Horrible formula regret

amother

Ivory

Mon, Mar 06 2023, 3:50 pm

amother OP wrote:

I had a really traumatic birth. After, I was really out of it, depressed and in a tremendous amount of pain. Mentally, I just was unable to nurse (even tho I bought a pump before I went into labor and was initially really excited to nurse). Soon my milk dried up, and by the time I was semi interested to even look at my baby- it was too late.
My baby has sever stomach issues, is crazy colicky and is very difficult. We jumped from pediatric gi drs to a variety of homeopathic approaches to acupuncture. We put her on hypoallergenic formula. But nothing helped.
Now she is a bit older (4 months), and much better. But still not always great. I feel like if I would have nursed, she would’ve been totally fine. I regret it so much. I also feel like formula is garbage as the first ingredient is corn syrup.
Ugh I just feel horrible as breast milk is much better.

Well first of all you don't know that she would've been doing so much better if you'd nursed.
Although I agree with you in general, you really can't know.

But you can also relactate. Pump and pump, even if you don't get anything at first. There are adoptive mothers who have managed to relactate, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to do the same. But I warn you it is a lot of work and requires a lot of consistency. You can also ask for donations, I just did that and received a lot of frozen bags to supplement. I preferred that to supplementing with formula.