Best for Babes

 We hope you will join us for tonight’s #bfcafe–the fastest growing twitter party where expecting and new mothers can be cheered on, find breastfeeding support, evidence-based information and resources, and be entered to win a hot giveaway!     

When & Where:  Thursday, March 11, 2010 at 10-11 p.m. EST  on Twitter (and every Thursday!) 

How to join the party: Although I use tweetdeck.com for every day, I found that http://www.tweetgrid.com works best for twitter parties, as it allows you to follow the hosts (@bestforbabes & @zealandsmom) and automatically includes the hashtag #bfcafe.  All you need to join the party is include that hashtag in all your tweets.   

How to enter to win a giveaway:  To win one of the fabulous giveaways, you need to RSVP at this blog:http://zealandsmom.blogspot.com/2010/03/earth-mama-angel-baby-bfcafe-sponsor.html.  

Topic:  Weaning & Nursing Strikes:  What is weaning?  When does it happen?  What is baby-led vs. mother-led weaning?   What is a nursing strike and do babies wean themselves before they are a year old?  What tools and strategies are available to mothers who have to wean unexpectedly? 

Shari Criso, RN, CNM, IBCLC

Featured Expert*: Shari Criso, RN, CNM, IBCLC of http://www.mybabyexperts.com and http://www.ShariCriso.com; ;Shari Criso is the new breastfeeding expert for Babies ‘R Us; and has helped hundreds of mothers breastfeed successfully, as well as personally delivering over 600 babies. Along with her husband and business partner Joe Criso (who is an awesome dude and super supporter of breastfeeding) she founded the Birth Boutique, a 5,000-square-foot specialty store and learning center for new and expectant parents based in Denville, NJ.  The Birth Boutique was voted best baby store by New Jersey Monthly magazine in 2009.  Shari Criso was named Mom Entrepreneur of the Year at the 2009 Mom’s Choice Awards.  In addition to her game-changing DVD “Simply Breastfeeding” and her CD “Breastpumps and Briefcases”; Shari is answering mom’s questions and providing valuable know-how on her video blog, http://www.sharicriso.com. We are thrilled to have her as a regular guest expert on #bfcafe!

Image courtesy of Earth Mama Angel Baby. EMAB is a proud ongoing sponsor of Best for Babes

Featured Sponsor:   Earth Mama Angel Baby

Earth Mama Angel Baby makes premium products that are all natural, pure, and support mother and babies through pregnancy, labor, postpartum, c-section recovery, breastfeeding, mama & baby care, and even the loss of a baby.  All products are cruelty-free, certified vegan, kosher, and 100% free from toxic ingredients–that means no Quaternium-15, 1,4-Dioxane, formaldehyde, phthalates, petrochemicals, parabens, SLS, artificial preservatives, artificial fragrances or dyes. 

  Earth Mama Angel Baby is a proud sponsor of the Best for Babes Foundation, and have generously supported our work so we can help more moms and babies.   We are pleased to announce that we will be celebrating with a surprise giveaway from Best for Babes for tomorrow night’s giveaway.   To enter the giveaway, please RSVP at  ZealandsMom’s blog.  

If you are interested in being a featured expert or resource of #bfcafe, please email bettina@bestforbabes.org.  If you are interested in being a featured sponsor of #bfcafe, please email yahoo.comdaniellecwann@ 

  *Please use good judgment when participating on twitter.  While we strive to provide evidence-based information and resources, conversations on twitter are in no way intended to diagnose or treat any medical condition and are not a substitute for an in-person evaluation by a qualified, independent Internationally Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) or your breastfeeding-knowledgeable physician.   

Hope you will join us for tonight’s #bfcafe–the fastest growing twitter party where expecting and new mothers can be cheered on, find breastfeeding support, evidence-based information and resources, and be entered to win a hot giveaway!   This is our third week.

When & Where:  Thursday, March 4, 2010 at 10 p.m. EST  on Twitter (and every Thursday!)

How to join the party:  It’s easiest to twitter-party on tweetdeck, tweetgrid or tweetchat.   Set up a column for #bfcafe and make sure that all your tweets include the hashtag #bfcafe, otherwise others won’t be able to seee them in one spot. 

How to enter to win a giveaway:  To win one of the fabulous giveaways, you need to RSVP at this blog:  http://zealandsmom.blogspot.com/2010/02/cushie-pushie-thursdays-bfcafe-sponsor.html. 

Topic:  Early Breastfeeding Issues:  We’ll talk about early breastfeeding issues like engorgement, mastitis, and positioning.   Will also discuss positioning issues and myths and misconceptions for larger-breasted women.

Featured Expert*:   Danielle Rigg, CLC of http://www.bestforbabes.org:  Danielle, @Bestforbabes_dr,  is the Co-Founder & COO of the Best for Babes Foundation  (@BestforBabes) and is a mom of two children.  Galvanized by her own breastfeeding struggles, Danielle became a certified lactation counselor (CLC) and ran a successful lactation counseling practice and breastfeeding support group in Montclair New Jersey.   I call her the “boob whisperer” because of her natural talent in getting babies on to the breast while boosting a mother’s confidence and know-how.    Since losing her breasts to cancer, Danielle has been more motivated than ever to help moms breastfeed successfully and reap the long-term health benefits.  SHAPE magazine featured her in their November Issue as one of ten “Women Who Shape the World” along with Michelle Obama!   *Conversations on twitter are in no way intended to diagnose or treat any medical condition and are not a substitute for an in-person evaluation by a qualified, independent Internationally Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) or your breastfeeding-knowledgeable physician.

Featured Resource*:  Titania Jordon of http://www.babygooroo.com:   @TitaniaJordan handles the social media marketing for @babygooroo and is a breastfeeding mom passionate about helping other moms.  Babygooroo.com was founded by Amy Spangler, MN, RN, IBCLC and is an online resource where parents and health professionals can access timely information affecting the health of babies and young children. Updated daily, babygooroo.com provides content that reflects the ever-changing needs and interests of today’s parents. By separating fact from misinformation, our team of experts make it easier for you to be a mom or a dad.  *Conversations on twitter are in no way intended to diagnose or treat any medical condition and are not a substitute for an in-person evaluation by a qualified, independent Internationally Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) or your breastfeeding-knowledgeable physician.

