1. You can do anything for {insert amount of time}.
1 minute. 2 hours. 1 week. 6 months. I always think about exclusively breastfeeding in terms of working out, when the instructor screams at you during a plank, saying you have only 30 seconds left. And you think, “Sure! I’ve got this!” Only to realize what she really means is that you’ve got 30 seconds left of THIS plank, but don’t get up because we’ve got another minute-long plank coming right up. Oh boy.
2. Time goes incredibly fast yet the moments are the longest.
7 months. That’s where we’re at now. It’s been “but the work of a moment,” blink of an eye, but still about half a year no matter how you slice it. 7 months of exclusively breastfeeding. No bottles, just me and little man working our way through his first months of life. It paralyzes at first thinking that no matter what—if you get a babysitter for a few hours or your husband watches your child for a bit—you will always need to stay pretty close to home. You will never really escape. Your child literally needs you. Well, a part of you right now anyways.
3. Breastfeeding is a journey: you know your goal, but you don’t know when it will end.
Hitting this point in the journey, it seems surreal that we have made it this far. It almost feels like a honeymoon stage. There are obviously my postpartum days (weeks?) when this ain’t no honeymoon, sister! As I was gaining stamina on this whole breastfeeding thing, I now am coming to terms with the fact that we’ve made it 7 months (woo hoo!), but we have only made it 7 months (crikey). And we’ve got 5 more months (prayerfully), of screaming when the milk doesn’t come fast enough, of not being able to go too far from home before being called back, of continuing to sacrifice my body for another. But I am so thankful the milk continues to come. It’s like the milk gods have blessed me with the continued flow of sweetness.
4. There are moments I feel I could do this forever, and there are other times I want to quit.
I’m not thinking of jumping ship, but being an exclusive breastfeeder is extremely difficult. It has been wonderful for 7 months, knowing that my body is doing this amazing thing of providing my son all of the nourishment he needs. But it’s like hitting the halfway mark of a marathon and realizing, oh shoot. I’ve got to continue? We’re not just going out, we’re come back in as well??
The gravity of the situation hits…hard, taking the breath right out of me which suffocates for the briefest of seconds. And the fog, or darkness, sweeps back over me. Postpartum. I can come up for air as much as I want, but I never really escape it. Not yet, anyways, with my body not being my own.
It’s like knowing I have this child to feed without thinking specifically about my son: the little boy I absolutely adore. When I think of this whole breastfeeding situation without picturing my smiling boy, it seems daunting, pointless even; I am doomed to be just a food source for a little creature. But when I picture my laughing little one, the one whose smile lights up his face and the one who blows bubbles to get my attention, I am overcome with mama bear tendencies and can’t imagine not being everything for this little human.
5. Breastfeeding is a battle of struggles and blessings.
A friend recently shared Psalm 42 with me, and it’s the perfect illustration for my ups and downs.
Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.
Psalm 42:7
Why am I so sad that my body has allowed me to breastfeed for this long? Praise God that my body has continued to produce breast milk! But no matter what, it is a battle. A battle of selfishness vs self-sacrifice. A downward-spiraling yet glorious and rejoicing journey. And “deep calls to deep” in this roaring battle within me to throw in the towel, yet continue to weather the storm. To blow the whistle and call the game or to continue playing in the rain.
Bottom Line
One day I will look back at this blip in time, this short season, and I’ll only remember holding my baby boy in my arms, feeling his super-soft hand in mine, cupping his sweet little head. But for now, it is very real, this battle. Most days I can see the blessings, but the struggles are present, and I give my mind stillness knowing that this particular surrender is only for a season. But it is the continued sanctification as other sacrifices present themselves.
Soon I will blink again, and the next season, just like the instructor-induced plank holds, will be a series of struggles and blessings. And as more seasons come and go, my hope is that I will “see” more light because when my mind turns struggles into blessings, this is where the grace of God manifests itself. And I will choose to live in this abundance of what God has given so generously, no matter what length of “time” I have to hold it.
For those of you who just let it flow…
For those that choose or have to pump…
