Transcript:
This is Maureen Farrell and Heather O’Neal. And this is The Milk Minute. We’re midwives and lactation professionals bringing you the most up-to-date evidence for all things lactation. So you can feel more confident about feeding your baby, body positivity, relationships, and mental health. Plus, we laugh a little or a lot along the way.
So join us for another episode. Welcome to The Milk Minute Podcast, everybody. So today we have a very special bonus episode. I’m going to say a special guest, Lyra. So if you’ve been paying any attention at all for the past you know, nine months or so, you’ll know that I was pregnant.
And now you’re not. And now I’m not! Yay, you did it. Yay. So today we’re going to have a little birth story share and talk about my breastfeeding stuff and how everything’s been going since then. But before we hop into that, of course, we have to do a listener question. No, not that we have to, it’s that we really want to. We get questions all the time and we love to be able to answer them for you in a way that helps everybody.
So we’re going to do a question and then we’re going to thank some patrons and then we’re going to do an award in the alcove because you all deserve to be cheerleaded. Okay. Today, I want to answer a question from Alexandria. K. I think this is a good question. So she says my six-month old gal only cares about the boob and I’m feeling discouraged about the whole food thing.
Has anyone else experienced this? Is she just a late bloomer when it comes to food? And should I be worried? Should you be worried? No. No. So, basically six months is typically when it is safe for most babies to be introduced to solids. And between six months and a year is kind of the time when all of these babies kind of get used to eating, learn how to eat and then progress to eating full meals.
And typically by the time they’re a year old, solid foods represent a significant portion of their diet. Yeah. I mean, think about this. Your baby has spent six months learning how to perfect the boob and now you know, it sounds like your baby is brand new, trying to figure out solids, and that’s a whole new tongue movement.
That’s different muscles that your baby is using in the mouth. It tastes different. Yeah. Different textures, taste. And they have a lot of protective mechanisms in their brain that protects them from picking up like poison berries or things that they shouldn’t have in their mouth. So it’s normal for them to question everything and to spit things out and it’s normal for them to gag.
And it’s also normal for them at that point to want to go back to what they know and their comfort zone, which is the breast. So if your baby tries a food and has a bad experience, don’t worry about it. If they want to go right back to the boob that day for comfort or for food, that’s fine. Yeah, the first couple of weeks for almost everybody are like this and even a couple of months, for some people. We’re going to see a lot of tongue thrusting, gagging, funny faces, tossing food away, bringing food to their mouth again, tossing it away.
That’s all okay. It’s a learning process. It should be fun. And there’s no deadline that you have to meet. Right. And you don’t have to start at six months. That is a guideline. You can start at seven. Some people really don’t even get really into it until eight months where the baby is at that point snatching food out of your mouth. Yeah. So. Take a deep breath, relax, Alexandria and have some fun. Yeah. And let your baby have some fun too. Don’t put your baby in a box folks. Remember all of these things are guidelines. I hate putting these numbers on babies. It just never fits quite right. No.
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Okay. What do you want to know Heather? So. Oh, so, Oh, are we going to do an interview style birth stories? I’m down for that. Okay. So, or we could do it like hosted by Blanche from The Golden Girls. It was a long, hot night that we thought would never come. The birds were chirping. The crickets were rubbing their legs together. And Maureen felt a pain deep in her loins. That is exactly what my birth story is going to be like folks. No.
So I don’t know. I’ll just tell a story, I guess. How did it start? First of all, what did you expect? What did you expect? Because, you know, I know your first birth story, was it, were you expecting it to be similar or not? So I expected this one to be a little bit faster as most people’s second babies are. I expected to still have a lot of pain, but it to just to also have the knowledge that it was going to end. You know, I don’t know how, how many people I’ve talked to who felt the way I did in my first labor where I was like, Oh, this is my new reality. It’s never ending. And I’m just going to die. It did end folks, but I never had the experience of it ending before.
So already having had that, I was like, okay, well, it’s going to suck and I’m going to hate it, but it’ll probably be faster and it will end. That was my expectation. Oh, it ended, it ended. And it’s right here in my arms trying to breastfeed, but I can’t help it. Hold on, hold on. Pull your boob out. And for reference, in case you missed the last episode Lyra is a loud fucking eater.
She, she doesn’t have the greatest latch, which is fine, but it means that she’s like squeaks and clicks a little bit. She still tries to slurp the nipple in like a spaghetti noodle. Right. Anyway, Lyra’s birth. Expectations. Met? Unmet? Met pretty much exactly what I expected. It’s almost like you’re a midwife. A little faster than I expected actually.
So let’s see. I had my baby on April 11th. Oh my gosh. My child sounds like a little breast pump.
