Pumping

Because my baby is premature, I have 3 extra months to breastfeed compared to a mom with a full term baby. The day I delivered her, my nurse told me to start pumping. It seems out of place at that time. I had just delivered a baby at 25 weeks and 5 days, and pumping milk was not the first thing on my mind at that time. But now I realize it was important because it takes time to start producing milk and if the doctors decided to start feeding my baby on the 3rd day, I would not have any milk for her and she would have been fed formula. Luckily, or unluckily, Emilia was not in a condition to be fed until Day 10 because of her PDA medication and some aspirates from her stomach. That bought me a lot of time and I have a huge stock of breast milk both in the NICU freezer and at home.

I was told to pump right after holding or looking at the baby. If that was not possible, I should look at her pictures instead. Supposedly moms make more milk when they hold their babies. So, I did just that. After holding her or looking at her for a while, when I feel let-down, I go to the pump room, and behind a closed curtain, I start pumping milk out of my hard breasts like a pervert ejaculating after peeping on a pretty girl. That is how I felt, seriously. Sometimes I found myself so pathetic that I could only give frozen breastmilk to my baby. At other times, I was happy that at least I could give her something - my gift of love.

The milk came in around the 3rd day of pumping. After a week of pumping, the volume just increased so much. The only thing is I need to get up once in the middle of the night and once in the very early morning to pump. Compared to what Emilia is going through, this must be nothing to complain about.