I Didn’t Know This Was Normal
While meeting these beauties, we talked about motherhood, breastfeeding, bodies, and careers.
At one point, she asked whether my boys ever took bottles, and I told her how resistant they were. With my second, I tried pumping more because I wanted a little more freedom, but neither of them made it particularly easy. She shared some of her own struggles with breastfeeding, and I told her something I haven’t talked about very much.
I didn’t love breastfeeding. Honestly, I didn’t love the newborn stage at all.
There were a couple of reasons nursing was difficult for me, but one was especially strange. As soon as my milk started to let down, I would get this sudden rush of negative emotion. It was intense and incredibly unpleasant but didn’t last long.
I didn’t know anyone else who experienced it, and I wasn’t even sure it was a real thing. I just kept breastfeeding because it was important to me, and I assumed this was another uncomfortable part of being a mom I needed to push through.
I was surprised to hear my friend knew exactly what I was talking about. She described it perfectly, though she hadn’t experienced it herself, and later I looked it up.
Dysphoric Milk Ejection Reflex, or D-MER.
Dysphoria is exactly the word I would use to describe it. D-MER, it turns out, is a real, physiological reflex, a wave of dread or negative emotion that floods through the body around letdown and passes in a minute or two. It has nothing to do with whether you want to breastfeed, and it isn't psychological. One of the early published case reports appeared in 2011, but clearly women were experiencing this long before anyone studied it.
The Pressure to Keep Going
That got me thinking about how much we simply power through because we think we’re supposed to. There can be so much pressure to parent the right way, be grateful for every minute, and somehow need very little for ourselves in the process.
Looking back, I wonder how differently I might have felt if someone had simply told me that other women experience it too. Maybe I still would have breastfed exactly as long as I did. Maybe I would have pumped more or asked for more help. I don’t know. But I wish I had known that taking care of myself didn’t mean I was taking anything away from my babies.
If any of this sounds familiar, please talk about it. You may be surprised by how many women understand.
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Reflection Question: What do you wish someone had told you was normal when you were a new parent?
✨ If this spoke to you, I’d love for you to subscribe to my blog or connect with me on LinkedIn. And if motherhood has left you carrying guilt, pressure, or old expectations about what you should have done differently, coaching can help you look at those experiences with more compassion and a little less judgment.
