My poor girls...for women only :)

Grant will be one in a little less than two weeks. Oh...how time flies. I ordered his cake, bought some plates and napkins, a pinata...pretty sure he could care less but I'm learning that the first birthday party is really for me. Not so I can get presents and have everyone sing to me...but for me to feel like a mom who is providing a fun day full of laughter and cake for my kiddo. I know he knows I love him. The birthday party is just icing on the cake. The cake of which will probably be disgustingly and oh-so-adorably devoured at his party.

So, with his one year birthday approaching, do you know what that means? It means BREASTFEEDING IS ALMOST COMPLETE!!! I have LOVED the bonding moments with my child that come with breastfeeding. I have LOVED knowing that he has gotten the best nutritional start to life that he could possibly get. I have LOVED knowing that my body is providing his nourishment. HOWEVER...let me tell you why my nips will sing praises when this breastfeeding stint will be completed.

I should have known that I was going to have troubles with my nips or "the girls"...as we shall lovingly call them. Life for them had been completely normal until a funny thing happened when I was about 24 weeks pregnant. And then, life as they knew it changed.

One night, I was getting ready for bed in our bathroom. I took out my contacts, put them in their holder, put on my glasses (which is a MUST because I am as blind as a bat), and proceeded to shut my glasses case. DIRECTLY ONTO MY RIGHT NIP. I screamed loudly, pulled off the case, laughed so hard I wet my pants because I was A. in shock B. completely embarrassed C. feeding off of Ben's laughter and D. no longer had great control of my bladder since there was a small child using it as his trampoline.

Now here's where it turns from funny to a little scary for a second. After I finally regained my composure, I realized that my heart has jumped out of rhythm from my immense laughter (not that uncommon during pregnancy) and is beating at about 215 beats a minute. My nursing knowledge kicked in. I did the valsalva maneuver (where you hold your breath and bear down) and it kicked my heart back into normal rhythm. Problem solved. However, I did feel the need to let my OB/GYN know that my heart was acting weird. Talk about an odd conversation.

At 10:45 p.m.: "Yes, I need to have Dr. Lamar paged....Hi, Dr. Lamar. Sorry I'm calling so late. Ummm...we had an incident...ummm...end result was that my heart went into SVT."

Later that week, I did tell him the whole story at my next appointment. I believe it was the talk of the office for a while. As he was laughing while I was telling the story, he said, "I figured it was either something funny or something sexual." Welp, let me tell ya, it was about as far from sexual as you can get.

So there was the start of the rough road my nips began.

Since then, they have lived through the initial shock of breastfeeding. It's like taking the hose of a vacuum and attaching it to your girls. Eight to 12 times a day. Day and night. Then 5 different episodes of thrush. If you don't know what it is...look it up. All I can imagine comparing it to is having your nips look like red hot tamales, clamped down into a vice, and twisted. Then I accidentally burned the right one (poor girl...she's always getting beat up) with my flat iron as I was straightening my hair in my robe. Who even knows how that happened. Then Grant got teeth at 6 months. I called him my little piranha. For a while, it looked like a small hand grenade went off inside my bra. One time he bit me so hard (left side this time) that he drew blood. A lot of blood.

Then, smooth sailing for a few months until Memorial Day weekend. Grant fell on his face in the kitchen and chipped his two front teeth. Naturally, it was on Friday afternoon. The dentist was closed until Tuesday because it was a holiday weekend...so we (myself and the girls) had 3 1/2 days of breastfeeding a child who had razors for teeth. I would have pumped, but I just don't have the best pump and I feared my milk would dry up.

So, do you see why my nips will sing a song a freedom and redemption when Grant is weaned in a couple of weeks? They've been through a lot. They're tough gals. They've earned a break.

P.S. I really contemplated whether or not I should blog about my girls since it is somewhat of a sensitive (no pun intended) subject. Then I decided to put myself out there. A little humor to all you moms currently breastfeeding or have done it or are getting ready to do it...I'm proud of you. It's a sacrifice but oh-so-worth it.