My name is Lori and I am mother to 4 beautiful, breastfed babies. When I was pg with my oldest, we found out it was fraternal twins. My first thought was, I'll have to formula feed because I'm having twins. Thankfully my mother, who is an OB nurse, told me otherwise, & convinced me to breastfeed. Well, coincidentally, I lost one of the twins early on in the pregnancy. The remaining  twin was then born 14 weeks premature and spent 4.5 months in the NICU. I pumped for all those months, plus when she was 34 weeks gestation, I started nursing and was thankfully successful. I went in with this is the best thing for my preemie and once she started, OMG, the "bond, love, and other words that slip my mind right now" was so strong.  I pumped for a month after she came home(at night due to her being on an ng tube for 2 weeks at night to make sure she was getting enough). She nursed til she was 18 months old and stopped on her own. I cried the night my first born(my preemie) decided she didn't want to nurse any longer. My 2nd child, a son and full term nursed til he was 22 months when I had to stop him cold turkey because I found out I  was almost 3 months pregnant with #3. I was devastated that I was making him stop when he clearly didn’t want to, but because of me being considered high risk, I didn't want to take any chances in possibly causing a miscarriage that I had read could happen-causing premature labor.  My 3rd,a girl and also a Ft, nursed til she was 15 months old and quit on her own and I was heartbroken once again
My 4th baby is a different story. He was born with a bilateral cleft lip & palate. we did start out trying to breastfeed while he was in the NICU for 9 days (due to being a late "pretermer" as they called him and his bottom portion of his lungs were not fully developed) he did rather well, or so we all thought. He was latching on, he was sucking, but he wasn't getting enough, wasn't getting the hind milk and wasn't gaining weight. I was told he needed to be bottle fed. I was devastated-to say the least. I felt like a failure. Now understand, I produce lots of milk, my hubby refers to me as a dairy farm, but I wanted to breastfeed. I didn't want my son to be fed by a bottle even if it was my milk. I started into a depression, that was until I met Lavawn. She was determined to help us out. We came to the conclusion that my son was only getting fore milk before he'd get tired and quit nursing and that is why he wasn't gaining weight. We worked a plan where I would pump the fore milk, nurse him as long as he would nurse with the hind milk present and then finish with the bottle and then pump. It started working, except my son had realized that it was easier to take from the bottle, so his nursing started to dwindle. He will still nurse about 5-10 minutes depending on the time of day and the atmosphere around him. If it's calm and relaxing, he'll nurse more. I have come to the understanding that he may not nurse exclusively like the rest of my babies, but he still is getting the best milk possible, mine. And the times that he will lay and nurse, I cherish every single second, because he is our last. So no matter what your situation is, there is hope in your baby getting the best they can get from you, your milk! Don't give up, you're baby will thank you later in life for it.