An Activation Guide for Your Breastfeeding Support Skills
It's not as hard as you think
Cultural messaging around breastfeeding is confusing, polarizing, and intertwined with myths, disinformation, and misinformation.
So many members of the health care community say that they “support” breastfeeding, but it turns out they actually have their doubts about it and many mistrust the process of breastfeeding. They turn to formula and pumping in the blink of an eye with no regard for the future of an individual’s breastfeeding journey.
Both the parents you serve directly and the health care community in which you practice are heavily exposed to poor information and commercial marketing messages that say “breastfeeding doesn't work” or is too hard.
Ultimately, mothers and babies lose because when they repeatedly encounter messages and people who doubt that breastfeeding can work, their confidence is eroded and they lack the information or skills they need to make it work for them.
Commercial interests should have NO role in educating or influencing patients OR health care workers.
In the past few years we have faced unprecedented shortages of infant formula, yet I am still hearing from parents who have been told by pediatricians and other doctors to use formula and were given formula samples without any discussion of how they will get more once the samples run out.
In fact, just this year a formula company enticed mothers to begin using their pricey brand of formula using misleading messaging about breastfeeding on social media and then failed to ensure an adequate ongoing supply of formula would subsequently be available. This is outrageous.
I recently watched a pediatric office local to me advertise a giveaway on Instagram consisting of a formula company-branded gift basket. (In exchange for filling out a form containing basically ALL of their personal contact and demographic information, a contestant could earn a chance to win the basket.) Their defense was that they “support all mothers, including those who choose to breastfeed and those who choose to formula feed due to their own individual and/or medical circumstances.” After I provided them with links to the statements and position papers of all the major health organizations, which detail why activities such as this actually HARM both breastfeeding and formula feeding mothers and parents, they took the post down.
Why did I have to remind medically-trained providers about the importance of breastfeeding?
Today we have plenty of evidence about best practices for initiating and maintaining breastfeeding and lactation, yet I am surprised daily by how this information is ignored or applied incorrectly, leading to iatrogenic low milk production, early weaning, and unnecessary use of infant formula.
Today new mothers and parents have access to a wealth of information about breastfeeding and lactation right at their fingertips online (and no, it’s not ALL bad information!), yet too many continue to struggle to understand HOW to use the information they find - or even which information applies to their situation.
There’s a simple way to cut through all of this. We’ve got to start narrowing our gaze to understand how critical the first 4 days of lactation truly are. We have to look at the whole of the lactation journey through the lens of those first 100 or so hours of life. We need to streamline the support & information we give to new mothers so that they can navigate that timeframe and come out still breastfeeding at the end.
The First 100 Hours concept is my career’s work. It’s been 10 years since the day I sat at my backyard patio table and sketched the outline of the strategy, a course, and a way of thinking that could actually revolutionize-while also streamlining - how we practice early lactation care.
Now, it’s a book!
It’s a plan that anyone can follow; it’s not only for IBCLCs. It’s for breastfeeding peer supporters, birthworkers, lactation educators and counselors, physicians, nurses - basically anyone who has the honor to be invited into the new family’s space either before or in the most immediate hours after birth. It allows you to take your knowledge about human lactation and adjust how you talk about it depending on who you are teaching.
It’s a whole attitude and style. It’s a way of thinking that can shift everyone’s focus from formula being the first answer to every early breastfeeding question to knowing that human milk CAN be expressed by hand, without a breast pump, and fed to baby without needing to worry about using a bottle or artificial nipple.
Most importantly, it’s a way of teaching these concepts to parents and to the rest of the health care world. By having the right words to say and intentional points to make, we can focus on meeting our audience where they are and taking them where they need to be in terms of breastfeeding and lactation knowledge and techniques.
I believe this lactation teaching strategy can be effective for anyone who needs to communicate with someone else about human lactation. Let’s be real: sometimes you’re talking to a 16-year old young woman who has just given birth, while in the next few minutes you might be speaking with an experienced nurse who needs your patient report and justification for the lactation care plan you just made. Or you might be working with a lactation client who is educated and experienced in livestock management right after you have finished teaching a prenatal breastfeeding class.
Our beautifully diverse and ever-changing clientele and audience present unique opportunities to communicate fundamental concepts in radically different ways throughout the day, and The First 100 Hours concept can take your lactation teaching and communication skills to the next level.
