shouldn’t!  Now I try to enjoy those moments and snuggle with my baby in my arms when I can. They’re only little once.
7. Don’t start habits you’re not willing to break. Within reason! One night, our 3 week old fell asleep in my husbands arms. He was enjoying these early moments of fatherhood and continued letting her sleep. I, very pointedly, said to him “Is this a habit you’re willing to break in 6 months?” His response: “Absolutely.” His point was that moments like these are rare. Enjoy them, and don’t let the rule books steal your joy.

My point here is to take anyone’s advice on how to breastfeed “properly” as just a suggestion. YOU have to decide how to make it work for you. One thing I WILL say and BEG of you: if you DO choose to breastfeed, or at least try to do so, commit to it for at least a month. I have heard so many people say that they tried for two weeks but then quit because it was too hard. Well, guess when it starts to get easier? Day 15. After two weeks it becomes more and more easy to do. Your body has had time to adjust; if it has been hurting, it will fade away after two weeks; milk production will start to regulate; and overall, it gets so much easier. Just take it one day at a time.
Have you ever had to think “outside the box” when it comes to breastfeeding? Do you think there are certain breastfeeding “rules” that are meant to be broken? Do you fit in the typical nursing mom mold?
Please do share with me your views on the post and also if it helps you in any way!!!

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