On October 10th, I wrote a post about my Supply Issues. On October 19th my coworker gave birth, so the last day I pumped at work was on the 17th. Since then I’m pulling double duty job-wise at work (not for double pay, sadly), and there is absolutely no time for pump breaks. In a way this is a relief, because I was SO stressed about my pumping output (or lack thereof) and that sucked. This means that all daytime milk 4 days / week is coming from my freezer stash – and it means my supply is obviously dropping during the day even on the days that I am home. A generous blog friend has offered to send me some milk if need be to get us through to one year, and I might need to take advantage of that offer. Over the past month Harvey has also decided to only rarely nurse when I’m home at lunch, so at 10 months old, he’s pretty much on the following schedule:
- 5 and/or 7am – early morning nursing session upon wake up
- 10:30am – 3oz bottle from my freezer stash after nap #1
- 3:30pm – 3oz bottle from my freezer stash after nap #2
- 7pm – nurse before bed
- …and sometimes he wakes up to nurse around 12-2am, and I always do it because I’m so worried that he needs the calories!
That’s it. Maybe 12-15oz/day on work days and even less on the days that I’m home? If the Nanny tries to give him a 4oz bottle, he doesn’t finish it, so 3oz is the max we try now. I just looked back and realized that Stella was only nursing 4-5x/day at this age as well, so I guess I shouldn’t worry too much, except Harvey has actually LOST weight from 9 months to 10 months. Granted he is moving a TON, but to actually lose weight? At 9 months Stella weighed 20.2# and Harvey was 20.1# — almost identical weights. At 10 months Stella weighed 21.5# and Harvey had dropped to 19.4#, so he’s now 2# less than her at this age! I know they’re different kids, but gah… it’s hard not to worry as a parent, isn’t it?
Harv just has zero desire to nurse during the day — and even the morning and night time nursing sessions I have to be in the pitch black, and sometimes I have to let him cry in the crib for a minute at night before he will settle enough to nurse. Sometimes he just won’t nurse at all before bed. He is just go-go-go all the time! I never understood before when a nursing Mom would say “he weaned himself at ___ months!” Um, shit, now I do.
Thankfully the kid LOVES to eat solid food, but I think I’m going to have to concentrate on getting some high calories + high fat food in him, because he needs to be a growing boy at this point – not a shrinking one.
The most recent pic I have of him nursing – 6+ weeks ago on a hay rack ride at the pumpkin patch. We just never nurse during the day!