Hopefully this helps someone.

This is a post about mammary hypoplasia. This is the reason I could not breastfeed my son. The first couple weeks that I tried to exclusively breastfeed were absolute hell. He had problems latching because of his top lip so we saw a lactation consultant, we saw two as a matter of fact, both in the hospital and after we got home. He had finally latched properly and gotten the colostrum but my milk still wasn't coming in three days after I had given birth. We took him to the doctor, he was loosing weight and wasn't peeing or pooping. I was so determined to breastfeed so the pediatrician told me to start taking fenugreek and pumping to help my milk come in. I did everything she said, every time he would eat I would pump directly afterwards until finally I started to get white drops of milk. I never pumped more that two ounces so I upped the amount of fenugreek I was taking and I started eating lactation cookies and a whole lot of oatmeal. My suppply still didn't increase and my son was loosing a lot of weight so we had to start taking him to the doctor every two days for weight checks. He was almost 7 pounds when he was born but two weeks later he had almost dropped to 5 pounds. He also was very dehydrated and still hadn't pooped and only peed once a day. When he did pee there were pinkish orange crystals in his diaper which was another sign of dehydration. The doctor said that he needed to start gaining weight and having wet and dirty diapers within the next week or else they would have to admit him into the hospital and give him an IV with fluids. His health was at steak and this is when she suggested supplementig with formula. This devistated me. Before I had my son I was very judgmental of mom's that formula fed. I hate to say it, but I was. All we hear on these mommy boards is that breast is best and formula is the devil and yes, breast is best because breast milk was made for babies but what we don't hear is that for some people, breastfeeding just isn't physically possible. Despite my hesitation to use formula, I knew that my son needed it to survive so we started giving him an ounce of formula in a syringe every time he breastfed. I didn't want to create nipple confusion just in case my milk supply did increase. I still wanted to breastfeed. After a while my son started gaining weight and he was healthy but my milk supply still stayed at 1 1/2 to 2 ounces every time I pumped. Feeding him with the syringe was difficult and it made going out with him impossible. He would suck on my breast for about 5 minutes and then he would begin screaming so I would move him to the other one and he would begin screaming again. His stomach was getting bigger so he needed more food and I wasn't making more so we had to up the amount of formula and after a while we realized that it was just easier and less stressful on all of us to use a bottle. We were almost exclusively bottle feeding unless he was fussy in which I would breastfeed him for comfort so he would go to sleep. I was still pumping though and I would mix the breast milk in with the formula I gave him. On a good day he would usually have about one bottle of breast milk and the other bottles would be formula. Over time my supply started to decrease so at around 6 weeks postpartum I went to an infant nutritionist and she told me to keep taking the fenugreek and eating the oatmeal and to pump or breastfeed ever hour on the hour. So that's what I did. I stayed cooped up in my house for nearly a month just eating oatmeal, popping fenugreek capsules, and pumping but nothing happened. I started to notice that this whole situation was taking a tole on my mental health. I felt like a failure. I was so depressed and I hated my body for not doing the one thing it was made to do, feed my baby. This led to even more depression and body image issues until finally I decided that it was enough. I was not a milk machine like a lot of my friends that had no problem whipping it out whenever their baby got fussy. These were the facts and as much as I hated it, I couldn't change it. I don't like to say that I quit breastfeeding because I didn't quit, I was not a quitter. I tried my hardest and in the end I just realized when enough was enough. I still get women on this app, and other mommy groups on social media, that tell me I failed and I didn't try enough and that I'm a quitter but you know what, this post isn't for those women, this post is for women like me that feel so depressed and so alone because they feel like they couldn't take care of their baby in the way a mother should. At the end of the day, no amount of words I type and stories I tell will ever make the judgemental people stop being judgmental. The only way to do that is if they go through it themselves and I pray that they never have to because it is such a lonely a defeating experience to go through. When I was pregnant I had never heard any stories like mine so I didn't think they existed. I wish I had known about mammary hypoplasia and that I had it. Maybe that would have taken the burden off of me somewhat and made me feel like less of a failure. I am posting my story and this blog post in this group because I know that some of you are going through this right now and you feel alone and you feel judged and you feel like a failure. Well, I just want to let you know that you aren't alone and you aren't a failure. I wish you all long and happy lives with your new bundles of joy. 😊