I always knew that I wanted to be a mother. And now here I am, with two babies in less than two years.
As I sit here, I think back to birthing my first baby boy. I had a regular OB, planned on giving birth in a regular hospital. My water broke at 36 weeks, unexpectedly. I laid in the hospital bed, hooked up to monitors, being induced. I got my epidural, and 17 or so hours later my little boy was born.
Then we got pregnant again. I wanted to hire a doula. I didn't think that I could afford one, so I didn't look very hard, until I was about 34 weeks and a few days. I found a doula that I really liked. In fact, I was going to email her the next day to hire her. But I woke up at 5am, with my water breaking early -- AGAIN. Off to the hospital for a repeat birth. Pitocin. Epidural. Monitors. Preemie.
With both babies being early, they BOTH had breastfeeding issues. It was hard for us. I did EVERYTHING I could. I consumed myself with reading and researching about breastfeeding. I can help you with how to prepare for breastfeeding, best practices in breastfeeding, how to deny formula in the beginning and why, latch problems, tongue and lip tie issues and revisions, low supply and other supply issues, supplements to increase milk, and more. I read all of the books. I talked online about it. I talked with people that I knew about it. I visited with both an LC and IBCLC. I even own my own baby scale at home, to deal with all of our weight and breastfeeding issues.
When I say that I feel like I got shafted out of an deserving birth AND breastfeeding relationship, I mean it. And it hurts me every single day. It's not something that I can just "get over." Maybe it's not important to some people. But it was important to me.
I sit here and often feel sorry for myself. I immerse myself in all things both birth and breastfeeding. I'm so passionate about these things. I didn't get to have them myself. It caused postpartum depression.
Now that my second boy is almost a year old, I'm digging myself out of the depression hole. And I'm finding myself. I know where I am and want to be as a mom. But where am I and where do I want to be as a woman?
I want to help other women. I want to help them have what I didn't get to have. I want to help them deal with it if they DID have what I had, and hated it.
I want to be a doula. Both birth AND postpartum. I want to counsel in breastfeeding. I want to help women breastfeed. I want to help women succeed. I want to empower, advise, support, and advocate for these women.
I want to be a doula.
(I wrote this moreso as an essay for an application for a scholarship for a doula program, but I'm posting it here, too.)
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