Addicted?

Warning: boob talk. Not boobs in a bikini at the beach, but boobs as major kitchen appliances for babies.

Although the bigger issue to be discussed herein is part of my slightly obsessive psychology, the specific topic is my "grocery stores." As many of you who have breastfed know, your breasts often become as "titillating" as kitchen appliances during breastfeeding, and suddenly even the shyest of people have no qualms about whipping out a boob to settle a crying or hungry baby. In fact, some chase down people in parking lots who have just hit their car, WHILE the baby is still latched on (see Astrid's blog: Life in the Woods, link to the left). And most will agree that it is sad when the time comes to give it up. Liberating, but somewhat sad.

Ideally, one would experience a natural tapering, as was the case with Avery. I was a little sad to see it go, but we sort of weaned each other mutually over time until she was not interested any more, and it certainly didn't seem right to force the issue. And so the breastfeeding faded into the sunset, within the few weeks after her first birthday.

Of course this isn't the story with Jordan, exactly. I stopped nursing her in March (except for some recreational nibbles along the way), but I have continued to pump at record-setting capacity since then. Most people cannot maintain milk supply by pumping, and almost no-one has the supply I have (osmosis from growing up on a dairy?) according to many lactation specialists, doctors, and fellow moms. But the facts are, even though I have 3 months worth stored up in the freezer, and even though (in this case) breastmilk was NOT the magic brain booster it's touted to be, I just can't seem to give it up. Pumping screws up my sleep schedule to some degree, because I have to do it before I go to bed, and first thing when I wake up in the morning. In the middle of the day it's lunch time and dinner time, which are not the most convenient times for excusing myself from life for 30 minutes. My friend who went through a similar thing with her daughter says I'll be surprised at how much more energy I'll have when I quit. Devon wants me to have more length and flexibility with sleeping options. Even the pediatrician is trying to reason with me -- that I'll still get her to a year with breastmilk from the freezer, and I need to ease up on myself a little. They make perfect sense, and I like to believe that I am logical and reasonable, but the fact is, I can't stop.

I decided a couple of months ago that I would be done by 1 October. That said, I started a plan to wean the pump on 1 September. I would set a timer for 20 minutes (instead of my regular 30-ish minutes), then the next week for 15 minutes, then the next for 10. You get the picture. But the first whole week I ignored the alarm when it went off and just kept pumping. Finally by the second week I was able to stop myself (more or less) after the alloted 20 minutes. But even after the obnoxious alarm sounds, it's still difficult for me to stop. I sit there thinking, "well I'm already here, and there's still milk, what a waste to stop now." But I am now able to rationalize the 20 minute limit (thereby saving me ~40 minutes each day) and decided that it really was a good start. I figured that since I finally got it down to 20 minutes I could hang there for a little extra time, since 1 October was a completely arbitrary date anyway. Baby steps.

But then life had to go and get complicated. Now I have a plane ticket to Detroit booked for 2 October, for a week full of testing for Jordan. I've managed until now to work pumping into my daily schedule, but I just don't see how, logistically, I'm going to be able to pump while on a plane or running from test to doctor appointment to hospital room. Now I'm being forced to meet my 1 October deadline (total fluke, by the way). You'd think this might give me the "out" my brain needs, yet even that doesn't seem to help. In fact it makes me a little mad, because I don't want to HAVE to give it up to accommodate a doctor's schedule. I've been racking my brain for a couple of days trying to figure out how to make this work while travelling.

By now you must be wondering, why is she torturing her grocery stores like this? All the burning yeast infections, all the squeezing and sucking and pinching, constant leaking & engorgement, all the late nights and early mornings, all the hassle with freezing and thawing and refrigerating. No, it has not been easy, but the practical side of me says I can't stop because it seems like such a waste to get rid of such a "gift." Millions of women would love to have the kind of supply I have. I should take advantage of what I have. The other part of me, deeper down, must think that nursing Jordan for even a few minutes here and there will somehow make things better. I guess I expect, deep down, that maybe she'll just snap out of this now that the seizures are gone & the ACTH is done. The smiles and grins are back, and she's starting to act like a "baby" again, so why not? Maybe she'll want to go back to nursing. And if I stop pumping we will lose that opportunity. Stopping is so final. There's no going back (okay, some ultra LaLeche ladies will disagree, but in reality, once it's gone, it's gone). It doesn't seem to matter to me that she can get breastmilk for 3 more months through her tube, or even through a bottle in her mouth if she's able to.

I guess I should just think of it as another way of helping Jordan (since, as mentioned above, the brain power of the boob juice didn't seem to work). The doctor we're going to see is the world famous innovator of PET scans for infants, and I'm sure, without a doubt, the person who has seen the most kids with IS in the world. Just to be able to talk to him will be incredibly valuable to us, no matter what the results are. We have to take the opportunity to go while it's presented to us, and a bunch of leaky, stinky, crusty, boob juice stained shirts aren't going to hold us back.

But, I still have to wonder, are there cigarette lighter plug-ins on airplanes?