Featured Sponsor:   The Cushie Pushie Breastfeeding Pillow is designed to help you gain the correct breast position for easier breastfeeding. This breastfeeding pillow pushes your breast upward in order to allow easy latching by your nursing baby, while maintaining correct positioning throughout the feeding.  For more on the Cushie Pushie pillow and the giveaways, please see ZealandsMom’s blog.

Can’t wait to tweet with you tonight!

If you are interested in being a featured expert or resource of #bfcafe, please email bettina@bestforbabes.org.   If you are interested in being a featured sponsor of #bfcafe, please email daniellecwann@yahoo.com.

Today, March 3rd 2010 is IBCLC Day as designated by ILCA–the International Lactation Consultant Association.  (IBCLC stands for International Board Certified Lactation Consultant.)  This year’s theme is “Experience You Can Trust.”  Best for Babes would like to congratulate ILCA on 25 years, and salute the thousands of incredible, dedicated lactation professionals who are helping moms and babies breastfeed every day.   While there are still not enough lactation consultants (LCs) per capita in every region, the numbers are growing, as is the awareness of the critical role that LCs play in the mother-baby breastfeeding relationship.    Given  breastfeeding’s power to reduce the risk of diseases in mother and baby, LCs are truly helping to save two lives for the price of one.    If you were fortunate enough to have the help of a great lactation counselor, we hope you will stop right now, and send them a note and thank them.   Trust us, they don’t make nearly what they are worth (though we do think health insurance should covered the cost fully, based on reduced lifetime risk of disease and hospital visits).  As was beautifully described in the recent New York Times article, lactation counseling is a science and an art, and it is time we gave them their due.   We have had the wonderful opportunity to meet amazing IBCLCs (and even a few MD IBCLCs–fancy that!) and we worship the ground they walk on.  

We also thought IBCLC day was a great opportunity to talk about a hidden “booby trap” that moms need to know about and know how to navigate.  All too often, new parents are getting poor breastfeeding guidance from so-called hospital lactation experts, some of whom are not even experts at all!    How do we know?  It happened to us!

Bettina:  I was having a lot of trouble latching my first baby in the day after he was born.   I had seen what seemed like an endless parade of nurses on duty, all of whom had different advice for me and my newborn.  Finally I asked if there was a lactation consultant available to help me latch my son.   The so-called specialist on call marched in my room, and barely said hello before she yanked my boob and gruffly moved my baby so she could shove my breast into his wailing mouth.  “There you go,” she said, and marched back out.   I can not describe how offended and humiliated I felt, and how my already flailing confidence in my ability to learn to breastfeed was completely eroded.  

Remember indifferent Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?

Sound familiar?   We have heard far too many horror stories of moms like this one; stories of so-called lactation “specialists” who took one look at a vulnerable new mother’s exposed breasts, and shook their heads, non-chalantly crushing that new mother’s hopes and dreams.   Giving out nipple shields like they are candy, telling a mom that she will have difficulty breastfeeding because her nipples are too small, too large, or too flat, recommending nighttime formula-feeding so that mom doesn’t “wear herself out,” are just some examples of routine, non-evidence-based — i.e., bad — advice given out daily which can spoil breastfeeding, often for good.   To be sure, there are excellent, gifted lactation consultants all over, both hospital-based and in private practice.   There are also many wonderful nurses who go above and beyond to help mothers succeed in achieving their breastfeeding goals.    Unfortunately,  however, the Centers for Disease Control found that most hospitals perform poorly on breastfeeding support.   It is a crying shame, but new parents can’t assume that every hospital with a maternity center–some 3,000 in the U.S.–will provide quality breastfeeding help.  Unless the institution itself has been designated “Baby-Friendly” (and only 3% are) or has a proven track record of high breastfeeding initiation and continuation rates, you will very likely find an awful lot of lip-service to “breast is best”, and along with it, imposters – nurses dubbed “lactation specialists” who have only received a few hours of uncredentialed breastfeeding education, or who have enhanced their paychecks and credentials by taking the IBCLC test but don’t display competency (or much compassion), and don’t seem to stay true to evidence-based breastfeeding management.  And  the real lactation “pros?”  There are many awesome, talented lactation consultants who are crushed under an impossible caseload and unable to deliver the care they are capable of.   And often they are like lone wolves running against a pack of nurses and physicians, and pushing against outdated hospital policies.  

The cost of this masquerade is very high, and those who are committed to delivering excellent breastfeeding care have known this for a long time:  Relying on poor quality lactation support and having a miserable breastfeeding experience, can be a bigger blow for moms personally, and for breastfeeding in general, than not having received help at all.  Moms who go down this road of getting quasi-help and failing will be absolutely convinced that they are fundamentally incapable of breastfeeding, and worse, even that it was their fault.  Their collective experiences also validates the common myth that large numbers of moms “can’t” breastfeed or that breastfeeding is always horrendously difficult.  Their destroyed confidence can affect how they feel about mothering this child, can carry over to their next newborn, can discourage their peers, and can provoke understandable defensiveness and anger against those who well-meaning friends, health care providers or advocates who harp on about breastfeeding.

So, what is an expecting or new mom to do?   We encourage you to educate yourself and to be empowered as you choose where you will deliver your baby, and as you go through the birth and new mother experience.   This doesn’t mean that we want you to be a nightmare patient; it is always a good idea to be pleasant and respectful as you advocate for yourself and your babe.   We have a great deal of respect and admiration for the thousands of health care professionals whose job is to take care of us when we are at our most vulnerable, and a little courtesy goes a long way.   That said, unless moms start asking questions and requesting that hospitals provide truly excellent breastfeeding support, nothing will change.

