a little boob issue

so finally, here i am, stealing a few moments away from the baby to preserve a few fragments of sanity. she's sleeping and my husband, brother and dad is watching over her. don't worry.

it's been almost 3 weeks since i had my baby. so far, motherhood has been great. wait, who the hell am i bullshitting? ok, fine, in general, motherhood is great and i think i can do this. probably, i wont be the best mother a good, beautiful baby like arwen could ever have. it's not like she has any choice, right? i'll make a lot of mistakes along the way. but until i die, she just has to deal with it and love me unconditionally.

but motherhood, albeit i've only been at it for 19 days, is complicated. and every time people point how how i'm doing it wrong, which is about almost everything, i just tell everyone that it's not my fault. the doctor forgot to deliver the mommy manual before she stitched me up that day. so go bother someone else. motherhood is not without its complaints. you know me, i complain and whine about every single thing. so, this post, you should've seen it coming.

i dont really mind waking up at night to change diapers and feed the baby. although my husband will totally tell you otherwise. seriously, i dont mind. i only get on his case when he complains that i give him a headache when i try to wake him up to help me put the baby to sleep - yes, after i've singlehandedly changed the diaper and feed the baby, via boobies and bottles and boobies again. i've been up for almost 3 hours and i only need him to do me a favour which only takes about half an hour. so, in my head, i think i have all the rights to be a bitch when he says such silly things.

i know this may sound selfish, but i hate breastfeeding. people expect me to feed her using these boobs .. because that's the norm. like that's what being mothers is all about. Other mothers, like aunts, neighbours and friends would ask me if I breastfeed and when I say I do, they nod like as if I was asking for their approval. nobody asked me if i wanted to it. they didnt ask me if i'm okay with the idea. they simply shove the baby to my chest and viola, the baby will grow up to become a doctor.

i had breastfeeding issues from the moment arwen first latched herself onto my right breast, half an hour after i've given birth to her. the next day, i was told that she needed to be bottle fed every hour because she was so hungry. then, i found out that i was not producing any milk. but everyone told me to keep on feeding her with my empty boobs, hoping her suckling will generate milk production. so, we did that for the next couple of days until she almost gave up on the boobies altogether. it was disappointing and i almost broke down because of it. on the forth day, my urut lady came and had to massage the milk out of me. it was painful but at least arwen got some colostrum.

and now, although the milk flows like manna from heaven, well, sortta. and arwen sometimes will latch on for half and hour at each breast, suckling until she falls asleep, she still needs to be bottle fed. with expensive formula milk. because apparently, my milk isn't fulfilling or sustaining enough. which makes me think now, why do i even bother? the long hours of latching, the backaches, the painful cracked nipples, the inconvenience, it all seems insignificant and totally not worth it because she's still hungry even after all that.

and they say that breastfeeding helps strengthen the bond between mom and baby. i totally dont get it. because whenever she feeds, she sortta sleeps. how do i talk and connect to a sleeping baby? and when she wants to feed in the middle of the night, i get cranky. and when i get cranky and sleep deprived (because i know i can save a whole lotta time bottle feeding her) i get mad at her and my husband who is nicely snoring.

and yeah, i believe that breastfeeding is inconvenient. because one, it takes a really long time for the baby to get fully satiated and latch off without giving you sore nipples, and two, you have to find some private place to be by yourselves to breastfeed in discreet, whilst you can bottle feed anywhere and at anytime and around the company of others. Breastfeeding makes you anti-social.

oh, and what about those breast pumps? i've never been so frustrated at a machine as much as i had with that breast pump. my mom bought me the battery operated one, thinking i'll be having so much milk that it's all love, peace and unicorns all the way when it comes to breast feeding. but i wasn't producing that much milk and thus electronic/battery pumps doesnt really work. so one day, i sent my husband out to buy me the manual pump. i had to pump them so hard till all the muscles in my arms to my shoulders were sore. so i called my mom to help me. she pumped while i massaged my boobs. i've never felt so much like a cow than i did then. and all we got was less than 2oz of boob juice. from both boobs. like in the words of my urut lady, ... "harap mangkuk je besar!"

formula milk lagi senang! baby kenyang, hati tenang.

Call me stupid, selfish, self-centered, whatever. But i think breastfeeding should be a personal choice for mothers. but don’t get my message all twisted and call me a hypocrite when you catch me breastfeeding my baby. I do it only because she wants it.