Where I pumped this week, last week, and the week before!

No more travel since our return from Seattle, but I've still had to pump on a number of occasions...

This week: In the bathroom at the auto dealership while getting some work done on my car. Fun, fun, fun, as bathroom pumping always is. Still, worth it to avoid having to entertain Noob at the auto dealership for nearly three hours.

Last week: In the pump room of one of our Dallas office buildings...

 

Very basic, just a sofa/padded bench, a table, and a clock. It's directly off a women's bathroom, so there is convenient access to a sink for washing pump parts. There are also lockers in the bathroom, perfect for leaving my pump between sessions... which I realized after I left my pump in the pump room itself after my first session one day, and it disappeared! Imagine my shock when I returned for my next session and couldn't find my pump anywhere. I finally asked the receptionist if anyone had dropped off a black shoulder bag that had been left in the bathroom, and she said, "Yes! The cleaning people turned it in." What the heck? Whatever. After that, I used the lockers.

I also had a rare in-person encounter with another pumping mother :) She was finishing up her session one morning, just as I was coming in for mine. Always nice to know there are more of us out there.

The week before: I was in the other Dallas office building, teaching a training session. Teaching is often tricky because breaks are short and infrequently, and if you're the teacher, you can't exactly slide in late from a pumping session. Thankfully, for this particular training, there were two 2-hour sessions each day with a long lunch break in between. So I could easily pump before the first session and pump during lunch. After the second session, I could either pump again or go home (about 5 minutes away) to nurse Noob. It worked out very well.

Another thing that worked out well was that there was a small conference room directly across the hallway from the room where I was teaching...

It had completely frosted windows and a locking door, so it was perfect for pumping. Less time spent walking to the pump room = more time to pump! I did discover the hard way that the locking door did not unlock when you opened it. So I locked myself out the first time I used it. Whoops. Fortunately, security got it opened again pretty quickly, and I was careful not to make that mistake again!

Ahhhh, pumping. Always an adventure.

Where I Pumped Today returns with a vengeance!

Longtime readers may recall that when I was pumping for Littles, I did a series called "where I pumped today," documenting all the weird and wonderful places that I ended up pumping.

Pumping for Noob is much easier, because most days, I don't have to pump at all! Since we have family watching him at home right now, and I mostly work from home, I'm able to nurse him directly most of the time. It's so much easier than pumping!

Of course, on my business trip to Seattle two weeks ago, I wasn't able to do this, so I did end up pumping most days. To make things even more fun, my meetings during my trip were spread across various locations around the city. I logged a lot of miles with my pump, and pumped in a lot of different places!

On Sunday, I had a meeting in Benaroya Hall, which is normally the home of the Seattle Symphony. Despite the large number of attendees, I was not surprised when I inquired about a pumping room and was told that, well, there were always the less-frequently-used bathrooms on the second floor...

I pumped in bathrooms pretty often with Littles, but never took pictures of them because, well, no one likes to see pictures of bathrooms. But no more sugar-coating. This is the life of a working/pumping mom.

For my first session, I set up in a stall. This is my pretty typical bathroom pumping setup -- I hang the pump from a purse hook, and try not to let my pump parts touch anything. It's really uncomfortable because there is nowhere to sit, so I have to pump while standing. Also, stalls usually don't have power outlets, so I have to use the battery pack for my pump. The suction isn't as strong, so it takes longer to finish pumping.

For my second and third sessions, I got bold and decided to pump out in the main part of the bathroom. This way, I could use a power outlet. Thankfully, no one walked in while I was pumping. There was no way to avoid putting my pump bag on the floor, so I just dealt with it. Ick.

As is always the case with a long day of meetings, just finding the time to pump is a challenge, but I did pretty well this day.

Alright, if you're still with me... no more bathroom pictures. Promise.

On Monday and Tuesday, I worked out of the office building that houses the offices of my Seattle-based co-workers. It has its own pump room, which is typical of the pump rooms in my company's Seattle offices. There are two cubicles with curtains. Each cubicle has a chair and a desk. There is also a small refrigerator for pumped milk and pump parts, and shelves for storing pumps. This room does not appear to be used very much; I never saw another woman's pump or milk.

 

On Wednesday morning, I had a meeting at one of our offices downtown. The pump room in this office was very similar, although it also had a small sink for washing pump parts. I also saw another pump in there -- always nice to know there are other pumping moms out there! Unfortunately, I didn't have time to snap a picture of this one.

On Wednesday afternoon, I had to go to the convention center for another meeting. As I explained in my post about this trip, my company was running a big convention this week (which was part of the reason why I was there in the first place). So I asked about a pump room at the convention information desk, and was happy to find out that one was available! It was a small room, perhaps serving as a storage closet under normal circumstances? But it was furnished with comfortable couches and a table for my pump. Very nice, and much appreciated!

Thursday was my worst day for pumping. I had a meeting starting at 9:30 AM in yet another office building, so I went over a little early and did a quick pump session. This building had pump rooms on three out of four floors, so the rooms just had a single cubicle, rather than the double-cubicle style of most of the other pump rooms in our offices. There was also a sink and a small refrigerator.

 

My meeting ran until about noon, and then I had to grab lunch with my co-workers and head over to a team outing. So I didn't get the chance to pump any more that day :( By the time the outing was over and I got back to the main office, it was nearly 5:30 PM and I was dying to pump! I pumped about 12 ounces in one sitting!

On Friday, thankfully, I was out of meetings and back in the main office, and able to pump regularly again. My supply took a definite hit from the limited pumping over the course of the week, but starting Saturday, I was able to nurse full-time again and now my supply seems to be right back where it needs to be.