She just put her middle finger up. She doesn’t care what you think. Okay. April 11th. So I woke up to pee as I did every day at like 4:00 AM. You know, I don’t do that anymore. It’s really great. And I was having a couple of contractions and I was like, Oh, this could, this could be labor. I guess I’ll just go back to bed.
And, you know, had a couple more, had a couple more. They were like 10 minutes, 30 minutes, 15 minutes, four minutes. And I was like, okay, I’m not going to time these anymore. This is silly. I need to try to sleep. Okay. That’s not working. It’s seven in the morning. I’m just going to get up and go about my day and take my own advice that I give to clients and ignore it until I can’t.
And then basically when I got up, they went away and I was like, all right, whatever, not labor. Fuck it. Just go about my day. I had two friends that were actually planning to come pick up turkeys that I had picked up from a farm swap the day before for them. I don’t know what the heck is a FA, I don’t even know what a farm swap is.
It’s like when a bunch of people get together with animals that they’d like to sell and you purchase what you’d like and sell your animals. And it’s fun. It’s a fun little community thing. How do you even know what a fair exchange would be? Well, you don’t necessarily swap animals, usually just pay for them, but sometimes you trade, it depends, but it’s called a swap because you can buy and sell and trade and whatever.
Gotcha. Yeah. It’s kind of no rules. Wild West. Yeah. So anyway, my friends wanted to get turkeys. They were at the swamp near me. I went and picked them up and somehow hauled this giant fucking massive ass turkey back. And I was like, okay, well they’re in my yard. Come catch them. One of my friends who was coming, Hannah, was going to come and watch my son Griffin for the birth anyway. So before they left, I was like, Hey, you might not go home tonight, but I’m not going to think about it too much, but just plan for that. Okay. And she was like, okay. But I was like, come get your damn turkeys anyway. Because I don’t want to take care of them.
So, you know, we have a nice day. We’re hanging out outside. Griffin, I asked if he wanted to help catch the turkeys and he was like, no, but I’ll eat popcorn while I watch, which was hilarious. And he did. And it was great. Cause it’s hilarious to watch someone catch turkey guys. Anyway, we had a fun day.
We’re hanging out. I’m having a contraction once an hour, twice an hour, not for two hours, you know? Kind of random and I’m like, Ugh, it’s not labor. Just ignore it. And then, now that I think back, I’m realizing I was having like a hormonal shift in the afternoon and I was like, God, these people are so fucking loud and I don’t want to be near anybody.
So I told all the boys, I was like, just go to the river. Hannah and I are just going to hang out. I’m going to get in the tub. Because we have a tub on the porch, I was like, I’m going to take a bath and we’re going to hang out and listen to Dolly Parton and you need to get out. You brought Dolly into the mix.
Heck yeah, I did. Dolly’s the bomb. You know, so I’m hanging out with Hannah and it’s like, I don’t know, it was, it was like four or five o’clock or something. And suddenly I’m realizing like, Oh, I’m having contractions a lot. Oh, they’re really kind of fucking hurting now. And then, and I have been talking to my midwives all day and they were like, are you sure you don’t want us to come?
And I was like, I don’t want another fucking person at my house. No. You were being like a cat. Cats do this. Right. So now that I look back in quiet places, no one bothering them. This is the hormonal shifts we experience in early labor that is pretty easily disrupted by a lot of people. Right. So that’s why I was like, get out, go. And you know, so Hannah and I are hanging out and I remember I had one contraction where I like leaned against the wall and punched the wall and was like, fuck.
And I looked at her and I was like, I think I need to call my midwives. You should tell the boys to come back. So, yeah, called in the cavalry. Right because I’m planning a home birth. Sorry, forgot to mention that, if you didn’t catch that earlier. But here’s the thing about home birth in West Virginia. There’s not a lot of midwives and I’m like kind of the one that serves my area.
So at the time the nearest midwife is an hour and a half away from me, who is my midwife, which is like, you know, cutting it a little close for a multiparous person. So I called her in and she got to my house a little bit, I think, around like 6:30. And I was like in labor, in labor land. Making noise, in the tub.
Everybody leave me alone. Don’t care what happens to anybody else, as long as they’re out of my space. You know, her assistant who lives even further away showed up at like 7:30 and sometime around then. So I was like laboring in our beautiful cast iron tub in the back porch, which was awesome.
It was like the perfect temperature for it. You know, we have it set up like a hot tub with like a burner underneath and everything. So, Oh yeah. It’s super nice. You mean you set it up like a saucepan? Yes. Like a saucepan cooking myself. No, but it’s great. Oh, and I had a birth photographer this time. And that was so great.
And she showed up some, I don’t know sometime. I can’t fucking remember. Right. People just showed up. I ignored them. As you should. Yeah. And then it started to get dark around 7:30. And I remember Ivan was like doing stuff inside and I told him to set up the birth pool inside cause I knew it was going to get cold.
