Pump it up?

Pump it up?  Not quite.  I'm sad to report that despite my latest efforts to pump up my pumping and stimulate an increased milk production, no such thing has happened. (sad face)  My milk production has pretty much plateaued to where I pump throughout the entire day and still only produce about 8 oz for Mateo. 

What have I done better?  I scheduled an additional daily pumping session on the Mother's Room calendar at work. Although I'm usually done in 10 minutes, I stay pumping the entire 30 minutes even when there is no more supply.  I've also been drinking more liquids.

What could I do better? (and here's where the "but's" come in...)  I could probably change my diet and try to eat more things that are known to help increase supply.  I could probably pump in the middle of the night after Mateo wakes up around 3am (but I'm dog tired!).  I could probably try to stay on the pump for an hour instead of a half hour (but the Mother's room schedule is for 30 mins at a time, at home my pump (I have 2) is super loud and like I really have a WHOLE hour to be a slave hooked up to the pump while my effervescent boys are traipsing around the house. 

It's funny now that I've been trying to increase my time at the mother's room at work, the other mothers have come out of the woodwork.  Before I had any milk supply problems, I only ran into one mother in a very awkward situation.  But other than that it was silence and crickets.

Now that I have this problem, it's as if the moms want to see who this low-lactation producer is.  I don't know about your workplace, but at mine we observe the 10 minute rule.  If someone is usurping your conference room, it is customary to allow them 10 minutes into your hour to GET OUT!  Same goes for people who are late to meetings.  There have been times when I've reached the mother's room to find the "Occupied" sign.  I've allowed 10 mins before even knocking, only to find that the room was empty and the last mom forgot to change the sign.

But when the role was reversed, I had a mom come and knock on my door 5 minutes BEFORE her scheduled time was due.  I still had 5 good minutes people!  Then there was a mom who asked to come in before I started pumping because she wanted to get her milk (it was 4pm on Friday so I understood).  And then there was another mother who emailed me to see if we could switch spots on calendar because she had a conflict.

Where were all these mothers coming from?!  I had been using this room for 3 months and never was there this much traffic.

Back to my point, all the extra pumping and mom encounters have not helped my supply.  It's really grueling and very difficult to keep up when there are no results.  When you choose to exclusively pump, it's not something that you just happen to keep up after a month.  No, this stuff takes dedication and perseverance and right now I've been feeling like "What's the point?  I should just let myself dry up!"  But at the end of the day, when I see at least 8 oz in Mateo's hands, I think to myself : 'it's better than nothing.  It's for Mateo.  You should really just keep going.  You've made it this far.'

So that what I'm doing; Just keeping on... - Shirley