I’m Joanna, the marketing manager behind Babyation. I’m here to share a little bit about my breastfeeding/pumping journey because as they say- no pumping journey is a straight line (do they say that? No, but they should!). 

When I gave birth to my first son The Pump wasn’t on the market yet. I was already working with Babyation and knew more than the average person about pumping and I still found it so overwhelming and confusing. 

From the very beginning of my journey, I promised myself that I would not put specific expectations on myself. If I’ve learned anything about motherhood- it’s never what you expect. I told myself I would try to breastfeed but if it became too difficult or impacted my mental health, I would stop. I refused to give myself a timeline for what “success” would mean in terms of how long I breastfed. I know everyone is different but this mentality helped me go with the (milk- HA) flow. 

After having an unplanned C Section, I remember being in the hospital with a “hospital-grade” breast pump, wondering what to do with it. I had daily lactation consultant visits. Every lactation consultant had a different tip or advice to share and I know this sounds counterproductive, but I actually found that reassuring. If there were so many different opinions and suggestions for breastfeeding and pumping, then that meant there wasn’t one end-all-be-all.   I ended up creating a “Frankenstein” pump- flanges from one pump, connected to the tubes of another pump. 

I consider myself extremely lucky that my son latched easily and was a good eater- not everyone gets to experience that. Another common roadblock for most women is the return to work impacting their pumping/breastfeeding journey. I worked from home most of the time so that allowed for an easier schedule. 

Right around the time when I thought that breastfeeding was getting more difficult with my schedule, Covid happened and I found myself stuck in the house with my 8 months old. The positive of that? It extended my breastfeeding time. My son weaned himself at 13 months (and we still weren’t going anywhere!) but I feel grateful that this could be done on our schedule and no one else’s. 

Now, I am gearing up to have baby boy number two and I am still trying to keep my mind open and not have any expectations. I know each kid is different and I’m trying not to assume because it went so well with my first, that this time will be the same. What I do know is that I cannot wait to actually try The Pump!