And at some point he came out and I was like, is the birth pool setup? And he was like, no, no, I haven’t even inflated it yet. And I was like, what the fuck have you been doing? Oh gosh, my poor husband. I guess I guess he had been trying to like, get us a big stockpile of hot water instead of inflating the tub first and was doing it all out of order.
And you know, he doesn’t do this for a living. I do. I do though. Yeah, it was fine. So by the time I like rushed inside, entering transition, you know there was like six inches of water in the birth and I was like, God damn it. The birth pool is not ready yet. You know? And just like, kind of like flailing around the house in like 20 minutes of transition, right.
Where I’m just screaming like, I hate this part!
And my wonderful midwifery team, Dinette and Stephanie were just like, it’s fine. It’s going to be over soon. I was like, I fucking hate it! You guys. I’m not a gentle birther. I scream at the top of my lungs. Like somebody stabbing me is how I scream. It’s fine. It’s okay to be a loud birther. What’s that book, was it baby catcher? Where she had a patient that was just wiling out, you know, screaming at the top of her lungs.
And one of the doulas got in her face and said, stop. You’re going to scare the baby. Oh my God. Because they had to like monitor the baby at some point or something and she wouldn’t stop crawling up the wall. So funny. Well, that’s how I feel in transition. Like I’m going to crawl out of my skin and I would just like to die.
Thank you very much. And my son was upstairs with my friend Hannah. You know, and I had asked her later, like, what was he doing when I was screaming like that? And she was like, well, you know, he’d kinda zone out for a second while you’re screaming and then I’d be like, Hey bud, let’s play this game and he’d be fine.
So kids are fine guys. But anyway, basically right before I started pushing, there was just enough water in the birth time to cover my butt. So I hopped in and shoved an entire baby out. And let me tell you what Heather, like she was not low when I started pushing, like, I didn’t feel her head against my ischial spine until I pushed.
Oh man, it was, it was rough. I pushed and then I was like, Oh, gosh! She kind of like slammed down in your pelvis. And I just, like, I had this visual of like what was happening, where her head was. And I was like, this is not, not yet. Yeah. Should not be happening. When you know what your pelvic anatomy looks like and you can tell where your baby’s head position is in that pelvis, that would be a really like existential moment. Totally. And I could like feel the spines, like, like her head pushing on them, like.
Is that like when you left your body? Right. That’s when I just, yeah. Even into the fourth dimension. Yes, exactly. That’s when I had those theta brainwaves that make you feel like you’re tripping.
Well, yeah. And I remember shouting at Stephanie that she was too big and she was definitely bigger and I was like, she’s coming out, where’s her head? And she was like, her head’s not out yet. I was like, she is coming. And then her head was out. Cause sometimes, you know, people say the head is coming and you’re like, really?
And then they’re not at all. No. And sometimes they say it and it’s like out and you’re like, Oh, did you know you just birthed your baby’s head? Cause I didn’t. That’s crazy. Yeah. But I birthed her head and then I remember her like the next push wasn’t super productive. So I copped up a knee and she shot out, you know, as they do.
And then when I plucked her out of the water, I had to unwrap her cord from her neck, but she was fine. That’s normal guys. Yeah. 30% of babies are born with cords around their neck. Yeah. If you have an ultrasound and they say, Oh, the baby’s got a cord around their neck. Don’t panic. It’s going to be fine.
They do that a lot. And they can deliver through most of the time. I mean, she just. I think it was tight, so tight that Stephanie just couldn’t do anything about it. So she just came out in the water and then I unwrapped her. It was fine. Yeah. And then I sat down and cried and was like, Oh my God, I had a baby and hugged this cute little baby to my chest.
Did you feel the, the surge of hormones? Oh yeah! Just like you felt the head in the pelvis, you knew what was happening? Yeah. I was like, Oh, this is the good part. Also. I hate that there’s still placenta in me. It kind of hurts. Yeah. But you know what they say? The placenta does not have bones, so it doesn’t hurt as much coming out.
I don’t like the feeling of it on my like, butt. Like, I feel like there’s pressure. Oh yeah. And I’m just like, ah, just get it out. Sometimes it like sits in the vaginal wall for a minute and that’s kinda what was going on. And I, I remember, you know, we had like 10 adorable minutes in the pool and it was great.
You know, I probably spent like 20 minutes in the birth pool after all that. Right. Yeah. Soaking your butt in that four inches of water. But then I remember I got out and I, I looked at Danette, my midwife and I was like, just get it out, this freaking placenta out so I can relax. And that was great. We did. Yeah. You know, my son came downstairs when Lyra was still in the pool and Heather, this was the most adorable thing. He comes down and he’s like real, like quiet and skeptical, you know?