Here are some suggestions:

• Rely on word of mouth.   If you haven’t joined a breastfeeding support group, do so now, and get the skinny on which birth centers and hospitals are best for breastfeeding support.    You may be lucky and have a Baby-Friendly Hospital nearby!  If you can’t find a breastfeeding group, tap into the doula and midwife community in your area:  these professionals are a wealth of information.   
• Have a back-up plan:  bring the numbers of a few recommended, independent lactation consultants with you, even better, interview a few in advance and put the number of the one you are most comfortable with in your speed dial.   Again, it’s best to find LCs by word of mouth through a breastfeeding support group, the birth community, or even a baby store.   You can also go to http://www.ilca.org and search for lactation counselors by zip code. 
• Get to know your lactation counselors.  Read What to Look for In a Lactation Consultant by Heather Kelly, IBCLC.    Interview potential LCs by phone first; do they make housecalls? Do they take your insurance? How are fees structured?  Do they run a support group?  Most importantly, does their style mesh with your parenting philosophy? 
• Know excellence.   Quality lactation counselors are highly trained, compassionate, and have your and your baby’s best interest at heart.    They are excellent listeners, will take your breastfeeding history, will be professional, and will always ask for permission before examining you or helping you with a breastfeeding position, hand expression, or the like.     They want to make sure you have all the information you need to make an informed decision so you can begin the parenting journey with confidence, no matter what your final decision is, whether to breastfeed, formula-feed or a combination of both.   (Like a good coach, though, they will want to help bring out your best, and are likely to encourage and motivate you to try breastfeeding for a while before you make a final decision.) 
• Watch for red flags:  anyone who touches you without asking, judges you, or humiliates you is not acceptable.   You may want to take down their name and the details of what happened and consider further action.   Hospitals want to serve their patients and will want to know if the quality of their care in any arena is unacceptable. Wait until you’ve caught up on sleep to make sure you have a good perspective. 
• Prepare for breastfeeding before birth.  Read our  Ultimate Breastfeeding Preparation Checklist, learn how to find your A-team (ob-gyn, hospital, pediatrician), read the Learning Curve, and How to Get Your Best Game On, for starters.   Pregnancy lasts nine months but the benefits of breastfeeding last a lifetime for you and your babe, babe! 

How does excellent care look from the perspective of a lactation consultant?  Not to set the bar impossibly high, but here is the experience of Nikki Lee, RN, IBCLC, a wonderful lactation consultant (and my teacher during my CLC training), taken from her comment on our post about Healthy Children:

Nikki Lee, RN, IBCLC: a great lactation consultant and educator

I loved my work as a hospital LC. My favorite thing was to invite the baby into the conversation and encourage the mother to put her baby skin to skin, then pull up a chair and sit and chat. Neither the mother nor I could see the baby because it was under a blanket on the mom’s chest.

Half the time, in the middle of our conversation, the mother would get an amazing surprised look on her face and say,”My baby is breastfeeding”. I LOVE THAT!!. No work on her part, we were having a good time together, and the baby showed the mother that breastfeeding could be very easy.

The stuff I didn’t like about the hospital experience was having to fight against the ignorance of some hospital staff who were suspicious of skin to skin and totally convinced that giving the baby a bottle of formula was the solution to most problems and challenges. I didn’t like that mothers and babies were never left alone to figure things out for themselves. I didn’t like the time presssure, that a baby would have to nurse by “X” number of minutes, or else.

I really didn’t like how mothers and babies were injured and disconnected from each other as a result of birth technology and surgery and induction. It was so difficult to get breastfeeding going when a mother was recovering from surgery and her baby was premature.

I also didn’t like that so many staff people wouldn’t want to know anything about breastfeeding even when invited to watch me and learn. They would just wait for me to come to work so that I could take care of all the mothers. Breastfeeding is everyone’s business, not only a LC’s!

Every once in a while, I would encounter a mother that didn’t want my visit. Sometimes it was because she’d nursed a bunch of other babies and felt confident. Sometimes it was because she’d heard bad things about LCs. That was hard to hear.

I loved to see the mothers that had chosen not to breastfeed. I wanted to be sure they knew how to be comfortable with their breasts that would have to dry up. I would sit down and chat with these mothers, and after some conversation, ask how she made her infant feeding decision. Half the time, the reason she’d made her choice was out of some misconception about breastfeeding. When that misconception was corrected, some mothers would change their minds. That was exciting. The other times, where the mothers were absolutely definite about their choice, I would ask them to tell me more so I could learn about their lives and the reasons for their choice. This was important and humbling.

Any strategies you have used to ensure you get excellent lactation care in the hospital or birth setting?

To celebrate the official launch of the weekly #bfcafe, Best for Babes is thrilled to be giving away a “BfB Babe Basket,” courtesy of our generous sponsors.   All the contents of the basket are chosen specifically to help an expecting or new breastfeeding mother get off to a great start.  The basket will look approximately like the picture below, with the addition of a few items I did not have on hand, wrapped up in cellophane and tied with a bow in the Best for Babes signature raspberry pink!   Special thanks to all of our sponsors who make it possible for us to help moms and babies, this will be a special gift for an expecting or new mom!

BfB Babe Basket — Contents:

Be Nice Inc. Vitamin Packets for Expecting & New Mothers (featured sponsor of tonight’s giveaways!)

Simply Breastfeeding DVD: The Criso Breastfeeding Method (featured expert for tonight’s topic)

My Brest Friend Deluxe Breastfeeding Pillow

Hotslings Pouch-Style Baby Carrier

Milkdaze Nursing Cami

Earth Mama Angel Baby “Booby Tubes” Breast packs, “Bosom Buddies” compresses, “Natural Nipple Butter” and “Milkmaid Tea”

A set of Mom-eez Nursing Lounge Wear courtesy of My Baby Experts (featured expert for tonight’s topic)

Prenatal Peach & Calming CD by Jill Wodnick, MA, CD (DONA)

"BfB Babe Basket" Giveaway to celebrate the launch of #bfcafe!

