Formula Feeding 15 Months Later

A while back, I wrote a post about formula feeding for my favorite twin blog, Twin Talk Blog. Here are the cliff notes of that post.

"I'll nurse if I can, but no worries if not! Secretly thinking, I'm totally not using formula. Oh darn, the twins aren't nursing well. Oh yikes I have no supply. Try everything. Tears. Formula. Tears. Poison. Tears. Expensive formula. Tears. Baby Brezza Formula Pro. Miracle. Tears. Come to Jesus moment. He is better than formula. No guilt no shame needed!"

So 15 months later and bottles filled with formula are a faint memory. They weaned easily and quickly and were done by their first birthday. And my dishwasher rejoiced! A sweet friend recently asked for the link to that post, so I revisited it myself and thought of my perspective now that I'm an old washed up mom.

What surprises me the most 15 months later is what triggers to this day can still set off emotions of guilt or bitterness. Facebook is awash with great and terrible content. Cat memes always fall under the great category. Political posts of any kind are terrible (I vote for no-politics-allowed Facebook in 2016). Babies in costumes = great. Dogs in costumes = great. What is Your Lord of the Flies Name Quiz is and will always be absolutely terrible.

Just last week there was an article about the benefits of breastfeeding, pretty common and should be harmless. But I found myself clicking it, reading it, and resenting it. A mom nursing in public (covered or uncovered is a topic I dare not address) can set off these weird emotions. I was at a cafe when a group of moms with one baby each came in and sat down. They were happily discussing nursing and all that goes with it, and I found myself boiling up with said weird emotions. I felt like I had to justify myself to these strangers. I tried my hardest and it just didn't work! And you know what formula is okay! My babies know what the word somersault means!! I'm not a bad mom! You're not a better mom! Just leave me in peace to drink my latte and eat my scone!!!!!!

Don't judge. We all have moments that rank very low on the "most proud" list. Anyway turns out the problem for me isn't breastfeeding advocates, although some of them should take the same sedative I needed to take in that cafe. The problem isn't moms who are nursing in public. Or talk about nursing in public. The problem is my heart. It always is! In this particular circumstance, the root of those emotions is that I lack trust in who I believe to be the author of life. Author defined by my pal Trip Lee "just take my pen, here, you create my rhymes".  I can feel so guilty for "losing control" of nursing.  When the truth is that God wrote in the script the circumstances that led to formula in my babies lives. I ignore this and I often believe that breastmilk would have made a big difference in their life and justified me as a good mom.

If I zoom out of Maisie and Camille's nursery, and zoom out of my house, and zoom out of Wisconsin, and out of the United Sates, and zoom out of earth, and if I gain a greater perspective... things start to fall in their right place. It's not breastmilk that's going to make the biggest difference in Maisie and Camille's life, it's the saving grace of Jesus that's going to make the eternal difference. Case closed. The more often I reflect on the reality of that truth, the more equipped I am to keep my real but often wrong emotions in their proper place.

So every time that I feel a sting of emotion that isn't in check, I want to use that sting as a reminder to zoom out of my circumstance, and to gaze upon what I believe to be true.