The Grey Area of Feeding Your Baby

I breastfed my first son, Hayden, until he was 2 and a half months old. One pediatrician appointment later and she officially labeled him as “failure to thrive”. I begged her for more time to try to keep it up, improve my supply- I’d do anything. She made it clear our journey was over, I was starving him and I needed to go and get formula immediately- that day. Her empathy was clear, but her instruction and opinion cut like a knife. I felt as if I had no choice.

I felt like an absolute failure as I wallowed in self-pity, walking the formula aisle with hopelessness and confusion. I didn’t research this or prepare at all. In my head, formula = failure and who prepares to fail?

Now I know, on the other side of two children now, that formula does not equal failure. I still fully believe that breastmilk is the superior form of nutrition for your child. I still believe it has everything they need and that if you can give it to them, directly, through pumping or via a donor, you should. BUT- there is no easy path to this and with challenges and obstacles comes choice. I honor that choice. I’ve had to make that choice. It is not an easy choice.

With my first son, I felt as if that choice was completely taken from me. It was devastating and I felt suffocated in the echo chamber of “fed is best”, “you’re doing great”, “formula is just as good”. It’s not what I wanted to hear. It’s not what I believed. I felt like a hypocrite and a walking contradiction. How could I have a healthy lifestyle and formula feed my baby?

At the time I had thyroid issues, he had ties we couldn’t afford to fix immediately and I did not have a support team. It was also early 2021 and nobody cared to help. They only cared if I was covid negative. The lack of support that year was absolutely atrocious and my heart goes out to every person who did not receive the care they needed because of the fear that overtook far too many providers.

Once I accepted the fact that I had absolutely zero supply of breastmilk and that I was too depleted to reboot my supply, I moved forward with formula. At the time there wasn’t any options that were American made that I really felt comfortable giving him. So many ingredients that I was shocked to find out were in formula and I just couldn’t do it. I turned to the European brands which I found to be much cleaner. It is more expensive, extremely difficult to obtain due to the FDA’s biased (cough, paid for, cough) policies- but I made it happen. 9 months later I was thrilled to wean him onto local dairy.

Only 2 months after he turned one, I got pregnant. Holden W.T. was on his way and I was beyond terrified that my journey would go the same way. At the same time, I had the confidence of a year’s worth of research that I had done to ensure this didn’t happen again. I had decided my experience went badly with him because:

I wasn’t nourished with food well postpartum.

I didn’t have enough minerals or vitamins coming in.

I didn’t rest enough postpartum.

I lost too much blood during my traumatic delivery and I was given an excessive amount of pitocin post-delivery.

I didn’t get to do skin to skin bonding or latching immediately and was separated from Hayden for long stretches.

I didn’t have my blood work done postpartum and my thyroid was really messed up for far too long to fix it before it impacted my supply permanently.

Hayden had tongue ties and didn’t get them revised in time to not affect my supply and his weight gain.

With all of those factors, I went into postpartum with Holden very differently. I chose my providers intentionally and planned a homebirth where I did not lose a lot of blood, I was given nourishment immediately and I used herbs for blood loss management rather than pitocin. I was also loaded up with postpartum supplements, nourishing foods, minerals to replenish what I would lose, a postpartum care plan with help for my toddler so that I didn’t have to get out of bed for a few days. I followed that up with an extensive bloodwork panel to test my thyroid around the 6 week mark and immediate body work for me and Holden to help with his couple of ties and his latch and my tension.

I thought I did it all right this time. And it worked really well for awhile.

I pumped my excess, crying the first time I filled up a 4 oz bottle because I could never have done that when I had Hayden.

I cried when he latched and would drink until he was content.

I cried when he would stop to look up at me and smile, milk dribbling from the side of his lips.

So many moments I had dreamed about that I never got with Hayden finally came to pass. My prayers, answered.

And then life.

2 months postpartum, life started to get busy. 4 months postpartum, life started to get stressful.

I came off of maternity leave for my business and started to prep for our family business, The Dusty Nacho, to open back up for the Spring season.

I reached a mentally challenging point in my CR recovery program and things started to slip.

I started to workout and burn more calories and I wasn’t eating as much because I was feeling really insecure.

Holden started his 4 month sleep regression and the nights were long and hard.

I wasn’t sleeping well.

I wasn’t eating well.

He wasn’t eating well and therefore he wasn’t sleeping well.

It was a cycle that started and once it starts, it’s hard to stop.

I knew my milk had regulated but things started going down hill fast. He started crying out of hunger shortly after feeding, he was fussy constantly, he stopped having wet diapers and then quickly the nights went from feeding every 4 hours to feeding every 30 minutes.

It was too much.

