*Sigh* Matters of the Heart and Breast

There isn't much the BBCH doesn't have, including 'net access. Leave it to me to find it.

Matters of the Heart....Gabriella's Heart

Just got done sitting through an hour long echo-cardiogram of Gabriella's heart. She's been having some PAC's and spiked heart-rates and her doc wanted to make sure that the PAC's were associated with being premature and not a structural defect. Her heart is structurally normal and what I have been told is going on has to do with things that close either 2 days or so within birth or 6 months to 1 year after birth....both are still open. They aren't a defect, just something to watch, especially the one valve that's supposed to have closed already. However, this PDA which is what it's called, is seen in lots of premies...although the pediatric cardiologist had a hard time believing Gidget was premature. *sigh*

So tonight she has to wear a heart halter and is going to be monitored for 24 hours to check her heart rate and rhythem.

And whilst I've been told it's not something to get upset over, just something to keep an eye on and something that will hopefully close on it's own in time, tell that to my own heart and head.

Matters of the Breast....Mine

This is something that's pissing me off. Thanks to not being given enough time in NICU to get Gidget to latch on, which she does do, and them not allowing her to get hungry, she now has no motivation to eat...however it's on THEIR schedule.....even up here in pediatrics, she's still on a damn schedule and I'm so frustrated! She latches on then falls asleep and then they go ahead and glavage tube my breast milk. She's not being given any time to truly wake up and GET HUNGRY, dammit! And the lacatation consultants here are a joke. They don't return calls and I'm getting so frustrated.

Anyhow, I'm being pressured to establish a feeding pattern of some sort, yet they won't support me in letting her get hungry and fussing a bit so that there is some motivation or impetus for her to eat. What the hell am I supposed to do? Take her home and tube feed her from now until whenever?

I am tempted to bottle feed her my breast milk (believe me, I have enough of it, I could probably support a small third world country) and switch back and forth. I don't know what else to do.

Arrrrrrrrrggggghhhhhhh!

I'm thinking about calling La Leche League but I don't know if they'll come out to the hospital. But I need to talk to someone about this because I'm about to go nuts. This is so important to me. And being here round the clock leaves me feeling a tad isolated and I don't feel like I can rely on the nurses here to support and encourage me and let Gidget get hungry.

Well, enough for now. I'll post the link to this on my Mommy's club board and maybe one of the other mom's with premies can give me some advice. Because I don't want to give up and give in to the bottle (before anyone jumps on me, I'm not saying bottle feeding is bad, or unhealthy, I just prefer to breastfeed my daughter!) because I want to give Gidget the best start I can....she's already had it rough enough.