Milking

Yesterday was a bit of a crazy day.  J drove the three of us to Savannah's Candler Hospital so that I could pick up the breast pump rental.  So glad I decided to ditch the manual pump.  Ugh, I mean it was nice to have on hand but righty just wasn't producing but a few drops of milk.

Now that I have my milking machine righty is producing as much as lefty and it feels so good to have that milk let down actually go somewhere.  I can't use the original flanges that they gave me in the hospital here at Winn.  I opted to go with the 27 mm flange but should probably have gone with the 30 mm instead.  Yes, my nipples are just that big.  No wonder Little E is having issues trying to latch on.  30 mm is XL while the 24 mm are medium sized.

The Milkmaid tea I ordered from Amazon came in today's mail.  I'm having a cup of it while typing this blog post.  Very tasty with a teaspoon of honey added in.  I'll be milking again in about 15 minutes.  While I don't expect an immediate effect upon the production of the milk quantity I can say it will soothe the nerves a bit.

There is some stress in our household right now.  It isn't from the baby having tummy troubles last night with some spit issues.  No this is the Army stress.  I won't name names but we were told that J's unit was family friendly.  They lied.  Should I have expected differently?  No.

Not only did his paternity leave end yesterday but his regular leave was supposed to start today.  Someone high up decided, knowing full well that he needed to use those 22 use or lose days, that J was needed at work for what we aren't sure as they have plenty of warm bodies on hand.  Seriously how many warm bodies do they need for staff duty?  Yes I know just how many but to put him on the staff duty roster for his first day back which should have been his first day of regular leave means that they had no intention of even granting him leave in the first place.  Funny but the higher ups that visited our dwelling last week assured us that his leave packet was good to go as long as he would agree to come back for the field problem and split his leave.  We were fine with that.  I'm not allowed to drive for several more weeks which could make things interesting.

Little E has an appointment with her Pediatrician for next week Tuesday.  If they don't get J's leave straightened out I'm going to have to call a taxi to go to her appointment, which is going to be really interesting since I'm not supposed to be lifting more than just her body which means not lifting her in the car seat.

No our FRG doesn't help out like the other FRG at the last installation.  They aren't babysitters is right on their front page of their PowerPoint booklet.  Which to me implies that they won't help out with rides either.  I mean no one came by to offer hot meals for the new parents unlike the old FRG.  I was told by an E-6 that the FRG we have here is for the officer's wives only when it comes to support.  He said next time I go to a meeting take a closer look.  Yes, I noticed it already.  Usually the officer's wives I've met could care less what rank their spouse is because they don't wear it but here it is different and I'll have to learn that and be really careful or avoid going to the meetings altogether.  That saddens me.  But I'm here to support my spouse, take care of my little family, and help where I can.

For now that help means sticking close to home and taking care of my own needs so that I can get strong again.  I haven't had a pain pill in over 10 days, instead I've been sucking up the pain.  I have a nearly full bottle of percocet on hand, acetaminophen, and Motrin too for that matter.  But I'd rather have the pain since it makes life real and makes me stop and think that I might be pushing it too much.

The incision is still swollen and bruised.  It bulges rather oddly to the right side.  The ribs on my left side hurt like the dickens when I hold Little E for more than 15 minutes.  I was supposed to have a 4 week follow up to see my surgeon but the secretary for the clinic heard "follow up" and scheduled it for 6 weeks postpartum instead.  Rather than argue with them as I've tried to do that before and failed I just let it go.  If I have too much pain or I pass out again I'll have J on hand, I hope, to take me to the ER.

Well it is time to go milk the boobies.  J just found out they found someone to cover his staff duty.  It was an O-4 that knew about the situation and still put him on the list and the O-3 was the one that decided to delete J's leave.  Ugh!  Such stupidity.