Hi, I’m Your First Food!

My unexpected love affair with breastfeeding

My darling Solomon,

You got your first tooth recently. You are growing up way too fast! Soon your little tooth will be joined by many more. My milk is your main food source right now, but it won’t always be this way. At some point, you’ll start using those teeth for their purpose and discovering different foods. I hope that you inherit your dad and I’s love of travel, of which food is a huge part. You have started tasting various mashed up foods, but up until recently you’ve been fairly unimpressed. You’re just starting to even want to taste food — but boy, do you love mommy’s milk! And I love that you love it.

When I was a brand new mom, overwhelmed by the enormity of keeping your tiny little body alive, I was looking forward to a time when you’d be more self-sufficient. I knew I wanted to nurse you because it was the right thing for you — and because someone told me I’d lose the baby weight this way (hmmm that did not happen quite the way I expected it). But after I did what I needed to do, I knew I would look forward to being done and getting my freedom and my body back.

I was doing it for you — but I never expected to love it myself. I never thought that it would give me as much benefit as it would give you. Now that we’ve been nursing for almost 9 months, I can’t imagine stopping — because I have really fallen in love with it. And I have really fallen in love with you through doing it.

Nursing you has been incredibly meaningful and moving for me, and I think it made me feel more like your mommy than carrying you in my belly. I love the shared experience that nursing has created just for the two of us.

I love holding you close and transferring precious nutrients to your body from mine. I love the fact that my body makes this magical food just for you — read this article to learn just how mindblowing the whole science of it is. Did you know that your little body asks mine for what it needs, and it gets custom-made for you? In real time! How freaking cool is that?!?! Mother Nature thought of everything!

I love having this time that’s just for us. I love the trust and the vulnerability that’s there between us as a result of this experience. The fact that my milk is your first and still primary source of nutrition is a huge honor and a responsibility I cherish. I love when you fall asleep on me, dazed in a milky coma, so trusting and defenseless. I just want to hold you forever.

Our breastfeeding relationship has changed throughout the months. Here’s a look back on it — and peering into the future.

Stage 1: How does this work?!

Being someone’s sole food source is terrifying when you don’t know what you’re doing — and your dad and I just couldn’t figure out how to make it work. The first day we came back from the hospital, your dad and I got really scared, because — of course! — it only worked when doctors and nurses were around. So we mad an emergency appointment with a lactation consultant. Of course, it worked beautifully in her office — but when we came home, all bets were off. After close to 12 hours of us trying to feed you, and you starving and screaming, I called another lactation consultant to do a home visit that night. I cried on the phone. Fortunately, she was able to help us, and we were off to the races. Three sessions and a few hundred bucks later (and a lot of tears), we truly got the hang of it — and it was magical.

Stage 2: Eating all the time

At first, your tiny tummy could only handle a little bit, so you had to eat every couple of hours. You weren’t very good at it yet — and neither was I — and so it would take us forever to get set up and to actually fill your tummy. Your feeding sessions lasted easily 45 minutes each, plus about 15 or so minutes of setup beforehand. By the time we were done feeding, it was almost time to eat again. Those days were very tiring because it felt like the only two things we did was 1) not sleep and 2) nurse. I watched a lot of Netflix at that time — and got totally hooked on Facebook.

Stage 3: Interactive eating

At some point, you became very efficient, and 45 feeding frenzy eventually got replaced by 10–15 minutes at a time and at longer intervals. And the most amazing thing started to happen. You started to communicate with me. You would look for me and ask for food, and when you were done, you would look at me and smile. You looked at me with these huge, beautiful, brown eyes, and I could feel you peering into my soul. You’d even make awfully cute noises — which have also changed throughout the months. All the frustration, tears and fears in the beginning were so worth it once you could tell me how much you loved my milk.

Stage 4: Distracted eating

As you grew up and started to be interested in the world, it was no longer just me and you. We’d sit down to eat, and you’d take a few pulls and then start looking around. Anything that moved or made a sound was an immediate distraction. You’d contort your body to look at whatever was in your field of vision. Oh look, a person outside! Daddy just walked by! The washing machine is running! The night light is on! Mommy’s wearing glasses! There are socks on the bed! Wheee!! I started to have to kick your dad out of the room, close the curtains and sometimes even turn out the light just to make sure you eat. Sometimes it gets frustrating, especially as I’m trying to get out the door in the morning. But then you smile at me and start playing with my face — and I just melt.

And don’t even get me started on how weird and cute it is when you try to eat and suck your little finger at the same time.

Stage 5: Who knows?

I know the end of our nursing adventure will come at some point — it may not be for a while, but it will definitely be much sooner than I want it to come. I dread that thought.

I was on vacation in Mexico (on your first trip outside of the States) when it first hit me. You were in my arms, passed out in a milk coma, while your dad and grandparents watched TV in the living room. You had fallen asleep, but I just couldn’t take my eyes off you. I was starving, as it was getting pretty late — but I just couldn’t break our sweet embrace. Your little body, which was rambunctiously kicking just a few minutes before falling asleep, now melted into mine. And then the waterworks came.

The thought of there being a last time — a time after which we won’t do this anymore — was devastating to me. You no longer need me or your dad to fall asleep — and soon you won’t need my milk. As the years go on, there will be fewer and fewer things you’ll need me for.

At some point, there will be that one last time I nurse you — just like there will be one last time for everything else — but I won’t even know it at the time. I just hope that I remember to treat each time like it could be the last one — but not get so hung up on the future that I can’t enjoy the moment we have right now.

So just don’t bite me with that tooth — and we can hang on a little while longer. And please don’t grow up too fast, OK? And when you do, I do hope you still need me sometimes.

Love,

Mommy