We’re pleased to announce that @bodhi_bear won the “BfB Babe Basket”!

Best for Babes is pleased to join @ZealandsMom (see her blog) in announcing a new chat group for breastfeeding moms, to be held every Thursday from 10 – 11 p.m. EST on Twitter under the hashtag #bfcafe!   The purpose of #bfcafe is to provide support for expecting, new and breastfeeding mothers, to provide a safe, open forum where moms can cheer each other on, share success strategies, and receive evidence-based information.   While there will be a set topic for each week, all #bfcafe sessions are open to all questions that expecting or new mothers might have about nursing.   Each week there will be product giveaway, coordinated by Danielle @Zealandsmom.   (For upcoming sponsorship opportunities, please contact Danielle on Twitter @Zealandsmom.)

#bfcafe: New Weekly Twitter Support Group for #Breastfeeding Moms!

The idea for #bfcafe came about during an #Ecowed party on February 17 hosted by Three Green Angels (@3GreenAngels) and sponsored by Earth Mama Angel Baby.   Best for Babes was invited to be a special guest because the topic was “The Proper Care of Your Nipples,” certainly a hot (and sensitive, pun intended) issue for new moms.   It was an extremely successful chat and not surprisingly, “nipples” became a trending topic, attracting interested moms (and a couple of dads too!) as the hour progressed.  At the end of the conversation, it was suggested that a breastfeeding chat group be formed, and @that_danielle cleverly suggested calling it #bfcafe.   @Zealandsmom jump-started it by organizing a time, and starting to contact potential sponsors; I kicked off a discussion on how to structure #bfcafe so that it is of maximum benefit to moms.

The first informal #bfcafe, held on Thursday, evening after the #ecowed party, was a huge success!   It was clear that there are a lot of moms out there who are hungry for accurate information and support from other moms, just as there are other mothers who have been there and are glad to share their experience and provide encouragement.   As you might have read here the other day, finding quality breastfeeding support (i.e. not just “breast is best” lip service)  is a big “booby trap” for some mothers, and they are grateful for support on Twitter! 

Best for Babes’ mission is to break down the barriers (“booby traps“) to breastfeeding and ensure that ALL moms are cheered on, coached, and celebrated without pressure, judgment or guilt (see our Credo). 

Best for Babes’ primary role in #bfcafe:   will be to ensure that moms are getting the best evidence-based information and encouragement that they can use in achieving their personal breastfeeding goals, and in making decisions for themselves and their families.  We want moms to be inspired, prepared and empowered to succeed in carrying those decisions out, regardless of what they are.    

Specifically, Best for Babes will be contributing the following to #bfcafe: 

• Weekly online participation of @BestforBabes to answer questions and generate conversation.
• Topic development:   We are working on a list of preliminary topics, if you have specific topics you would like addressed, please comment below!  We will also strive to stay flexible and responsive to any breastfeeding-related news or issues that are making waves.
• Tweets relevant to the topic with links for further information.
• Expert Advisor:  In addition to a CLC (Certified Lactation Counselor) from Best for Babes, at least one expert from our vast network of trusted and social media savvy health care professionals will be volunteering to tweet relevant content and handle the volume of questions so that moms can get their questions answered and get evidence-based information.   We are constantly amazed at the dedicated professionals who care deeply about helping mothers and are grateful for their donated time.
• Sponsorship Guidelines:  This is still under development, check back for more information, or please feel free to share your suggestions personally or privately.
• Weekly blog post announcing topic and experts who will be on hand to answer questions, and link to the sponsor information.
• Special guests:  From time to time we will introduce special experts and resources to moms from the breastfeeding community

Image courtesy of Earth Mama Angel Baby. If you try to steal it you will melt. EMAB is a proud ongoing sponsor of the Best for Babes Foundation, a nonprofit 501c3. They are ethical, loving, hilarious, and we love 'em.

Going forward, we invite your participation and help!   We will always be looking for new topics, help moderating, and for additional experts and special guests.  @Zealandsmom will be looking for new sponsors!  We are working together and volunteering our time to make this happen as a service for moms.  Assuming it takes off like we think it will  we hope to be able to work with #bfcafe sponsors to enlist the services of 3GreenAngels who do such an awesome job with #ecowed!    Each week Best for Babes will announce the topic, expert advisors and any special guests; @Zealands mom will announce the topic and the sponsor & giveaway for the week (#bfcafe is already booked into April!).   To participate in the giveaway, you must RSVP to the event.  To participate in #bfcafe, all you need is an account in Twitter, and show up at 10 pm EST on Thursdays, including #bfcafe in each tweet.   You may want to download a tweeting tool such as tweetchat, tweetgrid or tweetdeck to facilitate the fast pace of tweeting and information exchange.    For more how to, see Earth Mama Angel Baby’s excellent guide to Twitter parties.

By Amy West, founder of Makes Mom Happy.  Amy is training to become an IBCLC and volunteers for Best for Babes.

When we talk about breastfeeding moms and medications, we reference Dr. Thomas Hale’s Medications and Mothers’ Milk.  It’s the golden standard for finding information on how drugs affect breastfeeding mothers, their babies, and their breast milk.  No other reference compares (for details on why Hale’s is the standard, read this article from Medscape).

The definitive guide to medications & breast milk

While the lactation community recognizes Dr. Hale’s work and uses it frequently, it’s not something that the medical community at large has adopted.  Too many doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other practitioners simply aren’t aware that this reference is available–though as membership in the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine grows, that will hopefully change.  In the meantime, the Physician’s Desk Reference is the guide practitioners typically use to advise pregnant and lactating mothers.  In short, the default listing for most medications in the PDR is to take the most conservative route possible:  recommend that pregnant and lactating mothers not use them, as research is scarce and lawsuits are abundant.