Cause there was a lot of screams and then he looks over and he’s like, Oh mom, she’s so beautiful. She’s like a diamond in the sky and he just kept repeating that over and over. And Lyra, she’s just a diamond in the sky. She’s so beautiful, mom. I agree. Right. And he was like, my sister’s here. I’m so happy.
It was so cute guys. Yeah. Griffin’s been riding that sibling wave for the whole time. He’s been so cute. I’m loving the pictures. He is obsessed with her. You know, all he wants to do is snuggle skin to skin with her and just like carry her around the carrier. My son was five when my daughter was born and they are still best friends.
He thinks she is the most hilarious person in the world. And she is, but she thinks like the sun rises and sets over him. They are just, it’s unlikely, you know, that you wonder five years apart, boy, and girl, like, are they really gonna get along? But they do. I’m excited for it. It’s amazing. It’s already great now, except that like, right now, it’s also like, Oh my God, stop fucking touching your sister for one goddamn minute.
That’s true. I remember yelling at my son and be like, can you please just not distract her when I’m nursing? Because she was such a distractable nurser. And like right now it’s like, can you just not wake her up? She’s sleeping. And he’s like, I’m not, I’m not as he’s going closer. I’m not going to wake her up.
Oh, look, she’s awake. See, I didn’t touch her. I’m like, I literally just saw you poke her in the eye. You woke her up on purpose. What the fuck. Oh, it’s fine. You know what? I would rather that to him, like trying to smother her every time I turned around or some crazy shit that children do, right. There are a range of reactions.
Yeah. I mean, they’re not really rivals because technically isn’t it. If they’re born outside of a three or four year gap, they’re technically like only children or your, you have two oldest children. Like they’re not rivals. Right, right. Yeah. And he’s just been like, he’s been excited about this the whole time. He really hasn’t wavered very much.
She’s real cute. Yeah. So did she latch right away when she came out or not? Yeah, after, I didn’t really try until after we got the placenta out. Cause it was like, eh, it’s fine. She’s fine. And then, yeah, we had a little bit of feeding while we were still downstairs. She had a pretty good latch, you know, fed for a little bit.
And then we moved up to the bedroom and she had lots of feeding and then we all took a real nice nap. When did you notice that her latch was a little shallow? Oh, I mean right away, like, you know, I was like, Oh, she’s a super tiny mouth. Just like my son. Wow. It doesn’t open very wide, but also she sealed well and sucked well, and for me, at least that’s like the most important part that we start with.
Like good seal, a good suck. She’s actually transferring milk. Okay. We can deal with whatever else is happening as it comes. Yeah. As far as like stabilization goes, you know, of course we always try to avoid nipple injuries in that first few feedings. But I think a lot of the time I get more worried about people that are under anesthesia and they’re trying to breastfeed.
They just don’t notice what’s going. Right. And then also the hormones can kind of mask some of that too, where you don’t realize that the latch is like really off until after you’re like, Oh look I have a nipple hickey. Shit. Here we go. Yeah. No it really didn’t start to hurt until like two days, three days later when I was like, Oh, now we’re cluster feeding.
My milk’s not in yet. And Oh, I do notice how shallow that latch really is, but, you know, I’m, self-aware, I was super careful about like, trying to get the deepest latch every time, at least in the beginning so I didn’t get that nipple injury. So I didn’t start with the deficit basically. Yeah. And you know, the other thing I heard you say is that you were just really open to craniosacral therapy if you needed it.
I think you said, yeah, if I can’t get her mouth to open, I’ll just take her to get some craniosacral therapy. That’ll probably work. It’ll be fine, but I don’t have any open wounds on my nipples. So it’s a little uncomfortable, but it’s whatever. That right there is a second time mom. First time mom would be like, Oh my gosh.
That’s okay. Because you know, any kind of nipple pain, you’re wondering like how bad could it get, but when you’ve already seen how bad it can get. Oh yeah, you were like, I know pretty much what my threshold for pain and what I can tolerate is. So hang in there. If you’re a first timer it’s okay. Just phone a friend.
And, and too, like, I was literally looking at all parts of my nipple after feedings to make sure I didn’t get that like under the nipple crack, you know? And there was like one day at the end of the first week where I was like, Ooh, that one might open up if I’m not more careful. And I did avoid it, no bleeding. But you know, that’s really good to be cognizant of too, because a lot of people get those cracks underneath their nipple.
They’re like, why does this hurt so much? And they don’t notice it until it like opens up all the way around. Yeah. And you know, what’s interesting is like she doesn’t have a tongue tie. No, it’s just her lip. It’s just her lip and also her tiny, tiny mouth. Yeah. So something we see was a lot of these babies with oral restrictions is they have this small jaw or recessed jaw and her jaw is a little recessed.
