was too soon for her to get any milk, and Zoe’s breasts were already sore. She went to take a shower while Austin held Jaime, and the baby cried the whole time Zoe was in the shower. Austin was looking frazzled when she came back to bed.
“I think she’s hungry, Zoe,” he said, looking worried. “Are you sure she’s getting enough of the other stuff to hold her over till your milk comes in?” He felt helpless and inept.
“No, she’s not, my milk isn’t in yet, this is just the practice round,” and her nipples were already burning and cracked. The baby finally went back to sleep, and Zoe’s milk came in with a rush two hours later and poured all over the bed. Her breasts were pounding, and she picked up the baby and woke her to nurse, which made Jaime howl until she settled at the breast, and then choked at how fast the milk was coming, and couldn’t drink fast enough or seem to get the hang of it. All three of them were novices, and Zoe and Austin were both looking stressed as he tried to suggest how to do it, and Zoe snapped at him that she knew the correct position of the breast, she’d read all the books on breast-feeding, but she couldn’t seem to make it work. The baby was getting drenched, and Zoe’s nightgown was soaking wet. The books hadn’t mentioned that.
“My mother said it’s easiest to nurse,” he said, looking frustrated, as the baby cried and Zoe looked as though she might too.
“Your mother had her last baby forty-two years ago,” Zoe snapped at him. “Maybe she doesn’t remember this part. I’ve got the name of a lactation specialist if we need one,” Zoe said, trying to settle the baby against her wet nightgown, and guide her pouring breast into Jaime’s mouth, as she choked again.
“What’s a lactation specialist?” Austin looked confused.
“They teach you how to nurse,” Zoe said, visibly unnerved. This was not going as she’d planned. At least not yet. She had thought the baby would know what to do instinctively, but she didn’t. She was as inexperienced as her parents.
“Can’t you figure it out for yourself? Women have been doing this for thousands of years. It can’t be that complicated,” Austin said casually, as Zoe bristled.
“Why don’t you try it, then?” she said, annoyed. Nursing was proving to be stressful and harder than she thought, and one of her breasts was bleeding.
“I’d love to, but I don’t have what she wants. Do you want a glass of wine?” he offered innocently, and Zoe looked shocked.
“Of course not. I’m not going to drink while I’m nursing.” She had been diligent about not doing so while she was pregnant, and was terrified of fetal alcohol syndrome, but there was no risk of that now, so it seemed harmless to him. Zoe treated him like a criminal at the suggestion.
“Maybe she’ll sleep better between feedings if you drink some wine.” He was half serious and she could see it. She changed the baby then, took off her own wet nightgown, put on a fresh one, and a few minutes later, the baby was crying again. Zoe put her to the breast. Jaime started to choke on the fast flow of milk and then figured out how to do it, and fell asleep two minutes later, before she’d had a full feeding, which was supposed to last forty minutes, twenty on each side. No one had explained the timing issue to Jaime, who kept falling asleep after two minutes at the breast, so every time she woke up she was starving and then passed out again at the first breast and never got to the second one, which felt to Zoe like it was going to explode.
“They ought to come with an owner’s manual,” Austin said, joking, trying to lighten the moment. The nursing had been difficult since they got home, and the baby was fussy, hungry, frustrated, and tired, and so were they. Zoe hated feeling so incompetent, and Austin had never seen her that way. Normally she controlled every situation. Her ineptitude at nursing made her seem so vulnerable, which touched him. He drank the wine that Zoe had refused, just as she started to cry.
“What kind of mother am I? I can’t even figure out how to nurse. I’m calling the lactation specialist tomorrow.” She looked like a little girl and he leaned over and kissed her.