I occasionally enjoy an episode or two of the Duggars' 18 and Counting TLC show (I know many of you probably find this show to be insane, but hang in there with me for a minute). Have you noticed that Michele (the mom) breastfeeds her babies? She walks around with a "My Brest Friend" pillow strapped to her and a blanket over her shoulder. The average person probably wouldn't think anything of this, but my trained eye knows what is going on under that blanket. P.S. Great tip for multitasking/feeding in public! One night while enjoying this fine show, my husband made an interesting point. We were watching the episode where Anna Duggar (the daughter-in-law) decided to have a home birth. The Engineer (as I lovingly refer to my husband in the blog world) said something along the lines:
"The natural childbirth and breastfeeding crowd are two very different groups of people. On one hand you have the ultra conservative gang (a.k.a. the Duggars) and on the other hand you have the ultra liberal hippies (dare I say, La Leche League)."Two very different groups with two very different approaches reaching same conclusion. The conservative folks are just keeping things simple, saving money, and sticking to more traditional gender roles. The hippie folks want to be natural, let their body do its thing. They tend to advocate for themselves and others...maybe slightly feminist. In some strange way I consider myself 1/2 of both of these. I'm one part conservative and one part hippie, which doesn't entirely make sense, but I guess either way it works for being a breastfeeding advocate!
This is exciting stuff - MY FIRST GIVE-A-WAY!!! To enter:
All you have to do is leave a comment. If you want to be really nice you can follow my blog. Just click on the "Follow" button to the right. (I know, it does appear that your being bribed to be my friend...) And if you really really want to be nice you can share this give-a-way with your friends :-) On Thanksgiving (the most appropriate day of the year to give thanks to any readers out there, right?) I will randomly select a winner.
I try to warn new parents of a phenomenon that has been titled "2nd night syndrome". It sounds so dramatic, but parents who experience this so-called 2nd night syndrome are relieved to have a "diagnosis". There are few factors involved with this "syndrome":
Here's a story for you from my dear friend and mentor, Margaret. Margaret is a lactation consultant at a local hospital.
One day I assisted a mom to latch on ber twin baby at about 33 weeks...they were born at 26 weeks and his big brother had been breastfeeding well for 2 weeks. Our little boy showed everyone that he was just as efficient as his big brother and in fact latched on and was breastfeeding very contentedly. Suddenly his eyes shot open and I realized that mom had had a let-down so I "delatched", him rapidly, just in case he choked. Mom's breast continued to spray his whole face. I wish I had had a camera to record the expression of shock, surprise and hurt. I could imagine that he thought, "Here I was cuddling and enjoying my lunch, when they not only open the hose in my mouth but proceed to spray my face, You hurt my feelings!! I am not sure if I trust this plumbing!! But it was great so perhaps I will try it again." He then tentatively re-latched and mom slipped backwards to reduce the pressure somewhat. I suggested that she pump for a few minutes to reduce the over-active let-down in future!! So sweet and trusting.
I'm sitting here pondering how I ended up in the lactation world and thought I'd share with you all my journey (well my begining more than journey since I'm still a newbie). In Spring 2006, I was sitting in my Maternal and Child Health graduate class and the lecture for the day was breastfeeding. I honestly don't recall ever thinking about breastfeeding prior to that point. I finished undergrad and moved to the big city to continue with graduate school, because I just LOVED college and wasn't ready to let go. One week into grad school and I quickly realized I NO LONGER loved school. I was working full-time, going to school full time in the evenings, and trying to keep a long distance relationship going. I was studying Public Health, which I really enjoyed, but I was trying to find my "niche". I had an on-going list going in my planner with ideas and interests. On that day I added "Breastfeeding Counselor", the last item to be added to the list. But why? Why did one lecture effect me so much? It wasn't the fact that breastfeeding is perfect nutrition. Most of us agree that human breastmilk is the optimal food for human babies. It was this statistic that hit home with me: 99% of women can breastfeed, but 80% experience problems. I was shocked. Doesn't breastfeeding just come natural to everyone? I immediately couldn't learn enough about this field. Whether this statistic is correct anymore or not doesn't matter, because once again I think most of us would agree that breastfeeding can be tough! For someone who loves maternal and child health this is the perfect problem to tackle. That's what this is all about for me - it's not to shove information you already know down your neck, it's to say it can be hard at times and if you decide to breastfeed there are people out there to help you.
Here it is the best kept secret alive!!!! The world's greatest diet is.......Breastfeeding!
As a person in the lactation world I'm often asked:
"Is it going to make my boobs sag?"Elisabeth Hasselbeck shared with the world that "After feeding two kids, mine are, like, origamically folded into my bra." And from the lovely Kelly Ripa we heard "I nursed 3 kids, so I went from a 32AA to a 32AA long."
Welcome! The Engineer and Lactation Chic (www.marcusandjulie.blogspot.com) have decide to add an addition to the family, in blog form that is. You've heard of food for thought, but here it's boob for thought. This is more than a blog, it's an on-going discussion and the topic is BREASTFEEDING and sexuality, fashion, body image, societal pressures...You name it and we'll discuss it!
