Patience, Grasshopper.

One of the great things about blogs is that they can lead you through an experience in 'real time.'  You feel the triumphs and disappointments along with the writer in a way that's not really possible through a newspaper or a memoir.

I've felt that way about the blog, Patience, Grasshopper.  It's the journal of Lauren, a mother of two from the Athens, Georgia area. 

I'm not really sure how I found her blog, but I'm so glad that I did.  She and I have been emailing recently and I'm really pleased to be able to share her story here.

Lauren's daughter Charlotte was born in March of this year.  Shortly after her birth they discovered that Charlotte had a cleft palate, as well as Pierre Robin Sequence (which is a condition marked by a small lower jaw, cleft palate, and a tendency for the tongue to fall back and downward). 

Lauren had nursed her first child, and was committed to giving breastfeeding her best effort with Charlotte.  Here is her description of their journey:

On March 21st, 2006, our daughter, Charlotte Elizabeth was born at 220pm. At approximately 3pm, it was discovered she had a cleft palate and she was ultimately diagnosed with Pierre Robin Sequence. She spent the first month of her life in NICU in ATL and I began exclusively pumping breastmilk for her the day she was born and haven’t stopped yet. (It’s going on 5 months now) She finally had her cleft repair on August 21st and I am hoping we will be able to breastfeed. I feel I owe it to other mothers to share our experience so that they may learn from it. This is our journey.

I'll start you off at the beginning of her blog, in August.  Her struggles are different from many mothers because they involve surgeries and tubes, but I'm willing to bet that you'll find that some of her feelings are familiar to you.

Here is an entry from a good day:

We have NURSING! REAL ACTUAL NURSING! Charlotte latched on and nursed for a grand total of 45 seconds. All smiles and dimples too! (Well, as much as a baby can be with a nipple in her mouth anyway!) I had tears just running down my cheek! She nursed like a total champ for those 45 seconds and completely made my day! The amazing thing is that she did this PRE-REPAIR! So with a bilateral complete cleft of hard and soft palate, she NURSED! WOOOHOOOO!!!!!!!!!

And one from a less good day:

After my last post, things went downhill - she started flat out refusing the breast. AND refusing to be held as well. She was happier laying down in her crib by herself than being held by me. ESPECIALLY if the boppy was in view. Oh my goodness… phew.. what a weekend that was!  So I backed off a bit and went back to square one after our breastfeeding support group on the 18th. Square one consisted of just getting her comfortable with being held in the cradle position with my shirt on. Once she was comfy with that (which took all of two days), we moved onto the cradle hold with no shirt. And this past monday, she actually found my nipple all by herself and licked at it and showed interest. However, NO further interest this week at all yet. UGH!

My favorite part of this story is that Lauren is planning on becoming a lactation consultant specializing in helping mothers breastfeed babies with cleft palates.  Believe me, this is something the world needs.  Her favorite online resources are the cleft palate page on kellymom.com, and the Pierre Robin Network. 

I hope that you enjoy reading about Lauren and Charlotte.  I definitely have.