Sad.

I'm a little down in the dumps today.

In the last month, Roger has gained only 7 ounces. I was planning on discussing weaning with his doctor at his appointment this morning anyway, but I expected it would at least be ME who brought it up. I suppose it's more psychological than anything, but I feel I've completely failed Roger. Despite diligent pumping, going back to school has destroyed my supply. I imagined slowly weaning Roger off breast, one feeding a week, but right off the bat, his doctor recommends switching two breast feedings for formula feedings. Based on his poor weight gain, she suspects I'm probably only producing enough milk for about 2 feedings.

You might be reading this thinking to yourself, well, what's the big deal? You were going to wean him anyway. And believe me, I've been TELLING myself that ever since I left the doctor's office this morning, toting my free samples of formula. Honestly, I don't know, but it's got me pretty bummed. I don't think it's so much the future that seems so bleak, but rather the past; the fact that I've just been mindlessly going about breastfeeding him like everything's normal when in reality I've virtually been starving him (and not a peep from him!! I wish he'd at least been fussy so I could've suspected something was wrong).

I don't know what it is that's eating away at me. I imagine if I could pinpoint it, I could probably do something to assuage the feelings, but alas, I feel sad. Maybe deep down I wasn't ready to wean him. On some level I certainly will miss breastfeeding for reasons I can't fully comprehend or explain, but reasons with which I'm sure other nursing mommies are familiar.

Roger was still awake when I got home from class Tuesday evening. Matt was feeding him his bottle (of my oh-so-diligently pumped milk) when I got in, so I decided to try and take over since in his 6+ months of life I have never given him a bottle. He does great with a bottle; he's taken it from his dad, his aunt, his grandmas and grandpas, and even our friends. When we went to Vegas for a weekend before Christmas, he did fantastic the whole weekend on nothing but bottle feedings and went back to breast absolutely seamlessly. I guess you could say he's a bottle-champ, especially for a breastfed baby. But when Mommy tried to give him the rest of his bottle on Tuesday evening? Oh, HECK NO. It concerns me about how weaning will go since I'm really the only one available to give him a bottle throughout the day. His doctor said diligence is key: the first few bottle feedings from me might be pure hell for both of us, but eventually he'll come to accept it. I certainly hope so. Weaning officially starts today...