I'm A Cow.

Tomorrow will be fifteen weeks since I gave birth to Nugget. How is he almost four months old already? Man, I guess time does fly. I suppose part of it could be the fact that I’ve turned myself into a Holstein. I don’t go more than a couple miles away from home without my trusty Medela Symphony breast pump.

That’s right, Dear Reader: If you don’t wanna read embarrassing and amusing anecdotes involving “the girls,” (even if I only use vague references and insinuations) stop reading now. If you find my self-abasing humor appealing, however: Do continue.

Back when we were first putting together the contract to start the process of bringing Nugget into being, we discussed the possibility of me expressing milk for the baby. I had no issues with doing so, but I was not about to agree to the task without it being written into the contract. Wiggle Worm and Tempest’s dad wanted me to pump for Wiggle Worm for a few days while he waited for her to be released from the hospital, and I did so. Except that he was in a hurry to get her home, and never came to collect what I had expressed. And because I was using a boiled (and therefore sterile) but not hospital-grade container in which to store it, no one else would take it. This led to engorgement, which HURTS. Oh my god, does it hurt. And you can’t express more, or your body will MAKE more, and that just perpetuates the whole mess.

Anyway, it got written into the contract, and Dad made all the necessary arrangements for me to get ahold of the aforementioned pump so I wouldn’t have to do it by hand. I’ve since come to refer to him as my “Lactation Supply Genie.” I type what I need into my phone and a day or so later it shows up at my house! Ta-da!

So originally I started pumping every four hours, on the nose. And by “every four hours,” I mean four hours from start to start – kinda like contractions. 6:00 am, 10:00 am, 2:00 pm, 6:00 pm, 10:00 pm and 2:00 am. It was not conducive to sleep.

Once I got back to work full-time (my boss let me do some work from home so I wouldn’t get bored), I shifted my schedule a little: 1:00, 9:00 and 5:00. Except then I started having to take the bus to work, which is three hours combined every day. And trying to get up in the middle of the night was not working for me. So now I pump at 4:00 am, 9:00 am, 1:30ish pm, 6:30ish pm and 10:00 pm. This allows me about four and a half hours of sleep (three complete REM cycles) per night. I know it’s not much sleep, but by sleeping in 90-minute increments (one REM cycle per 90 minutes), I don’t wake up exhausted. So there’s that.

It takes me 30-40 minutes to finish pumping at any given sitting, and I usually get at least eight ounces each time. That’s eight ounces total; four ounces per side (except at 4:00 – then I usually get at least twelve total, and it takes closer to an hour). Unlike the other two ambidextrous lactating ladies I know, I cannot double-pump. I’ve even tried a double-pumping bustier, ordered for me by the Lactation Genie. I swear that thing HAD to have been invented by a man. The holes for the pump’s horns are at most, eight inches away from each other, right on the front of the bustier. I’m sorry Medela, but NO ONE naturally falls to the front. Not a single woman on the planet. And even if by some strange chance, one of us did, she’d have to be no older than seven for the spacing to work.

Anyway, one of the difficulties of strictly pumping over nursing directly is that with pumping, there’s no saliva there to keep the ducts moist and therefore clear. So I often have to stop and use a rough cloth to clear the ends of the ducts. In order to do this, I need to see what I’m doing. You’d think that after almost four months, I’d have figured out a way to NOT spray myself in the face at least once a day, but NOPE. Not me. I surprise myself every single time. It’s okay. You can laugh. I would. In fact, I do. It’s funny.

Oh! And in spraying myself in the face, I accidentally learned something new about me: I am a true Vermonter - my roots grow deep in the soil of the Green Mountain State. I am also apparently a maple tree. Now, I am not the kind of person who's comfortable with the idea of trying my own consumable bodily fluids, but one day I "got" myself in the face while my mouth was open. Apparently my milk tastes like maple sap. No joke.  

The lovely thing about pumping at work is that my boss gives me absolutely no guff about it. I take my work laptop down to the Lactation Room (renamed “The Milking Parlor” by one of my wittier coworkers. Those of us using the room have begun referring to it as simply “The Parlor” for the sake of office etiquette) and work while I pump. When I asked if I could work during these breaks, my boss actually laughed at me – not because she wasn’t going to allow it, but because I was worried about taking too much time off during the day to do it. Granted, I’m not one to dawdle when there’s work to be done, so it’s not like I’m falling behind for it, but still.

This will all continue through the end of March – with the daily facials and visits to The Milking Parlor – after which, Husbeast and I will start trying for a second kiddo. Stay tuned – soon you may see a post something to the effect of, “I’m pregnant, and it’s actually mine this time!”