This is where Dr. Thomas Hale has done a great service to the breastfeeding community:  he has produced Medications and Mothers’ Milk, an evidence-based guide to lactational pharmacology (it includes information for pregnant women, as well).  It is updated biannually in print form and on an ongoing basis online.

Here’ s the problem:  If practitioners don’t know about Medications and Mothers’ Milk, or if they do, but don’t use it . . . then mothers and babies suffer.  All too often, this is the case.  The solution?  To create the InfantRISK Center.  The goal of the proposed InfantRISK Center is “To form a national call center, where mothers and their doctors can access up-to-date, evidence-based answers to their questions about using specific medications during pregnancy or lactation” (quote from the InfantRISK Center information page).

The sad reality of the medical world today is that practitioners simply aren’t educated enough on the subject of breastfeeding.  And while every practitioner ought to have a copy of Medications and Mothers’ Milk, far too few do.  This national call center can fill in the space where training and education fall off, giving practitioners the ability to provide their patients with accurate, safe advice in a timely manner.  The InfantRISK Center can also be at the forefront of furthering research on lactation and medications, an area that is sorely lacking.

The key part of the InfantRISK Center’s mission is that it is also for mothers.  Not every pregnant or breastfeeding mother is going to own their own copy of Medications and Mothers’ Milk. That said, many moms realize that they aren’t getting the most accurate, breastfeeding-friendly advice possible from their practitioners (for help in choosing great practitioners, see Your A-Team).  The InfantRISK Center would give them a hotline to call and check on how drugs might interact with pregnancy and lactation, and do so with confidence and ease.  No more consulting with Doctor Google when they aren’t comfortable with the counsel they’ve been given; no more asking around to friends; no more wondering.  That’s a beautiful and Babe-worthy thing!

Here’s are some more details on how much this Center could serve the breastfeeding community: (taken from this page)

• [Provide] drug risk information based on evidence
• Reduce misinformation
• Reduce unnecessary pregnancy terminations
• Reduce unnecessary lactation termination (early weaning, leading to increased health risks for mother & baby)
• Provide health care professionals with accurate and understandable risk information and registry data
• Provide and advise physicians on alternative medications

The InfantRISK Center has huge potential for helping moms and babies.  The challenge will be getting the word out to doctors, nurses, pharmacists, practitioners and moms so that all of them know where to turn whenever there is a question about breastfeeding and medications.  You can help by letting other moms and your health care providers know about it–share this blog post!   

If you’d like to help Best for Babes get this information into the hands of more moms and healthcare providers, you can donate here.

If you’d like to donate to the InfantRISK Center, you can do so here (and see a list of their donors here).

A couple of months ago I had a conversation with a mom on Twitter who had struggled with breastfeeding, and had been unable to find a support group either within or outside of her place of employment that accomodated working mothers.  She was extremely frustrated and disappointed.   Since not finding a breastfeeding support group can be a big “Booby Trap” that moms need help navigating and overcoming, I thought her story would be a great springboard to open the discussion and find out what mothers in a similar boat have done that works!   Please read excerpts from her story below, and share your strategies and resources in the comments.  We will use this discussion to generate a “Best for Babes Guide” to finding or creating a breastfeeding support group for working moms, either within or outside the workplace, and list your tips & suggestions!   To get the Solutions section started, underneath Anna’s story I am sharing the success of @crafteegirl in starting a workplace support group.   Please note that we are NOT talking about employer lactation programs, that is a whole other kettle of fish; for more information on starting an employer lactation program see http://www.workandpump.com, or our Champion for Moms Juanita Ingraham’s story, complete with resources and advice. 

Anna’s story*

The hospital breastfeeding class I took gave me a handout that included coupons for new-parent groups by age (which you could pay to continue) which, given they’d be made up of people in the classes, might be BF’ing friendly.  Unfortunately, all were Tuesday-Thursday in the middle of the day (between 9 am and 3 pm). So much for the working mother once back to work! I didn’t bother going – the first months are hectic and the hassle didn’t seem worth it, all for something I’d have to give up. No evening options. No weekend options. Clearly, working mothers don’t need support.
 
So I checked out La Leche League. None within an hour’s drive of my house meets at a time that a person working standard office hours could make, unless perhaps they happened to be just down the street and did it on their break. Unless their day care was local, they’d be doing it without the baby, too. Over half were on hiatus. Some people have suggested that I should have just emailed the leaders.  But I am very shy about approaching strangers, and didn’t want to come across as asking volunteers to turn their schedules around to accomodate me.  Nothing on the website pages indicated any sort of openess to any change in schedule.  It would have been at least nice if the website simply ACKNOWLEDGED the shortcomings of these schedules, for example, “We apologize for not having an evening/weekend group, but the organizers of this group have schedules that don’t allow for it.” or “We don’t currently have a weekend group but would be open to restarting a Saturday morning group if there is enough interest again; please email us.”  . . .  Seriously, just acknowledge the working moms exist. Not having a support group would still stink, but at least we wouldn’t be invisible. 

 There’s also a local mother’s group, part of Mom’s Club, in my city. Let me just quote: “We are specifically aimed at supporting moms who choose to stay at home with their children, including those who work out of their homes, as well as those who work part-time. We are the first, largest and fastest growing support group specifically for at-home mothers.” / “In order to become a member, you must be a mom and live in Wilsonville.    Although any mom can join, most of our activities are during the day.” At least they were up front about it. And of course, they’re not a breastfeeding support group.
 
Message heard loud and clear, here: mothers who work outside the home are not in need of, or are not deserving of, support. In parenting, in breastfeeding, in anything. Never mind that just like being a stay-at-home mother, being a working mother has its ups and downs; never mind that breastfeeding really does need support. Yes, I wouldn’t expect a mother who works in the home and never pumps to have my concerns with storage of bottled breast milk, but the latch issues and the social support for extended nursing and so on would be welcome. If, you know, there were social support, which for people like me in this area there actually isn’t.
 
