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Jarrod

by Krischne

Jarrod was born by emergency caesarean at 1:30am on the 25th of February 1994, after more than forty hours labour. His first feed was from a bottle, and at around 5:00am our breast feeding experience began. Jarrod took to breastfeeding like a duck to water, no attachment problems, no cracked nipples, just milk and plenty of it. It did take a little time, however, to work around the harness he had to wear for his hips. But a couple of pillows or the football hold soon had things back on track. He used to feed roughly three-hourly but took forty or fifty minutes to feed. By four weeks he would feed at around 10:00pm and sleep until around 4:00am. Apart from a rather painful letdown reflex, my experience of breastfeeding up to this point was bliss.

When he was five weeks old I became very ill with an infection and was put on masses of antibiotics. I remember the doctor saying that it wouldn't hurt him, but he might not like the taste. Jarrod would scream when I tried to feed him, so in my desperate attempt to cope by myself, I gave him a bottle. I ended up at my doctor two days later in tears, because he still would not feed and she put me on different antibiotics, but the damage was done. By seven weeks my son was completely bottle-fed and I was devastated and feeling as guilty as anything.

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