by guest blogger Wendy Wisner, IBCLC
I’m writing this as I lie in the dark at 9:30pm nursing my 14 month old back to sleep. He fell asleep about two hours ago and here he is again, wanting to nurse. He woke up and I wasn’t there. He let out a small cry, a complaint, and when I came into the bedroom, he was beginning to sit up. Now, two minutes later, he’s rolled away from my breast and is back in a deep sleep. [Read more…]
Q&A with Nancy Mohrbacher, IBCLC 11-20-13
QUESTION 1: My milk supply for my 4-mo-old is decreasing despite taking fenugreek and pumping. Any advice? I’m not ready to give up!
NANCY MOHRBACHER, IBCLC: I’m glad you reached out. You’ll be happy to know that milk production is a hardy process. Even mothers who have never been pregnant have brought in milk for adopted babies! You just need to know how it works. First, despite popular belief, drinking water and improving your diet does not affect milk production. Your body knows how much milk to make by the number of milk removals (breastfeeds plus pumps) each day and how fully the milk is removed. (Drained breasts make milk faster and full breasts make milk slower.) If you breastfeed your baby on cue, your baby will do this for you automatically without you even having to think about it. For most women, 7 or 8 milk removals per 24 hours are enough to keep supply steady. Fewer removals usually mean decreasing milk supply. More than 8 or 9 usually stimulate a gradual milk increase. Taking fenugreek or other herbs will not help if you’re not removing the milk often or well enough. For more on how individual differences among mothers affect this and how to use this info to keep up milk production after you’re back at work, see my posts on the Magic Number concept. [Read more…]
Wow, another year has gone by so fast, a whole year since I wrote about our first year of gentle parenting and breastfeeding triplets. This last year has obviously been gentle parenting and breastfeeding TODDLER triplets, which has been a whole new ballgame!
When I had Jack and began to have major struggles with breastfeeding I took to the internet. Google became something that I resorted to day and night. My problem was that I had no idea what I was struggling with. I had read a few chapters in various parenting books about breastfeeding before he was born. I heard it was hard; OK, I can do hard things. I heard you need to relax; yeah, sure, what’s new. I heard things like refuse formula, don’t allow pacifiers, do skin to skin, etc. But when I was faced with the reality of my birthing experience–induction, epidural, exhaustion, episiotomy–I fell victim to nurses and doctors telling me that my son was starving, that I needed to give formula, that my milk supply would be fine. It wasn’t long before Jack wouldn’t latch, my supply was plummeting and I was terrified every moment of every day that I was failing. So when I desperately took to the internet I had no idea what I was looking for. I didn’t know what reputable resources were or not. What was good information or bad information? There is a ton of information out there that will make a troubled breastfeeding relationship much worse!
We have received many messages since launching the “Sometimes Badass Breastfeeding Looks Like This…” graphic series on Facebook. Last week we were contacted by a fan in Germany who wanted to share her family’s truly unique story.
“My name is Tabea, I live in Germany. Maybe our family’s attitude is something for the badasses, too. My baby’s daddy is transgender, feels kind of half man half woman. The picture shows him feeding our son, Bela, some weeks ago, it’s my milk I pumped to enable him to feel the joy of breastfeeding a child. As I personally don’t feel the milk flowing out of my breasts, I guess it’s quite close to feeling like a breastfeeding mother. We do so from time to time, when I had to go to the dentist in a case of emergency it was very helpful to have breastmilk in the deep-freezer so he could have it. We don’t give him my milk like this in public.”
Yours,
Tabea
So yesterday I was talking this woman I know and I was expressing how Jack was having a hard time settling down for sleep in the rocking chair the night before; tossing and turning, doing gymnurstics, etc.
She said, “wean him! Why don’t you just wean him!?” [Read more…]
