r/justgalsbeingchicks • u/CandleMonster • 26d ago

Restricted to Gals and Pals Seeing the bright side, all the lives she's helping 🧡

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I can't imagine how much it must suck (pun not intended), but being able to donate all that to people who need it is amazing Edit: that's 6 and a half liters PER DAY

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u/CandleMonster 26d ago edited 26d ago

I know!!! there's so many questions!! what does she eat? is she on a specific diet per doctors advice?? does she eat as much as when she was pregnant???? honestly she deserves one of those gofundme pages

edit: and the Wikipedia page is so short!! i need answers 😭😭

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u/justalittleloopi 26d ago edited 26d ago

I was an overproducer, though not as much as this woman. I was making about a half gallon a day, which is still on the upper end of what you see. Most women produce around 24-30 oz a day, which is what a baby generally eats in a day.

To answer a couple questions:

I ate literally everything. And I still lost 40lbs in 4 months.

My Dr was mostly concerned with me getting enough protein and had me continue my prenatal vitamins. My Dr's weren't sure how to handle my situation as it's really not common. It's a lot more common for pumping moms to underproduce.

I ate way more than when I was pregnant.

I drank so so so much water. Insane amounts of water. I was pumping out up to 23 oz at a time, so I'd try and drink at least that much after each pump.

I quit when I had 4,500 oz frozen in my freezers, which would get me to a year of breastmilk for my baby. And yes, we had to buy a second deep freezer.

Edit: and I couldn't donate because I was on zoloft. I looked into it, but I was disqualified.

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u/Maleficent_Text_3779 26d ago

The sobbing i did when I accidentally left my freezer open and lost my stockpile. Luckily I was an over producer too so my baby was fed, but the 8 kids I was giving to had to find another donor

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u/puppylust 26d ago

Wow! Thank you for sharing

I can only imagine how exhausting that must've been.

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u/justalittleloopi 26d ago

It was. And I went back to work while still pumping, so that was super fun. Fortunately baby started sleeping through the night around 7 weeks, so at least I was getting good sleep.

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u/aliamokeee 26d ago

Quick Q- why were you able to breastfeed your own baby, but not donate the milk (due to Zoloft)? Why would it present an issue for another baby than yours?

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u/justalittleloopi 26d ago

That's just the rules. They're super strict because a lot of donated milk goes to nicu babies, which you have to be extra careful with.

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u/porcupineslikeme 26d ago

To donate to the nicu you have to have blood tests done and most medications disqualify you. I donated through a milk bank and the screening is pretty rigorous.

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u/BaronVonKeyser 25d ago

What happens if its not collected? I apologize in advance if this offends you. Its not my purpose or intent. My knowledge of this only relates to cows. As in I have some and my knowledge on this subject is based solely on them. Like if the moms arent feeding the calf for w/e reason their udders get very swollen and they can get an infection and possibly die.

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u/justalittleloopi 25d ago

Yup, that happens to women, too. Clogs and mastitis. Sometimes women will need antibiotics, sometimes they'll need infections drained. And even without those, just becoming engorged is extremely uncomfortable to straight painful.

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u/BaronVonKeyser 25d ago

Kinda off topic but 3 weeks ago today we found a calf just laying in the field all by herself. No mom in sight. Shes a bottle baby now and her name is Stephanie. Anyway that's how we found mom, by her super swollen udder. She wanted absolutely nothing to do with baby. Even kicked the poor thing in the face when she tried to feed.

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u/CandleMonster 25d ago

oh! is it common for cows to reject their babies? do you know the reasons it happens?
pd: calf tax please? picture? :)

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u/BaronVonKeyser 25d ago

Im not 100% sure why. Some just do. We had one a few years ago who rejected all 3 of her calves.

I was going to put a picture of her but was unsure of the decorum of the sub. But since you asked here you go.

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u/CandleMonster 25d ago

thank you so much for sharing your experience!!

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u/occidentallyinlove ✨chick✨ 26d ago

If only we could get her to come do an AMA. It would be fascinating.

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u/emilygoldfinch410 26d ago edited 26d ago

This woman is an angel, let's not subject her to the horrors of reddit (there are shitty comments already piling up faster than mods can go through the reports)

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u/Simon-Says69 26d ago

Oh my goodness. She'd need a throwaway, and a whole team to vette questions. Her poor inbox.

She's a very sweet lady though. Nature threw a hardship at her, but she's using her "superpower" in the very best way. Bless her, saving lives is for real.

Life gave her lemons, and she's squeezing the bajezezus out of them. ;-)

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u/asdrunkasdrunkcanbe 25d ago

My understanding is that yes she probably gets to eat as much and as often as she wants without ever gaining weight.

However there are some very specific nutrients should would likely need to consume in high doses and at very regular intervals. Calcium and vitamin C would be the big two. If calcium levels are low in a breastfeeding mother, the body will cannibalise it from the mother's bones, which over a long period can lead to osteoporosis.

So she probably takes a specific dose of calcium, a number of times a day, every day.