Yeah, yeah, I know—breastfeeding isn’t supposed to hurt. But it does.

For some of us, at least. Not for every mother, certainly. My mom couldn’t relate to me at all as she watched me nurse in excruciating pain; it’s not something she had to go through. But since becoming a breastfeeding mom, I’ve spoken to so many women who nod sadly and commiserate with me by offering their own battle stories and advice.

See that picture? All of those things have been slathered on my nipples in the past eight weeks—and some other things, too, including Lansinoh lanolin, which didn’t make it into the picture (because I hadn’t yet procured it when I took the photo) and my own breastmilk (because it didn’t occur to me to express some milk for photographic purposes). Three of them have been prescribed by doctors—one by a pediatrician, two by OB/GYNs. None of them have made a noticeable difference.

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Within a day of starting to exclusively breastfeed Baby Owl, my nipples started to crack. But considering she’d been fed with bottles in the hospital, I anticipated latch difficulty, and we worked hard to overcome it. Soon, as far as I could tell from reading countless articles and watching countless online videos, our latch was perfect. But the pain got worse. The nipple cracking got worse. I dreaded every single feeding, and cried through many of them.

At one point, Mr. Owl stood next to me and asked helplessly, “Honey, what can I do?”

“Encourage me,” I said through teeth clenched from pain, and he started rubbing my back and telling me how proud he was of me.

Giving birth was easy compared to this. Doing anything made my nipples hurt. Holding the baby made my nipples hurt. Wearing clothes made my nipples hurt. Latching on felt like my nipple was being stabbed by a thousand needles.

For me, after three weeks, it still wasn’t getting better, so we went to the doctor. She watched me nurse. She told me that there was nothing wrong with my latch, with my positioning, or my baby’s mouth. She told me that I didn’t have thrush. It was just hurting. That’s all there was to it. My doctor sent me home with a prescription for yet another ointment and told me there was nothing to do but wait it out.

That’s what I did for a few more weeks. Then a friend gave me the number of a great breastfeeding specialist here in Riyadh (there are no IBCLCs here, as far as I know). She came to my house. She saw my cracked, raw nipples. She watched me nurse. She saw that my supply seemed fine. She gave me some tips to help achieve a deeper latch, but she said that all-in-all, my latch didn’t look bad to begin with. Then she recommended that I visit her pediatrician, who, she said, was very pro-breastfeeding and would be able to check the baby for any issues that could cause difficulty with nursing.

So we went to this pediatrician. She checked the baby over and ruled out lip and tongue ties, just like the other doctor had. She could find nothing wrong with me or Baby Owl. For reasons no one could seem to explain, breastfeeding just hurt for me.

It seems like everyone is programmed to say that breastfeeding, if done correctly, should not be painful. I’m so sick of reading this, and my personal theory is that it’s totally bogus. Don’t get me wrong—I understand why people continue to promote (what I consider to be) the myth. If lactation consultants were brutally honest—“For some women, breastfeeding hurts worse than giving birth, at least in the beginning, and it might hurt for months. Or it might never stop hurting. Your nipples might hurt constantly, even when you’re not feeding. You know that weird, uncomfortable tingly, slightly painful feeling you get when your foot falls asleep and you have to wake it up? Your milk letting down might feel like your breasts are twin Rip Van Winkles. You might leak all over yourself at night and wake up in a puddle of your own milk.”—I can see how breastfeeding rates would absolutely plummet, despite it being what’s best for babies.

Furthermore, here in Riyadh, the culture is such that most babies are formula-fed (and this is despite the Qur’anic recommendation that babies should be breastfed for two full years—don’t let anyone tell you that Saudi Arabian culture is an accurate representation of Islam), so breastfeeding, while recognized as an ideal practice, is not a priority in maternity care. I’ve been told, “Just give the baby formula,” “All babies need to have a bottle of formula per day,” and “You need to offer her a bottle of formula after you nurse her each time”…and one of the women who told me that was the “pro-breastfeeding” pediatrician.

If I didn’t want to breastfeed so very much (and if I weren’t as stubborn as a mule—it’s a personality trait that sometimes serves me well), I would have given up long ago.

Still, I’m tired. I’m tired of doctors telling me nothing is wrong. I’m tired of asking for answers. I’m tired of reading about mastitis, vasospasm, thrush, posterior tongue ties, biological nurturing, nipple shapes, and high palates. At this point, I feel like I could be a lactation consultant (that’s hyperbole—IBCLCs have probably forgotten more about breastfeeding than I will ever know). The only thing I’m not tired of doing is actually breastfeeding my baby.

So that’s what I’m doing, and I guess, in the end, that’s all that matters. Nursing still hurts. I’ve learned to grit my teeth and bear the pain every time Baby Owl latches on.  But she is still exclusively breastfed, and at this point I’m just crossing my fingers that sometime down the road, it gets better.

And if it doesn’t…oh, well. It’s not like she’ll be breastfeeding until she’s 30. For better or worse, these days are numbered. And I’m not willing to give up on the joy I feel whenever I look down and see my sweet chubby-cheeked baby girl looking up at me, contentment in those big trusting eyes, gulping the milk that my body made just for her. That’s worth it, and I know that’s what I will someday remember most clearly about nursing her. Just like the pain of giving birth, the pain of nursing will eventually be a mere footnote in our story.