Week 1 back at work (written September 1)
Not surprisingly, Monday was very hard. Walking out of my house and leaving little Emma with the au pair may have been one of the hardest things I ever did, in fact. Even though we had a good week of orientation and I could clearly see how well she was doing with Emma and how Emma really is responding to her, I discovered that leaving your baby with someone who is not family goes against every single instinct in my body. I was so scared all day, and wildly convinced that I would get home and find them gone…Of course, they were not gone, and Emma was happy and smiling. So, it definitely seems like this week has been harder than on me than on her. So many emotions, and only half of th em probably reasonable. Questioning our choice of childcare, questioning my choice to go back to work at all. Dealing with work and the craziness here at FEMA with Hurricane Ernesto coming. The only good thing about having a hurricane coming our way is it leaves very little time at work to brood! Trying to work out the whole pumping thing and get myself on somewhat of a schedule each day too - not easy to do and be discrete with meetings every hour or so. My work did give me the key to a little "relaxation room" with an easy chair and a sink, so I have some privacy. Thankfully I have the support of senior leadership here (including two mothers - one of twins) who really want me to succeed in this nursing thing. That helps a lot. I also have the support of my supervisor - being a man, he really doesn't want to hear about it, but if I needed something he'd be there for me.
Physically it's been a bit challenging. I find I need to eat real food a lot more often than I used to (even more probably than when I was pregnant), so trying to squeeze in time to eat more than chips regularly. Also, the milk supply has been a little low. I think at the beginning of the week I was really stressed (go figure!), and I was not getting as much as I have in the past. At home with Emma was fine, but pumping I'm not quite getting enough to feed her all day while I'm at work. Luckily I had a bit frozen from a week or two ago. Slowly it seems like my "production" has been coming back up, but still a few ounces shy. So the au pair had to give her some formula for two days, which immediately made me feel so sad and like a failure! Part of me knows that she's still getting mostly breast milk and a bottle or two of formula won't hurt, but we were doing so well on the breastfeeding that I guess I just t hought pumping would go well too. It's probably going better than can reasonably be expected with so much change and worry, but we all want to be supermom, no? Guilt guilt guilt. My husband told me the problem is I see myself as Clark Kent and can't see the giant "S" on my chest that everyone else sees… Also, as predicted by the lactation consultant, Emma's sleep has been thrown totally off. Still getting at least 4 hours a night, but not consistently 6 anymore and the times are all off. Some nights I can't seem to get her off my breast at all. She is definitely making up for our time apart! Also, we've almost always gotten up between 3 and 4 to eat, but where we used to go back to sleep after, now she's been staying fussy and again not wanting to come off. She falls asleep latched firmly on (which is admittedly very sweet) and wakes up the instant I try to pull back. Something about that magic hour of sleep be tween 4 and 5 am apparently is very important to my body, because the couple of mornings now when I haven't been able to get it have been pretty rough. I do have to say, though, that on the flip side that 3 or 4 am feeding has become really important to me as a quiet time with her. No work, no au pair, no husband - just her and me and the quiet dark. I have nothing to focus on but her warm sleepy weight and the little noises she makes, and it reminds me over and over how completely amazing this is. You know, I think I sortof fell into breastfeeding originally as something I should do, but lately I've come to realize how much I like it and now I know I would choose it consciously again.
Physically it's been a bit challenging. I find I need to eat real food a lot more often than I used to (even more probably than when I was pregnant), so trying to squeeze in time to eat more than chips regularly. Also, the milk supply has been a little low. I think at the beginning of the week I was really stressed (go figure!), and I was not getting as much as I have in the past. At home with Emma was fine, but pumping I'm not quite getting enough to feed her all day while I'm at work. Luckily I had a bit frozen from a week or two ago. Slowly it seems like my "production" has been coming back up, but still a few ounces shy. So the au pair had to give her some formula for two days, which immediately made me feel so sad and like a failure! Part of me knows that she's still getting mostly breast milk and a bottle or two of formula won't hurt, but we were doing so well on the breastfeeding that I guess I just t hought pumping would go well too. It's probably going better than can reasonably be expected with so much change and worry, but we all want to be supermom, no? Guilt guilt guilt. My husband told me the problem is I see myself as Clark Kent and can't see the giant "S" on my chest that everyone else sees… Also, as predicted by the lactation consultant, Emma's sleep has been thrown totally off. Still getting at least 4 hours a night, but not consistently 6 anymore and the times are all off. Some nights I can't seem to get her off my breast at all. She is definitely making up for our time apart! Also, we've almost always gotten up between 3 and 4 to eat, but where we used to go back to sleep after, now she's been staying fussy and again not wanting to come off. She falls asleep latched firmly on (which is admittedly very sweet) and wakes up the instant I try to pull back. Something about that magic hour of sleep be tween 4 and 5 am apparently is very important to my body, because the couple of mornings now when I haven't been able to get it have been pretty rough. I do have to say, though, that on the flip side that 3 or 4 am feeding has become really important to me as a quiet time with her. No work, no au pair, no husband - just her and me and the quiet dark. I have nothing to focus on but her warm sleepy weight and the little noises she makes, and it reminds me over and over how completely amazing this is. You know, I think I sortof fell into breastfeeding originally as something I should do, but lately I've come to realize how much I like it and now I know I would choose it consciously again.
posted by me at 9:51 AM
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