Milk Donation

When Charlotte was somewhere around 4 months old, she developed a habit of pulling off the breast right at let-down, and she'd refuse to drink some more.  At that point, I started expressing some, even though I greatly dislike expressing, purely for my own comfort.  My children don't get bottles, nor did I think of letting Charlotte drink the expressed milk, as I didn't want her to start refusing the breast or for my supply to dip.  She's never been a big comfort-nurser, and I didn't want to tempt fate.  I then tried to convince Kieran to drink the expressed milk, but he wouldn't.  If the idea hadn't been a bit off-putting for my husband, I would've cooked with it.  Actually, if it's just something for the kids and myself, I will cook with it.

As it stood, though. I was expressing fairly large amounts of milk, only for it to go to waste.  I therefore started wondering if there was a milk bank to whom I could donate.  I went to the local LLL meeting around that time, and asked the leader if she knew of one.  She immediately told me the name of the Wirral Mother's Milk Bank and suggested that I contact them, as she'd donated to them before.  They accept donors from all over NW England, and provide that donated milk to the preemies and other infants in NICUs in the various hospitals around the area.  One of my friends had recently given birth to a very premature baby, and so she was on my mind.  I also thought of one of my cousins, who was also born premature.

So I contacted them, and they immediately sent me the information and bottles and information for the blood tests I would need.  I tried to express daily, provided the kids or I weren't unwell, though this didn't always happen, especially as we got closer to Charlotte's birthday.  As I mentioned before, I really dislike expressing milk, but I couldn't see denying those infants the gift of milk, knowing that human milk is better for them, and knowing that mothers of preemies cannot always express (while nearly all women can breastfeed, some have trouble expressing milk - it's really a completely different ballgame).

A lady came to collect the milk on a fortnightly or monthly basis, depending on our schedules and how much I'd been able to express.  The last collection was just prior to Charlotte's birthday.  They stop collecting at that point because the composition of the milk changes as the child gets older.  Obviously it isn't some huge change on the day they turn 1, but I see the reason for the cut-off.  This week, I got a card in the post thanking me for the donation of milk, and informing me that I'd donated 3,350 mL of milk.  I was rather surprised that I'd donated over 3 litres.  I'm very glad I was able to do that, though.

After I started to donate to the milk bank, Human Milk 4 Human Babies (formerly Eats on Feets) was formed.  I've not donated through them, but I will if I find someone in my area needs it.  I think it's wonderful that such a network exists, so women can have access to human milk for their babies when they, for whatever reason, cannot provide it themselves.

Maybe I Am Crunchy Enough. . .

Since Charlotte was born, I've toyed with the idea of doing Elimination Communication (EC) with her.  I have a few friends who do/did this with their children, and I remember Baba, my grandmother, talking about how she did it with her children (she didn't call it EC, but that's pretty much what she did).  When Charlotte was born, I could tell her signals fairly easily, but I didn't do much with it.  We were in the midst of potty training with Kieran, which was a chore in itself, and I told myself I'd wait until Charlotte could sit up well.

Once she started sitting up, I gave it a few tries, but wasn't consistent, and she didn't seem to enjoy sitting on the toilet too much.  We were still working with Kieran, and I thought it was just too much to also try to do EC.  I figured I just wasn't quite crunchy enough, and that was fine, so I stopped trying with it.  I did still notice her cues, at least some of the time, I just didn't get her to the toilet.

Fast forward to the past week or two.  I'm getting fed up with how long potty training is taking; part of the reason for that may be because I couldn't work with him much during my pregnancy, and haven't always been able to work with him and chase after Charlotte.  I really don't want a repeat of this.  So, I started trying EC with Charlotte again, and we've had some success!  Kieran gets a kick out of cuing her, too.  She always tries to go if I cue her, and once she's even told me she needed to go so I could get her to the toilet.  No, she didn't use words, but made it clear to me that she needed the toilet.  No, other people probably wouldn't have known that's what she wanted, but then, others don't know her other signs for hunger and other things, either.  At the very least Charlotte has an awareness of her own body and knows that the diaper isn't ideal.  It really isn't a hassle, either - no more so than changing a nappy.  So maybe I am crunchy enough.  I will try this with future children, too, though I still doubt I'm crunchy enough to do it from birth.