I'll be in our Dallas office a lot over the next two weeks, so stay tuned for a few more installments in the "where I pumped today" series!

Seattle

Twice a year, my company holds a big technical training conference for employees in Seattle. It attracts folks from all over the world! My fellow program managers and I don't really need to attend the conference ourselves, but one of the teams that we work closely with sends a number of people. So we run some sessions for them at the conference. Since the sessions bring remote employees like myself into town, our management usually uses that week to hold our quarterly team meetings and other events, so that we don't have to make multiple trips. Works for me!

This summer's conference was scheduled for the last week in July, so I anticipated that it would be my first business trip after my return to work on June 21. In early June, we found out that Hubby would be attending the conference himself. I quickly confirmed with my manager that I would need to be in Seattle as well that week, and that it would be OK for me to bring my family. We started making plans:

• Flights: Noob is home with family for most of the summer -- mostly my mother-in-law. (She's a teacher, so she's off work for the summer.)But the Seattle week happened to be the first of two weeks where my mother planned to come watch Noob. She was flying in from Georgia, and booked her ticket to go to Seattle before coming to Dallas. We also bought a ticket for Littles.
• Hotel: I booked a two-bedroom suite at a Residence Inn very close to my company's office. We've stayed at this same hotel in the past while traveling with Littles, and it always works out well. There is plenty of room to spread out, and having a full kitchen makes meal preparation/eating with kids much easier.
• Child care: Although my mom would be in Seattle with us, she did have some work she needed to do. With Littles out of preschool for the week, we knew that she would need some help with the kids. We used our company's backup care program to locate a nanny, "J," who would come to the hotel in the mornings, allowing my mom to get some work done. My dad also planned to fly out later in the week to help -- he wanted to see the kids anyway, and Seattle has much nicer July weather than Georgia does!

With all our plans in place, we took off for Seattle on Friday night, on Noob's first flight ever!

I brought along about 25 oz of breastmilk. About 15 oz was frozen milk from May, and 10 oz was refrigerated milk that I had pumped over the previous day or two. The frozen milk started to defrost on the way to Seattle, and therefore had to be used within 24 hours. So Noob got bottles all day Saturday, rather than breastfeeding, and I pumped. So at the end of the day, I had 25 oz of refrigerated milk that just had to be used within the next few days. That was more than enough milk for an average day away from Noob, along with some extra in case I fell short pumping.

The extra milk did come in handy, as I had a difficult time with pumping all week. I was in a lot of meetings, and often had to delay or skip pumping sessions. In fact, by Wednesday, I actually had to make a special trip back to the hotel in the middle of the day to drop off the milk I had pumped that morning, in order to ensure that Noob had enough milk to get him through the rest of the day. If I do a trip like this again, I'll definitely pump more in the days before our departure, so that I can bring more refrigerated milk with me as a safety cushion.

The child care arrangements worked out reasonably well. Noob did fine. At his age, as long as he's kept fed and rested, he'll be OK, and J and my mom did a good job of that. Nights were a little tiring for me, as the best way to keep him quiet with so many other people sharing the hotel room with him was to pull him into bed with me and nurse him all night. But that worked out fine, as I still got a good bit of rest, and having him nurse so much was good for my milk supply anyway.

Littles was more of a challenge. J had a different approach to dealing with Littles than Hubby and I do. Not in a bad way, really. To give an example, if I take Littles to the park, she never wants to leave. So a few minutes before it's time to go, I'll tell her, "OK, Littles, 3 more minutes, and then it's time to go home." She'll often respond, "5 more minutes," and I'll say OK. Of course, she has no concept of time, so a minute later, I'll tell her, "OK, 1 more minute," and she'll respond, "2 more minutes." And so on. But this gives her enough of a heads-up that she almost always leaves on her own accord within a reasonable amount of time, even if it's a little longer than 3 minutes. J, on the other hand, went to the park with her and told her "5 more minutes" and then counted down exactly 5 minutes. Again, this wasn't a bad approach, just confusing to Littles because it wasn't what she was used to.

On top of it all, obviously Littles was dealing with being in a different time zone. She was also missing both Hubby and me tremendously. I was working very long hours, and Hubby was actually staying in a different hotel -- he was downtown, close to the convention center, while the kids and I were out in a Seattle suburb close to my office. All in all, it was a bit of a rough week for her, and she definitely was not on her best behavior.

I felt a little bad for my mom. She doesn't get to see the kids all that often, so I know she was really looking forward to spending this time with them, but she ended up getting a bit of a raw deal under the circumstances. For example, when she came in to say "Good morning," Littles would cry "Mama!" and cling to me. It wasn't that she doesn't love her Nana, because she does, but just that she associated my mom with my leaving, and she didn't want me to go. Thankfully, my mom hung in there, and was a huge help on a couple of nights when I had dinner meetings. And then she flew home to Dallas with us and stayed with us the next week, where Littles got back on her normal routine and did much better overall.

All in all, it was a hard week in many ways, but I'm glad we brought the kids along. Really, the only other option would have been to leave my mom at home alone in Dallas with both kids. That might have given Littles a little more consistency, but she still would have been acting out some due to missing Hubby and me -- she does that even when just one of us is away. Pumping would have been a huge struggle for me. And it would have been a lot to ask of my mom, to care for both kids alone for a whole week. At least in Seattle, even working long hours, I could help her in the mornings, as well as most nights. So really, everything worked out as well as it could, under the circumstances!