Yeah. Just a little bit. Which definitely just means it doesn’t like open the same amount. But what I have noticed here, Lyra let’s demonstrate. The good thing, she’s not tongue tied. And when she’s resting, her tongue is up on her palate, which is where it should be. So when we see really badly tongue-tied babies and you know, they fall asleep and their mouth open a little bit, their tongues are going to be on the bottom, where our tongue should rest on the top. And her tongue comes over her gumline.
But when we lift up her top lip, you can see it does flange up. But when we flange it up all the way, it definitely blanches that frenulum a little bit. Yeah. And she has a little sucking blister right on her top, middle of the top lip. And you can kind of tell that maybe they’re not flanging their top lip enough if they have that sucking blister.
Yeah. Yeah. So I usually what I do most of the time when she latches I’ll just take a finger and I kind of like put a little bit of pressure right above her lip and just pull up. And then typically her lip will just flange out. Sometimes it doesn’t, sometimes I have to do it like kind of incrementally all around her lip and you know, if I was bleeding and in a lot of pain and she also wasn’t like transferring milk well, too, I definitely would have been like, Oh yeah, we’re seeing OT. We’re seeing SLP. We’re going to the chiro. We’re doing all this stuff, but. It’s really mild. Oh dear. She just pooped again. She just pooped.
Excuse me, everybody, we’re going to pause the recording. All right. We’re back from our poop situation. This, this girl’s a forceful pooper guys. She had her Evivo. She finished her full course of her Evivo starter pack. Yeah. She’s doing good. Yeah. She has pretty consistent daily or every other day, poops that are nice and yellow.
What we like to see like a good old squirt of mustard. That’s right. A little squirt of mustard. But anyway, yeah, I mean, at this point I feel like things are going well. She was a little slow to get back to her birth weight and a little slow to gain, like the week after. And we’re still on the low side now, but also that’s okay.
Like not every baby has to gain 10 ounces a week, you know. It’s okay to be on the four or five side, as long as we’re also meeting all those other growth factors, right? Yeah. So I mean, things are going pretty good now. You have to tell them about the thing that you have this time that you didn’t have last time that’s been a game changer.
What is it? The haakaa. Oh gosh. Yeah, guys. I love that. I will say it’s not as comfortable as I hoped. So I got the haakaa brand haakaa and then I got two other brands too. Cause I was like, wow, that’s kind of pinching, I don’t love it. Let me see if the other brands are better. So I got the Lansinoh brand one and the bumblebee brand one.
And the bumblebee one does not have enough suction, and just like falls off, but it’s very comfortable. Yeah. Yeah. And the other two, I do feel like I’m like, Hm, that’s a little bit uncomfortable. It kind of pinches a little bit, but dude, it’s awesome. But, yeah, so the haakaa is a little bit uncomfortable, but game changer in so many ways.
Yeah. Yeah. And I just want to say, like, it’s not like I popped it on five days postpartum and got two ounces. Like I think I put it on for the first time right after my milk came in and I was like, wow, look, five milliliters. Cool. You know, great. And then over the next week it was like up to 10 milliliters.
Awesome. And so I, so I just started doing that like two or three times a day and I’d be like, Oh, look, now I have an ounce, let me throw it in a bag. Yeah. So, so now when I put the haakaa on in the morning for like that really good morning, you know, when, when we wake up at 6:00 AM, like exploding, I get like almost an ounce out of my super boob and another like 10 mils out of the other boob.
And it’s great. And then I’m like, cool. Maybe I’ll do this again today, maybe not, whatever. Yeah. So you haven’t pumped at all? No, I have. So Lyra is six weeks old ish and I have like 30 ounces in the freezer. Oh my, I know. I haven’t really, and I haven’t worked very hard for it. Because I started cause I was like, Oh, we’re going to do the Evivo.
I just want to have some milk. And then I’d be like, okay, well we didn’t use that milk. It’s been in the fridge a couple days. Like, let me just throw two ounce bags in the freezer. And now I have a lot and guys like that could easily be my going back to work stash if I were going back to work in a week.
Yeah. I mean, and then you just pump whenever you’re away from her. You have enough, you only really need about 10 ounces to cover your time that you’re away from her the first time. Yeah. That’s great, and you know, how would you say that the Evivo has helped this time versus your son? Yeah, so I definitely see, you know, this baby doesn’t have diaper rash.
You know, my son had a lot of those red yeasty rashes all over. I haven’t had any of those with her so far. Much more consistent and much more consistent poops. Like my son started out like a million poops and poop and every fart. And then it was like let’s poop once every two weeks. And it was either or never.