I upped my calories again, I stopped working out, I tried to decrease my stress load- but once it had started, it was hard to stop. I pushed through, refusing bottles, pumping to increase my supply- I was doing it all.

Until one night I slept 4 hours broken up into 30 minutes increments throughout the night. The longest stretch being an hour and a half. He was five months old and I just couldn’t do it anymore.

I couldn’t be a good mom to my toddler.

I couldn’t be a good wife to my husband.

I hadn’t talked to my family in weeks because I couldn’t think straight.

I couldn’t be a good friend or a part of my church.

I couldn’t walk in my recovery well.

I couldn’t function.

I fought stopping, I really did. How could I stop early, something I had fought so hard for?

How could I purposely stop giving him something I still had in some amount?

How could I?

But how could I keep going the way I was?

I couldn’t.

I don’t really know what I was thinking when I fully gave in, but it was out of a place of desperation. All at once, I decided I had to be done and I was going to have to be okay with it and that was that. I thank God for that.

I thank God that after I switched him fully to formula that I still had milk coming out of me and that I hand pump it twice a day. I get about 4 oz a day total. Less than 1 of his bottles, but it’s something to give him the nutrients and immunities that truly only I can give him. And that’s not to shame anyone who doesn’t do that, it’s just really important to me and the benefits outweigh the inconvenience of not fully drying up. The benefits give me a moment to latch him when we both really need to connect and he just needs his first comfort.

There is this grey area between breastfeeding, formula feeding and between stopping early and being stopped, early.

The mommy groups make it seem so black and white.

The pediatrician makes it seem so black and white.

Your family and your friends may even make it seem so black and white.

Heck, I’ve made it seem so black and white.

But it’s not. And as much as my pride doesn’t want to say this because when I KNOW the benefits of something, it is hard to see the other side as anything but good- it’s just not that simple.

I was doing all of the things. Barely scraping by. Both of us unhappy, unsatisfied and not living life freely.

God made it clear it was time for me to loosen the reigns and to die to my expectations and belief that if I did not do this I was inherently a failure and an incapable mother.

It was clear it was time for me to extend the same grace to myself that I would extend to any other mama who was struggling as much as I was.

It’s so much easier to give grace to others than it is to extend it to ourselves.

I’m done arguing about what is a better way to feed your baby.

I’m done arguing about the benefits of the breast.

These are obvious to me. They do not need to be argued, the facts stand on their own two feet.

I am here today to hug the mama who is utterly broken by the idea of giving up something she loves so much- t0 the point where it is tearing her apart.

I am here today to hold you up because you are a good, good mama and you are not failing.

You are taking the intrinsically complicated body that you have been given and making a choice to nourish yourself and your baby, even if it’s not directly through your breast. You are nourishing their mind and their heart by being able to function.

Your human needs did not cease to exist the moment you became a mother.

Yes, we sacrifice, EVERYTHING, to give our babies the most. But we do have to live on 1%. We should not live on 1%.

When anything in life is getting to the point where we are living on 1%, it is time to ask what we need to be able to live.

We are supposed to live life abundantly. God did not say that we would only live life abundantly if we are breastfeeding. It is a gift- a beautiful gift and it is one I do not take for granted. But in this grey area, you have to look at what is best for your baby, what is best for your heart and what is best for your body. All three of those areas matter.

You did not cease to exist.

You did not cease to matter.

If God is making it clear that you are to go on- by all means, rely on every ounce of strength He gives you to push past the storm.

But if God is making it clear that it is time to surrender your expectations- by all means, rely on every ounce of strength He gives you to put down your sword and to wait for the sun to come out and illuminate what you could not see.

My heart broke in this process. He is putting the pieces back together.

I cannot understand why I had to experience this. Why it could not be easier for me. Why I couldn’t have just one year to nourish one of my babies.

But I will tell you this, you will feel peace when you step into where God is leading and in these last few weeks of transition, I have felt peace. My pride was the resistance and the unrest and when I put that down, freedom was on the other side.

Our systems are flawed.

Our postpartum experience is not what it should be.

Our nourishment is not prioritized, recognized or respected.

Our heart-dreams are valid.

But there is a grey area and it is time we acknowledge it.

I wrote these thoughts- “Grey”- the evening I put my weapons down. The evening I accepted where we were heading next. I don’t give you this as a warning, to scare you or make you fear your journey. It is yours. You will come across your own trouble. You will come across your own joy. You will be earn your own battle scars. You will try. You will cry. You will die to your own expectations-in your own time. No path is easy. Above all else, I encourage you to walk it with Jesus. In the lonely nights, He is there. In the cracks, He fills them with the Spirit. In the aching and the cramping and the bleeding and the breaking- He is there. In the success, He is there. In the moment of uncertainty, He is there. In the victory and in the loss, He is there. You will never be alone.