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Demanded Pump for Baby in the NICU
By
Tiffany
from Florida
I got pregnant at the age of 19 and even then knew I wanted to breastfeed! My daughter was born at 37 weeks by c-section because I had developed severe preeclampsia. I was unable to get up and Taylor was in the NICU, so I wasn’t able to nurse right away. It took me 2 days of screaming and demanding the nurses and doctors and anyone else to get a pump to at least stimulate and produce milk. The nurses or my husband took the milk to the NICU for me. I wanted my little girl to have the BEST milk possible, and I know that REAL breast milk has so many benefits that formula doesn’t have. I didn’t get to lay eyes on my daughter for 4 days after she was born! I did not have it easy to say the least, but from the moment she came home from the hospital, she ONLY got milk from me! I never supplemented and I continued to nurse for 13 months! So if you think that you can’t breastfeed because you are not able to start off nursing, you are wrong! I let everyone know that I wanted to breastfeed, including her pediatrician, who said she was under-weight. But my husband is 6' and 145lbs and I am 5'2 and 110lbs; we are small so she is going to be small! Looking at the chart he saw that she is steadily going up and therefore not "not getting what she needs"! It bothers me that women give up so easily! Women have been breastfeeding babies for thousands of years, why change it now?
Content last updated May 7, 2009.
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