Satisfaction redefined

I write this on the first day of the rainy august month , which also marks the start of the breastfeeding week this year. Its rainy yet sunny today in Hyderabad, and hence the spirits have lifted up.

This story will be part factual and part experiential and may be a useful read for new mums, and a trip down the memory lane for experienced mums.

Today morning , I see this nestle advert in the TOI with a smiling baby and a tagline “ Superbaby”: when breastfed, it shows. What it does for me is, take me down the memory lane to 25^th December’2012. While people were getting merrier, celebrating the spirit of Christmas, I was taking my then 7 days old daughter to the hospital, due to severe dehydration.

Don’t stop reading if you feel this is a sad account of what happened then, because its not. This was just a trigger for me to start expressing my experience with breastfeeding my darling, who is now 7.5 months old. We are still going strong, yet the journey has had its own share of pricks and needles.

Lack of proper lactation counseling, and my ignorance ( absolutely no reading on breastfeeding) led my daughter to a case of extreme dehydration within one week of birth. She was in the hospital for a week, within which I read up all I could, and was counseled by all who could.

I learnt to express, to feed in 7 different positions due to my baby’s illhealth, and most importantly I learnt the positive impact of a rested emotional state on our physiology.

While I struggled with a low milk supply , and a dehydrated baby who was being top fed to restore her back to health, one thing which kept me going was my resolution to breastfeed my baby.

While there were many around me loosing hope that I will ever be able to breastfeed, especially after this debacle, there were the godsend nurses , and my hubby who kept me going and pushed me to keep expressing. The saying” boond boond se heen sagar banta hain” was so apt in my case, and this resolve helped me to keep pushing all mental/emotional/physical barriers and continue with my efforts to express.

I am proud to share that now ar 7.5 months old, my baby is completely breastfed along with her solids intake ( barring an occasional top feed, when we step out for longer hours). The joy of seeing a satiated smile on your baby’s face, after she is fed, is priceless, and makes my resolve to continue BF becomes stronger and stronger.

I work from home, and hence she does take BM expressed in a bottle 2-3 times a day, when I need to step into virtual meetings for work.

My closing thoughts :

• Most of the limits/boundaries we lay are self made, and if we push them the sky is just limitless, so don’t loose hope and keep trying.
• Its essential to have a GOAL, so that one can always remind oneself on that, if faltering ( in my case my GOAL was to breastfeed my baby)

A year back on the same day and date, if someone would ask me “ what is satisfaction to me”, I would probably have had the classic troll and say work life balance, good family, good health etc etc. But now, in real and deep terms, SATISFACTION to me is “ When I see my doll well fed, healthy, with her toothless grin, thanking me with her eyes for a stomach fully fed, and a job well done  !!