Never like a poop every day or two. Was it a lot stinkier? No, but he would have a lot of weird colors and textures. And for the most part, hers have been pretty consistently like in the yellow range and like liquid, but not watery. And Griffin was really colicky. She’s not. No. She’s on the boob all the time, but I will say it wasn’t this early for him with the colic.
It was definitely like two to three months that it was really bad. And there was like the colic and the purple crying and I was going to lose my fucking mind. But yeah, she really doesn’t have any of that right now. Like she has some gas discomfort. She farts a good amount, but it’s not inconsolable. You know, and it doesn’t feel outside of the normal, like, yes, I fought that much too kid.
How about sleeping? So far her sleep, is a little bit perhaps better than Griffin’s, but I’ll say it’s hard to remember now, you know. We have a defense mechanism in our brain. Nope. We just forget some stuff when we have the mom brain, but I really, I think I correctly recall that Griffin honestly woke up every hour for the first month.
Yeah. I think you said that before. And she has done that a couple of nights, but for the most part does like a two hour, a three hour or one and a half hour. Like, you know, it’s, it’s not as frequent. Okay, so overall good with the Evivo. No, I’m pleased with it. And I have had a couple of friends use it also, and they’ve all been pleased with it.
I’ve had a couple of clients too. You know, I’ve heard a lot of people in the first week they’re like, I don’t know. I think it’s worse. We have gas, we have spit up. But after that first week, it seems like it’s pretty much better for everyone. Yeah. I reached out to Dr. Bethany Henrik about the gas, because a few of our people were like, is it normal to have gas with Evivo?
And it is at first because their bodies are going to clear all that pathogenic bacteria out. And that process does take a little bit of time. So it’s normal. If you still have the gas, then push through, finish your starter pack and it’ll resolve. Yeah. And I don’t think we really saw that with her at all.
Like I don’t, I don’t think there was a day where I was like, Oh no, it’s the probiotic. Yeah. Well, we’ll put a link to Evivo in the show notes for you guys, if you want to check it out. And then of course we have our episodes, our two part episode on that, that we’ll link in the show notes as well. But you know, like I’m a pretty baby accessory, minimalist, you know, I’m not the kind of person who’s like, look at this great rocker and bouncer and this and that and all the buttons I can push and all the supplements, like I really do the bare minimum.
So I like having one of the silicone milk collectors. I liked the probiotics. You know, I love having a ring sling for her. You know, baby wearing is my life because especially like I spend a lot of time outside in the garden and with the animals, and it’s hard to find a baby monitor that consistently works that far from the fucking house.
And sometimes I can get her to nap, like on a blanket in the grass or in a little basket. But most of the time it’s just easier if I pop her in a carrier, I feed her while I’m doing stuff. She falls asleep. I scoot her in the middle, tighten her up and, you know, do what I’m doing. Yeah. And that’s moving around is helping your mood.
It’s helping your recovery and being in the house, feeling like you’re imprisoned and stuck in your postpartum period is not a good situation. And baby wearing really kind of takes care of all of those things. Yeah. And it really helps you get like some nice, slow, gentle healing movement, you know? Cause you can’t go run a marathon with a baby strapped to your chest and you’re going to move slowly at first with it, for sure.
So I think a lot of people feel like their newborns are on the boob all day long. Like we had a post just the other day that someone was like, is it normal that I’m six weeks out? You guys must have gave birth around the same time. And she was like, and my baby’s on my boob constantly. How do I know when it’s not normal?
Yeah. And we’re like, well, yes, it’s normal. I had actually like the day before made a post in the group being like, Hey, I’ve been sitting in this fucking chair all day breastfeeding. Guess what? It’s normal. Also I don’t like it. And that’s okay. Yeah. I can tell you, I think I’ve seen you breastfeed 16 times since you’ve been here. Yeah, I’ve been here, what? Five hours? Yeah.
And that’s okay. That’s fine. You know, some babies are the kind of baby who sit there and they eat for 10 minutes and then they’re good for three hours. Some babies like this little girl, like what if I have a meal now? Oh, and then a snack in 20 minutes. And then I get thirsty after that so I’m going to feed for three seconds.
And then I just want it in my mouth for a little bit, and then I’m going to fall asleep and wake up and be very offended when it’s gone. And that’s not her using you as a pacifier? No, no. This is all very normal. It’s okay. And I’m really like, you know, some, yeah, sometimes during the day or night, like once or twice, I’m like, I’m done.
I can’t do it anymore. My baby’s fine. She’s fed. I ask my husband to take her away. He puts her in the carrier. He walks outside if she’s crying, so I don’t have to listen to it. And then usually she sleeps for like four hours with him cause he doesn’t have boobs. Yeah. It’s perfectly normal guys to get to the point where you’re like, okay, I know it’s fine to have a baby that eats all the time, but I need a break right now.