The good thing has been the internet. The breastfeeding community on LiveJournal, the Twitter community…you folks have been hugely supportive and informative. I think I’d have kept BFing anyway, I hope I would, because I operate on sheer stubborn and I WAS going to give my son the best I could. But you are the people who made it seem doable, who gave me the information I needed to tell off the medical professionals when they were being stupid (once I started reading and asking, anyway!), who have made me feel that I am not alone.
 
Locally? Except for one coworker, with whom I don’t really discuss issues, I am alone. On the internet, I’m not. But surely it can’t be right that the internet is the only place to find support. Where’s the community of likeminded people locally, with whom I could hang out, share a pastry, visit if we become friends? Not that I don’t love the people I meet on the ‘net but there’s a distance (literally and figuratively), and it seems unfair that there ARE local resources…if I didn’t work. It would seem less unfair if any of them even acknowledged that they are, by their schedules, excluding an entire class of mothers. But it seems like we don’t exist, to them. Very alienating and frustrating, at least for me.
 
(And my son? No supplemental formula since 6 weeks, almost none after 4 weeks, still breastfeeding strong. AND we got rid of all of the FREAKING hardware. My pediatrician was surprised-and-pleased that he was still BF at 6 months and going strong – she was very encouraging but with the start the hospital got us off to, she didn’t expect me to pull it off. Stubbornness, and information, are good things….)

(*name changed to protect anonymity at writer’s request)

Solutions 

From @crafteegirl:  I work for the State of Michigan and a co-worker and I started a support group for pumping moms.  We called it Express Yourself because it fit the idea that we were “expressing milk” and that we wanted moms to feel free to talk about what worked for them and their goals without fear of judgement.  We meet once a month on our lunch hour and talk about whatever the group wants to discuss.  Not all of us are pumping anymore and not all of us are nursing at all anymore.  We even have some moms come when they’re pregnant!  We love that.  We also keep a list of everyone’s e-mail address and send out information that moms might find exciting (i.e., resources in the community, new studies about breastmilk and breastfeeding, etc.).  Though a friend and I started the group, we want every mom to feel like she can offer her experiences or opinions to the group.  We don’t always talk about just breastfeeding…as moms there’s so much that goes on in our lives and we want to be able to share and discuss all aspects of motherhood.  We started in March of 2009 and we already have had 2 babies born to our moms, who are both nursing successfully!  It’s been a great group of women and we’re proud to have been a part of it!

Now, it’s your turn, working moms:  please share your story, what resources you used and what worked for you!

Take it from me:  we mothers find it very difficult to ask for help!   When my son was born, I found myself entertaining guests even though I had a grueling delivery, suffered from undiagnosed post-partum depression and could barely walk (I’ll spare you the gory details of why).  The fact that I could not articulate my needs or felt uncomfortable assigning specific tasks to my friends just worsened my already fragile state of mind.   Being in my late 30s and having enjoyed a successful career, I was used to being in control of my life, so the more my house became unkempt, and the less I was able to accomplish, the more I spiraled into a dark place.  Many moms today are living apart from their families and are extremely independent and self-sufficient, so bringing home baby and adjusting to the new realities as a family, including relying on others for help, can extra be challenging.  Not preparing properly (expecting? see our ultimate checklist) or not knowing how to ask for help is a big “Booby Trap!”

But there is a better way.   If you have read The Red Tent, or had the chance to live in or observe cultures that protect the mother-baby dyad, you will already know that taking care of the mother is the best way to take care of the baby.   Julie Hamilton, Mrs. Nashville 2010, a mother of 3 including exclusively breastfed twins (read how she did it) and a blogger at memoirsofabreastfeeder.wordpress.com knows just how important it is to ask for help, and worked with us to create a tool that can go a long way in making sure that a mother of a new baby is being cared for.   The best gift you can give any new mother is to nurture the nurterer! So yes, pick out that cute outfit for the new baby, but also make sure you sign up to deliver some TLC in the form of a meal, some grocery shopping, laundry folding or other errand.    Many moms need more help with tasks; having a clean & organized house makes it easier to relax, turn off the brain, and sleep when the baby sleeps.  Especially for breastfeeding moms, who need to master the learning curve of breastfeeding during the first few weeks, getting help can make or break her success.   If you are an experienced mom, then you already know just how welcome your efforts are.   If you are not a mom, then consider it part of the “what goes around comes around” cycle that will be paid back to you some day, in some form or another!  If you are expecting your first, it is the best internship you could have to learn the ropes.

Here are the new tools Julie developed with us.  Please let us know if you have suggestions to make them more useful to ALL moms who just had a baby.  As a non-profit our goal we rely on volunteers and feedback so we can provide more free resources to moms!

BfB Help Sheet: A  fill-in sheet to help new mothers or a mother of a new baby (baby #2, or #3, or #4 . . . ) enlist friends and family members to take care of errands and everyday household chores.    There is space to add other things you need help with.   Don’t be shy!   The point is to ensure your success as a new mother so these first few weeks can be as enjoyable and rewarding as possible.  If you are sunk in a pit of laundry, grocery shopping and cleaning up, you are no good to anyone.  Here’s how to use it:  Fill out one sheet for each friend.  Record who is doing what accordingly on the master sheet, and give the help sheet to the person assigned to the task(s).   If you have a home print/scan/copy machine, you can also make a copy of the help sheet to keep for yourself, if that makes it easier for you to keep track.

BfB Help Sheet–Master: This is a chart to help you keep track of who is doing what.   It is to be filled out by the mom, her partner or a friend or family member who is helping the mom every week.    Write the person’s name & phone number if necessary in the appropriate square, for example, “Amy S.: 212-999-9999″ in Dinner row, Tuesday column.  If you have a really super organized friend who wants to coordinate this, even better!  You may want to keep phone numbers of friends and relatives on a separate sheet that you can refer to, or that your partner, a relative or your best friend can use to contact anyone if there is a change in plans.  Put it on the fridge, by the phone or by your bedside where you know you will see it.

