My breastfeeding journey did not start smoothly.
One of my first memories after bringing my daughter home is sobbing over the phone to a member of La Leche League, begging for help. My nipples were so raw and blistered that every time my daughter latched, it felt like searing hot needles poking into my skin.
I wish I had known then what I know now: that you don’t have to suffer to breastfeed, but at the time, I was an 18-year-old brand new mother who had never even babysat—let alone knew anything about breastfeeding.
I thought to feed my baby, I had to grin and bear it— just get through the pain. So I did—for the first few days, I grit my teeth and silently cried whenever she needed to eat.
Many people say breastfeeding is hard until it isn’t, and for me, that was true. In the weeks after my daughter was born, it did get better. Gradually, the pain subsided. I learned how to hold her in ways that were comfortable for both of us. My supply regulated—and together, we settled into a rhythm.
As a teen mom, I knew there were so many things I couldn’t provide for my daughter. I couldn’t provide her with a stable two-parent household, a forever home or even certainty for the future, but I could do this.
I could provide nourishment for her body. I could hold her skin-to-skin while we nursed for hours, hoping she could feel how much I loved her and how much she was wanted, even if she was unplanned.
So many nights, I would look into her big brown eyes and stroke her cheek. Our heartbeats slowly regulating to each other’s paces as her little body relaxed into mine.
As her eyelids gradually closed, I would nuzzle my nose into the top of her head and breathe her in. I could feel I was her safety and she was mine, and in the warm bubble of each other, we would rest.
Nursing became our foundation, our constant in an inconsistent few years. We nursed through my countless online college lectures, her dad moving out of the house, her first laugh, her first smile and her first steps. Things around us constantly changed, but our nursing relationship was the thread that connected us through it all.
Sometimes breastfeeding is portrayed as a one-way relationship: the mother giving and sacrificing for their child, but for me, it has always been a symbiotic relationship. Feeding my daughter gave me just as much as I gave to her in ways I never expected.
Breastfeeding turned out to be the ultimate healer for me.
As an early teen, I was sexually assaulted—and that trauma perpetuated a teenagehood of being completely disassociated with my body. It felt like a shameful and dangerous object that was not connected to me. I did not feel like I had control or choice over what happened to my body, so my mind’s way of protecting myself was to shut down all physical and emotional sensations connected to it.
Breastfeeding broke me open in a way I didn’t realize I needed.
For the first time, I could not shut all those things down, and instead of being a source of pain and fear, my body was a source of safety, nourishment and love. It was helping my daughter grow, building our connection, and finally, allowing me to see my body as strong and capable—and mine.
As I continued to feed my daughter and see her body growing strong, I felt pride and love for my body grow. The more I connected to it, the more I slowly started to allow myself to feel again.
Because I needed to nourish my daughter, I also started to nourish myself. I gained a new self-confidence and stopped caring as much about what other people felt about my body. It was no longer for anyone else: I was in control and my body was a source of power instead of fear.
Somehow, this tiny human needing my body allowed me to reclaim it for myself.
Our nursing continued for over two years—and I mostly enjoyed it. But just like everything else about motherhood, not every breastfeeding moment was beautiful or peaceful. I always hated the rushing, tingling sensation of a letdown, the achy, heavy engorgement, and nursing a toddler is like having a wild mongoose attached to your nipple. But the grounding connection that it brought always outweighed the uncomfortable parts.
I honestly don’t remember the weaning process, which means it probably happened gradually, and we both reached a point of not needing it anymore. We found new ways to connect, and sometime before her third birthday, our nursing journey was over.
Fourteen years later, I had my son. Our breastfeeding experience has been both similar and drastically different.
Most drastically, I am in a completely different stage of life—I’m 35, I’m happily building a home with my long-term partner. We have stability and I have the knowledge of raising a baby to a teenager, and now, starting all over again..
With my son, I did not have the extreme pain at the beginning that I had with my daughter. That said, I have much less milk than I did the first time.
And, my son wants to nurse much more than my daughter ever did, so I feel myself getting touched-out often. Yet, I still feel that profound sense of connection and safety when I hold him to my chest.
We are still nursing 2.5 years in but I feel this chapter is coming to a close. I am at peace with that—but I am also not in a rush. Everyone’s journey to and through breastfeeding is different: ours will play out however it works for us.
Breastfeeding is like so many things in motherhood. It requires so much of you both physically and emotionally, and there are days when it feels impossible and like it is too much,—but there is also so much joy, love and growth.
Sometimes, my sixteen-year-old daughter lies in bed with me while I nurse my son, and these are some of my favorite moments.
So much has changed since she was in my arms—but those big brown eyes staring into mine are the same.
She curls into me, and I rest my head against both of theirs. We all settle into each other’s warmth, and I feel so much love and gratitude for my children, myself and the journey we have navigated together.
