You put on the only white tank top that's still white. The jeans that hurt to sit in - the ones that dig right into your c-section scar, still barely healed. You look in the mirror. Your left boob is enormous. An actual melon. Your right? Completely normal. Practically vintage. Because the baby has a preferred side, and she has made her feelings very clear.
Nine months in and this is where we are.
Nobody told me it would be this hard.
Breastfeeding is sold to you as natural. And it is - in the same way that childbirth is natural, and recovering from a c-section is natural. Natural doesn't mean easy. It doesn't mean instinctive. And it absolutely doesn't mean painless.
In the early weeks, latching felt like toe-curling agony. Which is not in the NCT leaflet. Your nipples - which have until now led a fairly unremarkable existence - are suddenly doing the most demanding job of their lives, and they are not happy about it.
The cracking. The bleeding. The holding your breath every single time because you know what's coming. The desperate googling of "is this normal" at 3am, one hand on the phone, the other trying to achieve a technically correct latch while a small furious human screams at you for getting it wrong.
It is a lot.
The science bit - kept brief.
Breastfeeding works on supply and demand. The more your baby feeds from one side, the more that breast produces. Which is why the left is a melon and the right is not. The body is efficient like that. Annoyingly so.
Nipple soreness in the early weeks is almost universal. Incorrect latch is the most common cause - which is why early support from a lactation consultant is worth it, not a luxury.
Engorgement - that rock-hard, feverish feeling - happens when supply outpaces demand. Usually when your milk first comes in, or after a longer gap between feeds. It is deeply unpleasant. It also passes.
And then there is mastitis. A breast tissue infection that affects around one in five breastfeeding women. It feels like flu- sudden and completely flooring. Fever, chills, a red angry patch on the breast. It requires antibiotics and, counterintuitively, continuing to feed from the affected side to clear the blockage. Getting it once is grim. Getting it and still choosing to keep going takes something.
The mental load nobody mentions.
Every feed is yours. Every hunger cue is yours to respond to. Every cluster feeding evening - where the baby feeds almost continuously for hours and you sit wondering if you're actually producing anything - is yours. You cannot tap out. You cannot pass it over. You are it.
And the mental load sits on top of the physical one. Is she getting enough? Is my supply dropping? Should I be pumping more? The constant tracking, the wondering, the 2am googling for the fourteenth time.
Nobody tells you that breastfeeding is as much a mental commitment as a physical one. That some days it feels like the most natural thing in the world, and other days it feels like the thing quietly swallowing you whole.
Both can be true at the same time.
On the intimacy thing.
Your nipples are working. They are not available for anything else right now. Low oestrogen while breastfeeding can also affect libido - which, combined with a body that has been in service of someone else for months, means intimacy can feel like a very distant country for a while.
It comes back. But for now: your body is doing enough.
The question I keep coming back to.
Do I stop? Or do I keep going?
Nine months in and I still don't have a clean answer. Some days I'm proud. Some days I'm done. Some days I'm both before breakfast.
What I know is this: the version of breastfeeding I was sold and the version I have actually lived are not the same thing. Mine has involved tears, mastitis, a lopsided chest, and more middle-of-the-night googling than I'd like to admit. It has also involved quiet moments I wouldn't trade.
What actually helps.
This consisted of a long list that included chat to some, see a lactation consultation and more. But the reality is you know this from a google search. So I'm telling you, go buy the Candy Kittens, the pint of ice-cream and take 30 mins for you. There's no magic answer you just need to remember you're doing an incredible job.
The bit worth saying out loud.
However far along you are - you have done something hard. Repeatedly. Without a day off.
If you keep going: valid. If you stop: also valid. If you're somewhere in the middle, still deciding, feeding through the ambivalence because you haven't quite made the call yet - that's the most honest place of all.
The melon and the apple will sort themselves out. The scar will heal. The jeans will stop digging in.
And one day - probably sooner than it feels right now - your body will be yours again.
This article is for informational purposes only. For breastfeeding support, contact the La Leche League on 0345 120 2918 or visit laleche.org.uk. If you are concerned about mastitis or any other symptoms, please speak to your GP or midwife.
— Elsie, Senior Brand Manager & first time mama, nine months in and still figuring it out.
