Our expectation as a society has really become distorted… babies NEED their mothers, and it’s not unusual at all in other cultures for babies to feed throughout the night well into his/her first year. The breast is functional in terms of comforting/bonding as well as fulfilling nutritional needs. Even with allergies, breastmilk is the nutritionally superior choice to formula.
Breast milk is nature’s way, but high infant mortality is also “nature’s way”, so of course we do not take what is
usually the best as
always being the best. A child can be allergic or intolerant to her own mother’s breast milk. If that is the case, the child will suffer if that is what the child is fed. If a doctor recommends alternatives that could make the child more comfortable, it is worth considering. That comment is for the record, however. If your child’s pediatrician does not believe breast milk to be your child’s problem, then that doesn’t apply to your situation.
This does not mean it is any less difficult to be a present parent throughout the night! No. It’s difficult. But worthwhile. I do not have issues with postpartum depression, but rather spiritual discontent due to my lack of (I think) a servant’s heart and having not been brought up to serve others. I was brought up in a home with a (wonderful!) working mother, so I have no model for what it means to truly cultivate an attitude of joy while providing a stable, happy, healthy Catholic home. None. I also feel very lonely at times, living so far away from family (that is also quite a recent/distorted phenomenon, living away from family). I don’t think I’m unique in that, which is why I asked for help.
How did the professional who diagnosed you differentiate between depression and discontent, and how did that person conclude that you are not suffering from some amount of both? I am curious to hear how that was explained to you.
My children did not sleep through the night until they were, oh, about five years old. At least one of them always figured out a pretext for a social call in the middle of the night. (I am soft enough to not let them suffer the fate of the boy who cried “wolf!”) IOW, you’re not talking to someone who threw the kids into their cribs and locked the door at night.
Our children’s pediatrician suggested that while I continue to visit the boys at night if I was so inclined, that I gradually
feed them less. They had started out low weight, and had become accustomed to eating a lot at night, but at some point, this became more of a habit than a need. Sure enough, when I fed them less, they slept more. As a consequence, I slept more. It turns out that I was a lot easier to get along with when I was not so sleep-deprived.
Having a servant’s heart does not make you into an angel that has no physical limits. You have to pace yourself, you have to take care of yourself. Just as you will learn to set up your child for behavioral success by making certain they have enough rest and nutrition to face social situations with ease, just so you need to set yourself up for success by seeing to your own physical needs. There are times when exhaustion cannot be avoided because of the demands of duty, but that does not mean that there is no duty to avoid exhaustion to the extent it can be avoided! So do look for ways to shoot these rapids straight, instead of with your boat sideways. It is plenty challenging if you do it the “easy way”, you can trust us on that one!!
I think most of us will agree that this is one of the biggest mistakes that new parents make: that is, thinking they are failing their child when they choose an option because it is easy on the parent. Nothing could be further from the truth. If it is hard on you, then you had better come up with some reason for yourself that the hard alternative needs to be chosen over the easier one. Christianity is not an exercise in masochism, and neither is good parenting. Learn to conserve your energy, because that is a habit your child will need you to have developed. Trust me on that one, too!
