Milk Donation

When Ry was a baby I wasn't sure I would be able to breast feed him for an entire year. I WANTED to, but I had heard so many stories of people who tried but their supply just didn't hold out, or their milk never came in or the baby just stopped nursing for no apparent reason.

I'm lucky and at my job they have special nursing mothers rooms where we can go pump when we needed to. Not only was I able to continue pumping after I went to work but I met some wonderful ladies and we pumped together and they were my B7 buddies. Some people might think its strange to sit around in a small closet like room, boobs exposed, everyone pumping together. But we were all doing it to feed our babies. Our babies were the same age so we had a lot in common. I wanted to give Ry breast milk all the way up until he was a year old when he could have regular cow's milk. Towards the end of his year my milk supply started dropping by a lot. I was panicked that I had come so far and would have to end up supplementing with formula. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but I would have felt a bit like a failure. Rex and I had MANY fights over wasted milk. He just didn't understand how much I was putting into this, so a bottle wasted here and there was no big deal to him, but it made me cry. I LITERALLY cried over spilled milk. I ended up making it to the year without having to supplement with formula and I was really proud of myself and Ry for sticking with it.

This time with Colton I decided I didn't want the stress of worrying if I would have enough milk stored up to feed him through the year so I started pumpig much earlier and more often. In the first weeks I would pump after feeding Colton to build up my supply, after he got older and went through a major growth spurt (and my nipples got sore) I quit the daytime pumpings, but kept pumping in the morning after he ate off one side and again at midnight when he started sleeping later through the night. Pretty soon my freezer started to get full. Now Colton is three months old and my freezer is completely full. I'm back at work and so far my pumping has been keeping up with his demands. In a couple months some of the stored milk will expire so I applied to become a milk donor. It took a long time before I finally worked up the courage to fill out an application. Rex started complaining that we couldn't have ice cream or frozen pizza, so I figured it was time for me to donate. Today I got a response back to my application and I'm not allowed to donate because I drank mothers milk tea! I just don't get it, the tea is supposed to HELP boost milk supply, so its meant for nursing mothers to drink. You would think it would be safe for babies to drink the breastmilk. It actually IS safe but they have certain rules because the milk goes to sick or premature babies. It makes me sad that I cant donate to those babies, but I'm still looking for someone else who could use my milk. I just cant bring myself to throw it all down the drain :(