When the Zabies were born they were eight weeks early and stayed 17 days in the NICU. I had an extremely rare delivery and complications after delivery {read here and here} that caused vomiting for 9 days after the Zabies were born. I was fighting for my life and the last thing I could muscle up energy for was pumping milk for my babies. Luckily, I had a loving and selfless friend who knew how strong my desire was to breastfeed my babies and was also a Labor and Delivery nurse. On day 3 of postpartum she explained to me that she knew how important it was to me and she was going to hook up the pump and stimulate a let down for me. She did this every three hours and took the milk to the NICU for days until I had the energy to do it myself. I will forever be grateful to her for this.
Fast forward to when they came home. Suddenly I was thrown into the routine in it’s entirety, alone. Josh had to go back to work and neither of our families where here to visit yet since we expected the Zabies to spend a little while longer in the NICU. Nursing the girls took 45 minutes per baby, not including burping, diapering and pumping the remaining milk they didn’t drain from my breasts. It was exhausting to say the least. I did some research and reached out to my local Multiple Moms Mingle Group for support. I quickly found that many mothers of twins exclusively pump, bottle feeding their babies breast milk. I was determined to give my babies breast milk so exclusively pumping seemed like just the thing for me.
Burping one baby while simultaneously feeding the other (and snapping a picture).
I have a rare and unique breastfeeding story and it isn’t nearly as beautiful as I’d like it to be but I wouldn’t change one thing about it. My drops of milk in the beginning gave my 32 week babies strength to grow and thrive. They were never measured on a preemie chart and have always been average or above on growth charts. Seeing your children grow leaps and bounds on solely your breast milk is the most rewarding thing about breastfeeding and I wouldn’t trade it for the world.
My advice to you, new mama, is to set a small attainable goal. Once you reach it, set another. Have a routine. Stay positive, surround yourself with supportive, like-minded people and never give-up on a bad day– Stick it out to the next good one and if you still feel in your heart that you’re done then you can end on a good note. You can do this! You are amazing and you are doing an amazing, selfless thing for your child which is awesome!!!
My Pumping Schedule:
At birth:
Every three hours, around the clock, for a minimum of 30 minutes each time, sometimes 45 minutes.
2 months:
Every time the girls ate (every three hours), I pumped for 30 minutes minimum. We fed on demand at this point so we were going longer stretches at night.
4 months:
The Zabies slept from 10 pm to 5 am. I pumped every time the girls ate (every three hours) for 30 minutes each time. I, too, went from 10-5 without pumping.
6 months:
The Zabies went to bed at 7pm but ate every three hours during the day. I pumped every time they ate for 30 minutes and also pumped one last time before I went to bed at 9 or 10 pm. My next pump was at 7 am when the Zabies woke. They could hold their own bottles at this point.
8 months:
The Zabies ate every four hours thru the day and went to bed at 7pm. I first transitioned to pumping every four hours and then by 9 months I also stopped pumping before I went to bed; I was then going 12 hours between pumping.
10 Months:
I pumped at 7 am, 11 am, 3pm & 7 pm
11 months:
I pumped at 7 am, 11am & 7pm
11 ¾ months:
7 am & 7 pm
12 months:
7am
Be sure to catch up with the rest of the Breastfeeding Diaries at the top of my navigation bar.
I love this series that you do! Breastfeeding is so personal and there are so many variations to a breastfeeding relationship and I think it's amazing that you're able to find so many incredible mamas to share their stories! I look forward to this post each week 🙂
you are amazing! what a gift you gave your girls! way to go mama!