We’re also compiling a list of helpful information and best resources on the ‘net on this topic.  Any suggestions?  Let us know, and we’ll add it to this list!   All we ask is that the information be mom-friendly:  non-judgmental, evidence-based, positive and encouraging, and not undermining of breastfeeding moms.

Tips for New Moms from About.com by Robin Elise Weiss

10 Tips to Help You Cope with New Mom Exhaustion from ivillage.com

How to Help a New Mom from Ehow.com

Just Had a Baby?  A Six-Week Survival Guide from Fit Pregnancy

What did we miss?   How did you ask for help when you had a new baby?

It’s been a crazy few days.  My Best for Babes co-founder Danielle and I were scheduled to fly out to Ohio on Tuesday morning to meet with a key player in the breastfeeding world.  Monday afternoon we noticed the weather report calling for a major snowstorm to hit the area and spread to the East Coast, where I live.   Should we go or should we call it off?  Every hair on my head said it was a mistake, that we should reschedule.   Various things started to go awry as if to prove that it was not meant to be; Danielle didn’t feel well, my printer kept fritzing as I was putting together our press packets, my daughter got a bad scrape under her eye while sledding with a friend . . . you know how it is.   I texted Danielle that I thought we should postpone.  An hour later I spoke to her husband who said she had gone to bed and was set to leave for the airport at 4:30 a.m.   So I worked until 2:30 a.m. and got up at 4:30 to leave for the airport myself.

We got to Ohio, and then I got a message that my flight back to Newark that evening had been canceled.   We went to our meeting, met some folks who are truly passionate about helping moms and babies breastfeed successfully and had a great time all around.   But what to do about my flight?   Danielle’s flight had not been canceled because she was flying into Atlanta on a larger jet.   I was booked on a flight for early Wednesday morning, but what if that flight too, would be canceled?   The likelihood was high because all the planes to the East Coast were smaller and more vulnerable to the weather.   My husband had already taken Tuesday off from work for me to stay with the kids, and now had to take Wednesday off too because school was canceled due to the storm, but I knew I had to be back before he left for a business trip Thursday morning.   I decided to drive.

Really, I should have my head examined.   On two hours sleep, pumped up with excitement from a great meeting and more ideas on how to “beat the booby traps” so that more moms can achieve their personal breastfeeding goals, I headed east on I-70 on Tuesday afternoon.   The streets were icy and snow was coming straight at me but I kept up a good pace until I hit a wall of exhaustion at midnight.  I had driven eight hours to Harrisburg, PA.   I pulled off, declined the seedy motels, and settled into a Howard Johnson, feeling a twinge of nostalgia from my youth.

When I woke up the streets looked really bad.   The snow had really come down hard, and there was not a crumb to be had at HoJo’s “Country Oven,” which was missing its employees due to the weather.  I cleaned 4 inches of snow off my rental car (with my bare hands, having not thought of gloves in the scramble to get to the airport the day before) and pulled out, figuring that at least the highways would be clear.

I saw a few of these. Not fun. Image courtesy of racheltingley.com

I have never driven in worse conditions in my life.   I thought the highway would be clear, but spent the next 8 hours (which should have been 3) crawling along single file on two grayish tracks in the snow.   The visibility was low, I sat hunched over, peering out my snow-encrusted windshield, sandwiched between two trucks, gripping the steering wheel so tight I now have blisters on my fingers.   I saw quite a few cars in various ditches, and a few slammed into the divider rail with a crushed bumper.   At one point in the Pennsylvania mountains, the road was so bad that a couple of jacknifed trucks were just stopped on the highway; traffic slowed to 5 miles an hour as we wove our way around them.  Anybody who was on the road was either a fool or was driving some precious cargo.

So, what about me?  What precious cargo was I driving in my bright blue Dodge Journey (aptly named for my trip from hell) from Alamo?  What on earth would persuade Danielle and I to fly right into the eye of the storm against our better judgment, and then have to practically dig our way out?   If I could have hunkered down in a hotel and waited for the storm to clear and the flights to stabilize I would have; but I simply could not let my husband miss his trip when he has done so much for me and for Best for Babes.  Was it sheer insanity?

I got a whole lot of help and a whole lot of love from some amazing women after a horrible birth experience and a rocky start to breastfeeding (you can still see traces of the black eye and burst blood vessels I had from pushing for 3.5 hours).

Nope, it was love. As I drove back, high on adrenaline, I was thinking about only two things:  how badly I wanted to get back to my family and go sledding with my kids, and how much I want to help mothers and babies.   These two loves are linked: never in a million years would I have ended up in this gig if it had not been for the awful time I had trying to breastfeed my son.   My experience coincided with the stories of dozens of women that Danielle had been helping as a lactation counselor, and is what prompted us to found Best for Babes.   We simply could not bear to see more women decide to nurse, only to have their hopes dashed by one booby trap after another.   According to our contact at the CDC, 86% of expecting mothers say they want to breastfeed, yet only 74% even try once after giving birth, and the number of women breastfeeding exclusively as recommended drops precipitously during the first days and weeks, long before many mothers go back to work.   Something is very, very wrong.   If breastfeeding was really meant to be as hard as it is today the human race would have died out–hence our conviction that moms are not only not getting the proper support, but are actually being prevented from succeeding.   A lot of moms are not as lucky as I was to be able to get excellent help and have women in my family who had breastfed and encouraged me.

Home at last thanks to my rental from Alamo. No 4-wheel drive but trusty nonetheless. The icing on the cake? After driving 16 hours in horrendous conditions without incident, I got stuck pulling into my driveway. Patrick had to shovel me out.

