Recipe: Lactation Oatmeal

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I've had MANY struggles during my time with breastfeeding. My  #1 trouble is not making enough milk, which was evidenced by his lack of weight gain. Since he had a nursing strike early on at around 2 weeks, we have been mainly pumping since. Pumping just doesn't get your body making milk like a nursing baby would, and it's a lot of work. One thing i'm doing to help my milk supply is eating foods that are known to help increase milk production (known as galactagogues). After searching through a bunch of recipes, I put together a few different ones and made one that I liked. To me, it tastes very similar to Maple Brown Sugar oatmeal. I've been putting the dry ingredients into zip lock bags and making a couple at time, to last me a few days. Easy on the go snack to grab before work too. Oatmeal should basically be a nursing mom's staple breakfast!

Gather up ingredients, most you probably already have. The Brewer's Yeast I purchased from Amazon and you really can't taste it in there at all, I know the taste can be a common complaint.

Here is the recipe:

Mix all the dry ingredients together in a bowl then add hot water until you get the consistency you like for oatmeal. Once mixed, I then add a drizzle of syrup (or honey) on top. You can also add almond milk, dried fruit, or nuts. Enjoy each morning for breakfast or for a quick snack throughout the day.

Here is the Brewer's Yeast I purchased:

Why I'm Dwelling On The Past

The past...you're supposed to let it go, right? Well, I can't. Maybe this is true for a lot of people who have gone through a traumatic experience. My experience was childhood cancer, which has made me forever a cancer mom. Three years ago, I would have never have seen myself where I am today. For some reason it feels like I went from the summer of 2013 to now in the blink of an eye. Seriously.. what just happened? What happened in these last three years? It went by so fast. Cancer diagnosis, new baby, new house, enrolled in a BSN program, cancer remission, another new baby - all while working. One thing after another. Happy times and sad times. In the two and a half years of Vienna's cancer treatment, SO MUCH has happened. I feel like I was dragged through it, without really experiencing it. So now that she is 6 months off treatment, i'm finally ready to comprehend what has happened.

Maybe some people want to just block out bad times, forget them completely. I'm not ready for that. I am constantly trying to remember the things that have happened to us in those years, and I always seem to remember something new. I find myself scrolling through my old Instagram and Facebook photos and looking at our old posts on her Facebook page. Constantly reminding myself of what she had to go through. It may seem like i'm torturing myself, but really i'm just trying to grasp onto all of those times and start to take them in and process them. I never had the chance to when we were actually experiencing them.

For me, I think dwelling on the past is therapeutic. It's a way for me to go back and accept and come to terms with everything. I'm finally able to talk to others about what has happened and how it affected them. Cancer has changed our lives big time but I haven't really had the chance to talk to others about how her cancer changed them too. I want to hear more of their side of things, where were they when they found out, etc. It's how i'm coping with this traumatic event. Accepting it as a part of my past. I'm still trying to work on how it all fits in with my life today, balancing between remembering the events and forgetting the emotions. What should I take with me and what should I leave behind? We're only 6 months post cancer, so with time I think i'll learn how to integrate all these aspects and move on.


**the above picture was taken 10 days before she was diagnosed, on a a horse at King Richard's Faire