Yeah. And both are fine. So, you know, I really try with my partner. Like he tries. If he’s, if he’s been working all day too, he usually comes home, settles down for like 10 minutes and then takes her cause he knows that she’s been attached to me all day. And then typically one time at night, I’ll give her to him and they’ll go sleep together on the couch. You know, especially cause she’s still has one of those like one period of time between one to three in the morning where she wakes up and feeds. And she’s still awake and she feeds and she’s still awake and she feeds, and then she just lays there and she’s like, guess what? I’m wide awake, alert, enthusiastic. And I’m like, it’s 2:00 AM. I’m sleepy, tired, and really over it.
Right. And I’m like, Oh, Ivan, wake up, go pee, put the carrier on, take the baby. He’s like, you know, he’s fine. He’s scheduling his vasectomy. Yeah, exactly. No, and it’s great. And she typically does sleep deeper with him, you know? Which is great. Yeah. Smell it on him. They usually get two to three hours together and that might be the longest stretch I’ve gotten all night.
And I also sleep more deeply when she’s not in bed with me. So yeah. Good trade off. Because of the sensitization, your brain just cannot shut off if they’re there. They’re so noisy when they sleep, they are. And you guys probably hear her on the background. She’s like, you know, a little like gurgle breathing, like snorting gulping.
If she was an adult I’d tell her to put on a Breathe Right strip. Right. Just like my husband every night. I’m like, did you put on a Breathe-Right strip? And he’s like, Oh, he always says, every night I quit wearing those. And you’re like, sure. You know, did you also quit sleeping with me? No, you didn’t. Yeah, no it but, but it’s nice.
It’s really, it’s important to talk to your partner about that kind of stuff. You know, I get it. Like some partners have trouble when they’re handed a baby and it’s crying and they’re like, I don’t know what to do. I don’t have boobs. But, you know, the important thing is to talk about it. Not in that moment, at a low stress moment.
You know, and be like, Hey, like I understand that’s hard, but it’s really important to me that you do X, Y, and Z with the baby, so that I can, you know, calm down and relax and reset and be ready to take it back. And there’s benefits to them too. Like all the research shows that the more they help, the more they want to help.
Like their, their oxytocin actually surges as well when they help. So avoidance, you know, the whole like, Oh, I’ll be a good dad when they’re two years old, that actually is not a thing. That’s not how any mammals work and it’s not going to be how this mammal works. No, and it’s a learning curve for them too.
And sometimes you also have to check yourself and be like, okay, I am going to step back and shut up and not tell you how to do a job that I actually don’t do. Because you’re a different parent than me and we’re not going to do it the same. I’m really bad about that. Yeah, me too. It’s hard. Every, I think everyone’s bad about that.
Watching them try to clean the pumping part and not be in like, I mean, it’s not that they didn’t do a good job. It’s just different from how you did it. It’s the most inefficient way I’ve ever seen anybody do it. I was trying to be nicer and it’s probably not that bad, but when you’re sleep deprived and you, you know, just need everything done just the right way.
There’s like 50 million things to do. And you’re like, I love you. You’re the most inefficient dishwasher I’ve ever seen in my life. And if you keep that up, I’m never going to actually get you to do the task I really need you to do, which is this. And then, yeah. So try to, you know, try to say it nicer than I would. I, yeah, I do try when I have criticism of my brain to do a shit sandwich with the bread is the positive, you know, I love you so much.
You are making me crazy watching you use that bottle brush and you’re cute. Right? I usually actually start with a thank you. Oh, that’s good. I usually say like, thank you for taking Lyra last night. I really appreciate it. I got a lot of sleep. Do you think you could change something that I’m asking you to change right now because it’s drive me crazy also, I love you. You’re wonderful.
You’re better than me. It depends on the day, Heather. Just don’t think that we’re over here being perfect. You guys. Cause it’s not, we’re all just doing the best we can. And I think Maureen, it’s been a pleasure to watch you in your postpartum period. You’ve done a great job. I mean, I didn’t get to see you with Griffin postpartum.
Yeah. Sorry. That was fucking crazy. Yeah. I mean dude, like if you had seen me after my son, it was a mess too. So. I think you are an awesome mom. You’re doing a great job. You’re a powerhouse goddess. Getting that baby out who fell into your pelvis and to six inches of water. Just shoved that little sucker out in a couple of minutes.
Yeah. Yeah. Total goddess move. And you know, you’ve really been rocking it and keeping your relationship in check and you’re getting you’re delivering sheep on the farm. You’re helping people on the Facebook group. You’re posting pictures even on your worst day and sending encouragement. So thank you for all that you’re doing and letting people in on your, on your birth story.