I still don’t know exactly what possessed me to basically endanger my life and make that crazy trip, but since I was listening to 80s tunes I’ll go ahead and be corny and say it was the “wings of love” (it’s okay, you can roll your eyes).   Love for my kids and my awesome husband, but also the love I have for transforming the breastfeeding movement into a true cause that cheers on, coaches and celebrates ALL moms, regardless of whether they breastfeed for 2 weeks, 2 months, 2 years or not at all;  love for my best friend and business partner Danielle who keeps going despite ongoing health problems stemming from her bout with breast cancer; love for all the moms and babies I meet.   I do it because I know it can be done; we CAN create a culture where breastfeeding in public or pumping at work is not just barely tolerated but embraced and seen as the awesome power that it is, and where moms who can not or decide not to breastfeed are respected and cheered on and have access to the best substitute, screened, pasteurized donor milk from a registered donor milk bank.

I also do it because of the synergistic contagious energy that flies around when I meet people who care about making the world a better place.  Every day I “meet” another mother who has gone above and beyond to help another mother, or a nurse that has gone the extra mile to help a new mom see an excellent lactation consultant.    There is a lot of love out there, love and protection for moms and babies.  I hope nobody else  was nuts enough to drive in a blizzard, but I will bet that there are some incredible stories of the lengths friends and strangers have gone to help another mother navigate “the booby traps” and get the hang of breastfeeding her babe.

What have you done for love? In the spirit of upcoming Valentine’s Day, tell us your story of helping one or more moms breastfeed, or how you are changing the culture and “beating the booby traps“.   We can’t wait to hear it!

Jan. 15, 2010; edited Jan. 19 to include new information. — Bettina Forbes, CLC

We spoke to the head of the Human Milk Banking Association and learned that the situation in Haiti for orphaned babies is especially grim due to the catastrophic earthquake that struck this week.

www.hmbana.org

Pauline Sakamoto, RN, MS and President of the Human Milk Banking Association of North America and Amanda Nickerson, Executive Director of the International Breast Milk Project have been in touch with the orphanages in devastated Haiti.  Sakamoto said,  “people from the orphanage are walking through the rubble and literally picking up orphaned babies off the street.”

www.breastmilkproject.org

Haiti has high breastfeeding rates, so these babies are equipped from birth to fight off disease and infection, but without mothers to feed them, orphaned babies are at risk for starvation.   Although disaster relief organizations are working furiously to get supplies such as food and clean water to Haiti, they are hampered by destroyed roads, airports and complete chaos.  *Update 1/19/10: A further complication is that because these babies are  mostly breastfed, they are not so keen on infant formula, and are not taking too well to efforts to feed them, according to Ms. Sakamoto.  Hopefully this situation is improving, we will update you when we can.

Sakamoto is urging relief organizations to especially focus on finding any surviving breastfeeding mothers, and to make them a priority for receiving food, water and shelter so that they can begin tandem nursing orphaned babies. Breastfeeding is the best bet right now because it is supremely nourishing, adjusts to changes in temperature or infant health, is comforting, and it protects the babies against further disease.   During any natural disaster, the excruciating challenge of transporting infant formula, supplying clean water and sterilizing bottles underscores the value of breastfeeding during emergencies.   To top it off, formula is not always tolerated, and the continuous use of formula is associated with a life-long risk of increased disease.  Of course is if breastmilk or breastfeeding mothers is not available, formula should be used but it should be only be procured and administered under World Health Organization guidelines. (see below)

*Update 1/19/10:  The International Breastmilk Project has posted that:

“Everyone involved is working around the clock to make sure we are ready to go once our on the ground partners have the infrastructure in place to handle donor milk. We will update our website and twitter details [@GiveMilk] as they unfold . . . The Human Milk Bank Association of North America is processing the milk that will be sent to Haiti. We are currently referring all donors to http://www.hmbana.org, or 1-866-998-4550, so that we can build up the supply in the United States so that when we are ready to send milk to Haiti, there will be an adequate amount of milk to meet the needs.”

Please keep checking back with the International Breastmilk Project (or @GiveMilk) for the latest.

These two posts have done an excellent job explaining the importance of breastfeeding in Haiti and the complexities of breastfeeding in emergencies; we urge you to read them and to circulate and educate those you know:

Breastfeeding 1-2-3 by Angela White:  Haiti Disaster Relief Organizations

Motherwear Breastfeeding Blog:  World Health Organization says Breastfeeding a Priority in Haiti

*Update 1/19/10: New Post by Motherwear Breastfeeding Blog:  Breastmilk Donations for Haiti, and a Shortage of Donor Milk in the U.S.

What can you do?

Use your contacts with relief organizations to educate about breastfeeding in emergencies.  Many of these wonderful organizations are not aware that human milk banks exist; many do not know of the risks of infant formula nor of the danger of marketing infant formula donations in emergencies.

*Update 1/19/10:  Many well-intentioned organizations & companies have announced that they are collecting infant formula.   We ask that all of these organizations please 1) ensure that there is a verified need for infant formula.    There may be enough on hand and it would be disastrous to breastfeeding rates to flood the country with excess infant formula.   2) Administration of infant formula should be carried out under control of qualified health experts so as to not undermine breastfeeding.   3) Formula donations should not be publicized so as to not violate the World Health Organization International Code of the Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes (WHO Code).   This code protects breastfeeding mothers and babies; publicizing donations of infant formula provides a PR and image boost to companies that violate the WHO Code and have worked to erode breastfeeding rates.  Please see the IBFAN statement .

Donate to Best for Babes to raise awareness of human milk banks, and to break down the barriers to breastfeeding success so that more mothers can breastfeed long enough to donate!!   So many mothers are being prevented from succeeding with breastfeeding, which makes it difficult to keep milk banks stocked.

Donate funds and/or breast milk to your closest Human Milk Bank or the International Milk Banking Project.  These relatively new organizations need our support.   With adequate funds and stores of milk, they can collaborate with the American Red Cross and other disaster relief organizations to deliver human milk where it is most needed.   Our vision is that some day human milk banks will be as plentiful as blood banks, they are just as vital!

We will keep you posted of anything we learn, and thank you for your support.