Vegas = Mastitis

Oh Mastitis how I loathe you...

Some how I went an entire 12 months nursing my 1st daughter Josselyn and I never once experienced a clogged milk duct, thrush, yeast infection, mastitis or any other type of breast related issue you can get while nursing. I probably never had any problems because Josselyn refused to take a bottle (I blogged extensively about that problem).  So I basically breastfed her every 3 hours for 12 months!!! (well near the end it wasn't quite every 3 hours but close). Now Julianna is a champ and totally takes a bottle without any problem. I do not give her bottles often becasue I am always with her but she will definitely take one. In the past months I have not pumped a ton but I did manage to stock up about 3 days worth of breast milk which came in very handy a couple weeks ago.

Some of our dear friends the Arringtons invited us to join them in Las Vegas to celebrate David's Oil & Gas Company (they sold 1,000,000 barrels of oil in a 12 month span). So about 300 of us came to Vegas for the "Million Barrel Bash". When we were first invited we said that we unfortunately could not attend becasue Jewel was only going to be 6 months old and I was not to sure about leaving her at such a young age. Well, after my husband convinced me that he NEEDED a mini vacay without babies crying I decided that 3 nights away from the girls might not be too bad. We decided to join our friends in Vegas and my brother and sister in law Joey & Stacey were more than happy to take our girls for the 3 nights (plus John's parents live close so they were there helping every day as well).

The good new is Josselyn had a blast while we were gone. She got to hang with her Aunt, Uncle, GiGi, PaPa & 2 cousins! Jewel was great and slurped down 7-8oz every 3 hours the whole time and John & I had a blast in Vegas up until the morning we were heading back to Dallas. The morning we were going to be coming home I woke up in excruciating pain in my right breast. I had never experienced this kind of pain and I basically had the most miserable flight home. The next day I went to the doctor and found out that I had a clogged milk duct that turned into Mastitis. My doctor explained that even though I pumped religiously every 3 hours the whole time I was in Vegas my body is not use to me pumping like it is to breastfeeding so all of the milk was not being released and it caused me to get a clogged milk duct which then turned into mastitis. They started me on antibiotics and they told me to continue to massage, take hot showers, use a heating pad and nurse as much as I could on that right side.

Within a day or so I started to feel better but my milk completely dwindled down! I tried pumping and I could not even get 2oz of milk. I quickly posted a status on Facebook to see what to do and I got a ton of great feedback from some experienced super moms. I immediately went out and bought fenugreek, oatmeal, coconut oil & all the ingredients (ground flax seed, brewers yeast, etc) to make lactation cookies! I began power pumping every hour, trying to nurse as much as I could and I ate oatmeal cookies like there was no tomorrow.

I can finally say that after a week of having no milk my supply is back to normal!!! I learned that it may not be the wisest thing to leave a 6 month old breastfeeding baby for 3 nights while you jet off to Vegas lol But John and I did have a wonderful time spending some much needed quality time together. For now, I am going to stay very close to little Jewel. But this whole experience did teach me that: Mini Vacay + Nursing Baby = Mastitis

Having brunch together in Vegas (pre-masitis)

Here are a few more pics from our little trip to Las Vegas 

With David & Shelley Arrington