Yeah. And I just, what I want to leave you guys with is that I think the thing that has been the most positive change that I’ve made for this postpartum that has directly affected my mood and, you know, everything in the best way was just adjusting my expectations. You know, like it doesn’t really matter what’s happening with my baby and my boobs and my partner right now.
But the fact that I, this time was like, okay, I understand what to expect. I kind of get the worst case scenario already, and I’m just not going to expect that I’ll be able to do anything for at least a month. And then the next month is like one thing a day. And then after that, we’ll see.
The next month? More like the next six months. Yeah. We were talking about this earlier and I said, you know, I finally lost my mind and I, I try to cram way too much into every day anyways. And when I finally was like, you know what, I’m not scheduling more than one thing a day, my life improved greatly. So if you can do one thing and that includes laundry and sometimes it includes just a shower.
Well, yeah, I mean, my one thing two days ago was that I put the dry dishes away. I didn’t do the dishes. I didn’t even gather the dirty ones. I was like, I’m just going to set this up so whoever does the dishes next, it’s like, a smidgen easier. You know? Or like I made myself salad out of a bag in the fridge.
There you go. That’s one thing. One thing that I did, and your one thing can get bigger and bigger as you feel more comfortable. And obviously you’re out of the house. You drove two hours to come record with me today. Mostly easy. Mostly easy, but this is one thing. You’re not doing this and you’re not going to go out and like have fun.
I’m not gonna stop by Walmart and the way home. Right? Exactly. Don’t overwhelm yourselves guys. Like the other day, my five-year-old who very nicely thinks there’s only soda in one location in the world really wanted one. And I was like, okay, fine. We’ll go to the soda place. You know, it’s like a 10 minute drive down the road to the gas station with the soda vending machine.
And that’s all I did. And it went well. But the thing that I did that worked instead of like, Oh, Lyra’s sleeping why don’t we also go here? I was like, cool, this is a success. Let’s go home. Yeah. Yeah. That’s the key man. And I still have to learn that and I’m not even breastfeeding anymore, but I still have to learn that just for my own sanity.
I think we all tend to cram way too much. Yeah.
Hey guys, it’s Maureen here. And I wanted to let you know about my Etsy shop. I am an artist and a designer, and I have a shop where I make educational breastfeeding posters shirts for birth workers like for your favorite nurse or midwife. Shirts for people who are lactating, mugs, stickers, all kinds of stuff. Some of my birth paintings are on there. It’s an eclectic collection and it’s really beautiful. So if you want to find that you’re going to go to etsy.com/shop/thewanderingwom6 except instead of a B it’s a six. So that’s The Wandering Wom6 with a six instead of a b.
Well, Before we go, shall we think a patron? Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So in case you guys didn’t know, we have a VIP membership area within this program called Patreon and people can submit monthly pledges to us to help support the podcast and the, you know, the thing we have going on here and there’s three different tiers.
So there’s $5 a month, $10 a month and $20 a month. And depending on the tier that you choose, there’s merch, there’s behind the scenes access to interviews and recordings. The B roll, the hilarious mix ups that we do. So all the Lyra poops, and grunts and everything from this episode, it’ll be in there. And then the $20 patrons actually get to do a live Q and A with us once a month and get all their questions answered and we get to see their beautiful babies grow and we get to watch them grow as mothers too.
So it’s pretty cool. So if you want to be a Patron and you can go to Patreon.com/MilkMinutePodcast, and let’s go ahead and thank our most recent patrons. We want to send a big shout out to our new patron, Andy W from Reynoldsburg, Ohio. Thank you so much, Andy. We really appreciate your support. You are a Lactivist and we love it.
Thank you so much. All right. Well, let’s do a quick award before we have to skedaddle.
Great. Today’s award goes to Colleen H. She says after a lot of traveling recently, I finally feel confident in nursing in public. I’ve fed him on a boat, on a plane, in an airport. I was so nervous, but I did it and kept him uncovered too! Yes. Good job. That’s awesome. It’s hard. It is hard. And first of all, I’m impressed that you’re traveling.
Like I just felt so imprisoned sort of in my postpartum period. Like I was afraid to leave the house because I could barely handle normal. So good job being so adventurous and taking your baby cool places and feeding on planes, trains and automobiles. Can we give her the traveling titty? Yeah.
You get the traveling titty award. Huzzah! Good for you, Colleen. All right. Well, that’s about it for today, guys, and we’ll see you next week. Yeah. And if you want to share your breastfeeding win with us, it’s MilkMinutePodcast@gmail.com and we’ll see you next week. Bye. Thanks for listening to The Milk Minute.
If you haven’t already please like, subscribe, and review our podcast wherever you listen. If you’d like to support our podcast, you can find us on Patreon at Patreon.com/MilkMinutePodcast. To send us feedback, personal stories, or just to chat, you can send us an email at MilkMinutePodcast@gmail.com.
