Breastfeeding Twins

It's a choice I made. Most moms get to make a choice and I chose even before I was pregnant to breastfeed my next baby. I exclusively pumped for Quinn for a few months. His latching and my efforts were both down the tubes. He got lots-o-breastmilk but I really wanted to give it a 100% shot with my next baby....Then I found out there were going to be 2 babies. This further cemented my goal.
The sheer number of bottles that would be used for pumping or formula feeding twins was enough to make me more nauseated than my first trimester was already making me. For the rest of my pregnancy I spent HOURS and HOURS researching nursing twins. You can feed one at a time, you can tandem feed (which I do now), you can try to schedule, you can feed on demand (that's me), but the bottom line is- YOU CAN BREASTFEED MULTIPLES! Don't let them scare you :)

The lactation consultants and nurses in the hospital were PHENOMENAL in helping me achieve this goal. I was very clear throughout my pregnancy that I had full intentions of exclusively nursing my two new bundles of joy. I bought a twin breastfeeding pillow (which is what is supporting the two of them in the picture) and, yes, I practiced with 2 stuffed animals regarding positioning. *I only did this once..give me a break.

Unlike Quinlan, these two latched right away. At first Paige was the stronger latch-a-doodle and, at first, neither one of them wanted anything to do with my left boob. However, over the next couple of days (which is one positive of a c-section-more time in the hospital to get this nursing thing down!) I was able to get them to latch individually and together (with assistance).

When I got home it was abundantly clear that tandem nursing 2 newborns is not a task for the faint of heart. Scott had to help position them with their floppy little necks and it took some time to get them both on and going. I decided to nurse one at a time for a while. Further, tandem nursing them as newborns proved an opportune time for Quinn to get in to mayhem.

Tandem nursing was on the back burner until about a month ago, when they turned 3 months old. By this point they could just lay in front of my boob and latch on themselves, and required little "extra" handling like a newborn.

For now it's great and I don't really know when I'll stop...we'll see how it goes (that's my motto for everything nowadays). They get one bottle of either breastmilk (if I remember to thaw some) or formula at 5pm because that's Quinn's dinner time and their fussy time. That's their last feeding of the night.

We used to use bottles of breastmilk over night for like every other feeding because they were getting up at different times and a lot so it was exhausting. Now they only get up once or so a night and I just popem on and then they eat a little and fall asleep.

I've had such a great experience nursing them I've become a full-on breastfeeding advocate and I really wish I worked harder with Quinn...(all in the past...he's fine and huge and it's water under the bridge lol)..

The point is, you have a choice. And, while I hope people choose breastfeeding or breastmilk by pump- JUST FEED YOUR KIDS hehe...Dont let people make you feel bad (formula) or weird (breastfeeding) for your choice.

love,
andrea