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Baby in NICU, Struggled to Make Sure He Got Breast Milk
By
Suzanne
My son was born at 37 weeks gestation. I had him in the water in a birthing center. I was not induced, but the doctor did break my water. After a few hours, she and the nurse decided I wasn't progressing as fast as they would like so they gave me Cytotec (sometimes used to induce labor) without telling me what it was or what the risks were. My son was born at 4:08 p.m. and I never held him. They whisked him away and worked on him for awhile and then called 911. The next day, the NICU doctor set me up with a lactation consultant who rented me a hospital-strength pump. I was disheartened to be getting very little colostrum (the doctor tried to help by assuring me that colostrum wasn't proven to help babies anyway — thanks a lot!) and even more disheartened that they were throwing away the few drops that I was able to get. I was told that they would not save it until I was able to pump at least 10 cc at a time. They would not mix milk from different pumpings. I was absolutely heartbroken. On Wednesday night, he had a kind nurse who allowed me to kiss him for the first time, and also got out a tiny syringe and sucked up the few drops of colostrum at the bottom of my bottles. I cried as I labeled it, and put it in the NICU fridge. She promised me that whenever he was able to take his first feed, she would make sure that he got my colostrum. I'll never know if my supply increased so much that night of pumping because it would have anyway, or if it was because of the kindness of that one nurse who gave me some hope, instead of just throwing away all I'd worked so hard to produce. But I came back to the NICU at 8 a.m. the next morning carrying a ton of milk. Tears welled up in my eyes when I'd learned that the doctor had ordered his first feed at 7:30. No one had called me, and they'd given him the few drops of my colostrum, mixed with formula. (He'd been on IV only prior to this.) When he was 5 days old, they removed him from the ventilator. The nurse offered to let me nurse him. I tried to get him latched on. He screamed in frustration and wouldn't open his mouth wide. My inverted nipple didn't entice him at all. The nurse said, "Here, try this." It was a nipple shield. With the shield, I nursed my son for the first time. I'd been trying to no avail since he was 5 weeks to get him to nurse without it, enlisting the help of both La Leche League International and lactation consultants. When he was 4 months old, he latched on and nursed vigorously.
Content last updated July 15, 2009.
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