My cousin Angie is such an inspiration for me. She and her husband had four children (five pregnancies) in eight years and she's such an incredible mother.
All of her children were born vaginally and fairly naturally, although in a hospital. I'm not sure anyone ever presented homebirth to her, or I imagine she would have considered it. She did have her last child with an epidural though, because, in her words she wanted to see what all the fuss was about!
She hated it it though, because she said made her feel really disconnected from her body and she was glad she didn't have it with any of her other children.
Did I mention all of her children were over 10lbs?
But the reason she's my inspiration is because on the last birth, she had to have some internal reconstruction done afterwards and she had her tubes tied. Because this was her fourth big child, both she and her husband knew this one would be born with blood sugar issues (either high or low, I can't remember which) and the hospital would demand that they feed them right away. Well because she was in recovery longer than normal, her husband was in the nursery with the baby, fighting with the nurses, telling them not to give Morgan Jane a bottle, that as soon as Angie was out, she would breastfeed her. Well the moment his back was turned, the nurse popped a bottle in. I realize this is a bit of a horror story, and against my point with this thread all together, but, it does have a good point! Because of the initial bottle feeding, Morgan had massive issues with breast feeding. I remember going out to eat once with them when Morgan was a month old, and Angie had to ask the waiter to microwave the bottle of formula, then it was too hot, so she had to wait for it to cool, and the whole time Morgan was screaming. And Angie just looked at me and said, "This is why, if you can, you breastfeed." Anyway, she never gave up. She pumped, she did everything she could, and when Morgan was three or four months old, they established an amazing breastfeeding relationship that I they still have to this day, and Morgan is almost three.
So Angie is my inspiration, because really, it was exposure to her and her thoughts that led me to explore AP (before my husband and I even met!) and really convinced me that breastfeeding is worth it, no matter what you have to go through to do it and she is just such an awesome woman and a real inspiration to me.
(Also, to any mamas that read that this bottle feed, please know that it's not my intention to make anyone feel bad about their choice. I know that for some people, bottle feeding really is the best option and in the end, having healthy children, no matter how they got that way, is really the only thing that matters.)
her! I have several of her books and she has got everything right on imho.
