Patience, Grasshopper!

Our Ped was simply gushing over how well Charlotte looked and is doing. She weighed in at 16.5 lbs and was 27.5 in long. He said she looks amazing and couldn’t stop saying it! LOL. I tell you what – that makes you feel GREAT as a parent. He said the soft palate is not split – which was good news. No more appts until January! Woohooo!

Welcome to my blog. I am very honoured that Tanya has chosen to write about our journey. I hope that mothers and LC’s alike will be able to glean something from our struggle and please feel free to email with any questions you may have for me as I will be more than happy to answer them!

I was honoured to have Tanya Lieberman of the Motherwear Breastfeeding Blog come across my lonely little blog and ask if she could feature it at her blog. Today was the big day and I have discovered that once someone posts something, it tends to snowball. And that is the beauty of the breastfeeding Community. I adore how supportive and empowering everyone I have come in contact with through Tanya has been of our journey. When it first began, I was not thinking ahead of sharing my story – I was clinging to anything and screaming to survive. My husband was the one who started blogging about Charlotte’s medical information so that we wouldn’t have to repeat the information over and over again. This is what gave me inspiration to start my breastfeeding blog and I stayed motivated to do so due to the lack of available information applying to my situation. As I stated at the CLC training – I fell into a huge gaping hole and now that I am aware of its presence, there is no way that I can just walk away without filling that hole properly. I feel I can do that through sharing my story and through becoming a LC specializing in the care and guidance of moms with cleft babies. With my first pregnancy I became a huge advocate for women advocating for themselves with their pregnancy care and their delivery as well as PPD care. With this pregnancy, it’s breastfeeding and PPD, two topics that have become very near and dear to my heart. So I guess you could say that March 21, 2006 was not only the birth of Charlotte Elizabeth, but the birth of a new activist for women – making sure they get the right care, support, and guidance in a very unsure world!

Well dear readers, I am at it again.

Charlotte and I are again treading down the path of breastfeeding. I was given a gift by a local WIC department – a scholarship for a Certified Lactation Counselor course taught by the wonderful folks at Healthy Children (www.healthychildren.cc) I got to meet Cindy Maffei-Turner and Karin Cadwell who were both gracious enough to allow me to speak on day 4 of the training regarding my trials and tribulations with Charlotte. I handed out a reference sheet that will hopefully be used by those who attended the training. I tried to put an emphasis on the lack of support I had from the professional community in hopes that maybe those who attended the training would realize that just because a woman has a baby with a cleft palate does not mean she won’t want to breastfeed that child. Another important note is that when you are dealing with a cleft mom, it is of the utmost importance that you deal with HER Situation and don’t tell her that normal approaches will work. Or just tell her to DO something like “take baths” or “be patient” these very phrases are what frustrate us. We need to be told HOW to do it as we may not have experienced breastfeeding problems in the past. We need continued support and knowledgeable support. Please don’t brush us off if you don’t know what to tell us. Find out what we need to know or refer us to someone who can help us. Fostering the breastfeeding relationship is just as important to us and we need more guidance at this time than we ever have before.

As for Charlotte and I – we are doing a LOT of skin to skin, and she’s been familarizing herself with my breasts. My two year old seems to think that the left one is Charlotte’s and the right one is hers although she’s not nursing anymore. I plan on co-bathing with her this week as well and seeing if that goes anywhere. I have not started to pump again and don’t plan to so if this is not successful, then it will be the end of it. I previously posted that Charlotte hadn’t been tube fed for 56 hours. I am pleased to report that she has not been tube fed since Oct. 28th and doing well with the Haberman. Unfortunately we think her soft palate may have re-opened which may be impairing her ability to use a normal bottle. We are having that checked on thursday.