Part 1: 'the best Christmas present it's possible to give'

I could not breastfeed.  There, I’ve said it.  Was I one of the estimated one in fifty who are physically unable to do so?  I have no idea – maybe, maybe not.  But what I do know is, with the body I had, the baby I had, the help and advice I was given by midwives and breastfeeding counsellors, and all the determination in the world, I just could not do it.  My son is now a toddler and happily drinking cows’ milk, but I still find myself spending rather too much time thinking about what happened and where we went wrong.  So what follows is my attempt, for once and for all, to put it into words and, well, to get my breasts off my chest.

‘I could not breastfeed.’  Before I gave birth, before I was pregnant even, when I heard people say those words, if I’m honest about it, I would feign sympathy but would secretly think to myself, ‘Well of course you could – you just didn’t try hard enough.’  I always knew Iwould breastfeed, even if I did find it hard at first.  Not because of all the health advantages, though I knew about those too – for me, they were just an added bonus.  I just loved the idea of putting my baby to my breast, putting my breasts to their proper use, and nurturing my child the way nature intended.  On my birth board as people would compare notes about what they’d bought in preparation for their new arrivals, I was surprised and a little bemused at all those (some who simply did not intend to breastfeed in the first place, and others who’d got some ‘just in case’) who had stocked up on bottles, sterilising equipment and even, shock horror, formula. I, of course, wouldn’t be needing any of those things (and although I wasn’t bothered that others were actually choosing to use formula, I just didn’t get it - who’dchoose the hassle of making up bottles and sterilising when they had all that their baby needed right there on tap?).  So I just quietly, smugly, stockpiled breast pads in preparation for the inevitable leaky boobs.

Not that I’d needed any of these during pregnancy.  My birth board was also full of stories of embarrassing wet patches on people’s tops, but my breasts remained quite dry.  Right towards the end of my pregnancy, if I really squeezed I could see a bit of clear liquid, but that was about the extent of it.  I wasn’t worried, though.  I had read up about breastfeeding, and I knew that everyone could do it.  Some people leak, some don’t – it doesn’t mean anything about how much milk is in there.  The same went for my husband’s worries about my flat, inverted nipples – ‘How on earth will you be able to breastfeed out of those?’, he’d ask. Again, I’d read the books and could reassure him - nipple shape shouldn’t make a difference, the baby latches onto the whole areola.  People breastfeed with all shapes and sizes of breasts, and why shouldn’t they?  You don’t see other mammals worrying about whether their breasts will suit their babies – they just get on with the most natural process in the world of feeding their young.

I did, of course, know that some drugs given in childbirth could make babies drowsy and make it harder for them to latch on.  So when my son came along – a 32 hour labour, involving a Syntocinon drip after it all slowed down at 27 hours, and ending in a ventouse delivery when a bit of my cervix just wouldn’t finish dilating with the rest – I waved away the offers of pethidine and diamorphine and did it all with the help of the TENS machine, 5 hours in the birthing pool, gas and air, and a single paracetamol up the bum.  For the final push (or pull, as I suppose it was really) they gave me a spinal, as if the ventouse didn’t work they’d need to go straight to an emergency Caesarian section, so for what I imagine would have been the worst bit (including the inevitable episiotomy and stitches) I was thankfully numb.  All of which meant, as I was wheeled to the recovery room and my husband was handed our beautiful son, I didn’t get the immediate skin to skin I’d asked for.  But it must only have been a few minutes before Tommy was brought to me and laid naked (but for a nappy) on my chest, where he made his way to my breast for his first wonderful breastfeed.

In the hospital I was given a chart to record feeds and nappies (including a helpful colour chart to gauge the changing colour of my son’s poo).  As instructed, I fed three-hourly, or four at night (he was sleepy so I had to wake him to feed, and he didn’t demand more than this) on one side at a time until he dropped off the breast (40 minutes or so).  I had one night in hospital, on a ward otherwise populated by C-section ladies, and the next morning I tentatively suggested to the staff that I might be ready to go home once Tommy had been checked over by the hospital doctor.  ‘Yes please – we need the bed’, was the response – but as I was breastfeeding I’d have to wait until they could come and observe a feed.  After the doctor’s check – ‘Are you breastfeeding?’ ‘Yes’ ‘Well done – you’re giving him the best Christmas present it’s possible to give’ – a midwife came to watch me feed and to show me how to hand express once my milk was in (my hospital was signed up to the Baby Friendly Initiative, so this was all standard procedure).  ‘Can you feel your breasts starting to fill?’ ‘No, not really’ ‘Never mind – it’ll come’.  Declared an expert breastfeeder I was packed off home under strict instructions not to lift a finger for at least a month until my stitches and pelvic floor recovered from the episiotomy.