a bad start to breastfeeding

Whenever I look back on the day I had to breastfeed my daughter for the very first time, I can't help but feel resentful towards those people in the hospital. It was two days after I was admitted, still in pain but definitely starting to get better. My husband was in the room with me when I was called. Before I went inside the nursing room, I donned the smock for moms like I was told to. The room had armchairs and footstools and posters about breastfeeding. I have always believed breastfeeding to come so naturally, but while I sat there holding my daughter the first time, I was clueless. She seemed more sleepy than hungry. I offered a breast but the best she could do in that lethargic state was gape her mouth and suck very very lightly. It got frustrating after a while and no one was really there to help. A few moments later, a hospital staff came in. Maybe I was pressing the baby too close against me or maybe it was her position, because my breast would cover her nostrils. So this lady pushed back the breast tissue with her finger to allow the baby to breathe and she told me to do the same. Much later, I learned that that's not what you're supposed to do if the baby is struggling to get air. Moments later, still not successful, the baby looking as though she would rather sleep, I just held her there until someone came in and took the baby. On my way back to the room, I passed by the nurses' station where another lady in white told me 'You have to try hard because we breastfeed exclusively here!', in a way that seemed to threaten me. They always have this authoritarian air about them, sometimes condescending, but that's not what upsets me the most right now. I just lament the fact that not one person I encountered there seemed to be knowledgeable enough about lactation. Maybe a lot of them knew theories; I know they're required to attend seminars, but it's more the attitude. Or maybe I was wrong to expect them to be of help. So my breastfeeding experience was off to a rough start. I had so many issues but that would be too long to talk about. Nevertheless, I'm now able to breastfeed exclusively although I must say it's still an everyday challenge.

Expecting,

and when expectations don't happen

I've always known that things don't go as planned all the time, but it is this time that life seems to be brandishing that fact under my nose. While pregnant, I had pictures in my head of how I'm going to deliver and live life with a new baby: being wheeled into the delivery room, holding my baby right after she's born, breastfeeding successfully, using cloth diapers and going back to my hobbies right away. 

Except for the first trimester, my pregnancy was going smoothly that I thought childbirth will be no problem at all. Everyone including my OB commented on how my belly looked small, which I felt so good about because that meant I won't have a hard time pushing the baby out when the time comes. 

Thirty-nine weeks and still no contractions. Then one February morning, I woke up to the feeling of water gushing out, which concerned my OB. On the way to the hospital, I maintained a positive attitude and kept hoping that the contractions would come. The nearer we got to the hospital, the vision of myself in labor and having a normal delivery a few hours later started to slowly fade. Eventually, I had to undergo Cesarean. Fifteen hours after we left the house, my daughter was born. From then on, I always find myself forced to dump a million other things I had planned out. ( I could go on talking about this but that would make an agonizingly long post.)

So that was only the beginning.