Breastfeeding Friday - Opening the Door

Phot by Viktor Mogilat

At the top of my list of tips for new breastfeeding mommas is to take a breastfeeding class. As full disclosure, I took one and it was immensely helpful for what I needed it to be. I am very much a learn-as-I-go type person. My best example of this is whenever we get a new board game, my husband reads the entire set of directions thoroughly: the alternate playing options, full moon on a Wednesday, and extended play rules. He reads the booklet from cover to cover and then  wants to explain them to me. I try to be a trooper, but 2-3 minutes in I throw my hands in the air and say "just explain as we go!" I just wanted to put it out there that I did not take an exhaustive course covering the ins and outs of nursing, those are fine (great!), but they would not have worked for me. What I needed was a class to open the door.

I grew up in a family where breastfeeding was kind of, well, weird. My mom didn't nurse my sister or me. My cousins weren't nursed, in fact, I don't think I was ever even in the same room as a baby being breastfed until my sister-in-law had our nephew Noah... I was 21. Other than that single outlier my only experience with breastfeeding was what I saw in the movies and television. In other words,my only exposure was through our Western media that pretty much makes it a joke. When I first found out I was pregnant with #1 my husband expressed that he wanted me to nurse our child because of all the benefits it provided. I was pretty much disgusted at the thought, but reluctantly agreed to try it until our child cut teeth. With that decision made I went to a class at the local WIC clinic. I view that single encounter as one of the biggest blessings that I have ever been granted.

My WIC representative had her small (and adorable!) baby in the office and he was happily nursing. I told her of my weaning plans and she assured me that teeth would not be a problem. She did it so warmly and confidently, yet I recoiled, because when a baby gets teeth aren't they getting a little old for breastfeeding? Ahhh... There we go, the real source of my hesitation. The answer there, by the way, is no. Even after hearing that, and hearing that WIC recommends a baby breastfeed for a minimum of one year* I held on to my insistence of weaning early.

Then the real class came.

We started by picking objects out of a box. I won't spoil the game by divulging all of the objects, but mine was a tampon. Our instructor had us go around and share what we thought our object had to do with breastfeeding. A lot of women were just as clueless as I was, some not so much. I was amazed, though at all of the benefits and facts that were shared.  Yes its good for baby, but its also good for Momma, for finances, and its more convenient than I thought. Yes, convenience! That was not a word I had ever heard associated with breastfeeding.  After going around the circle, we watched a video. Again, it wasn't exhaustive or a complete manual, but for basically the first time in my life I was seeing infants nurse and it wasn't being made fun of! I do not remember much else about that class, except for this: I looked around the room and realized that breastfeeding a child is not a strange thing to do. I was in a room with a dozen other women who wanted to (or their well-meaning spouses wanted them to) nurse their children.

The class that I took opened the door for me, and maybe even closed another. Ahead of me I had a world of positivity and support for nursing my child. Behind me was a world where I felt mortified at the thought.

So, not everyone is like me. We are at this pretty cool phase in our society where breastfeeding is being normalized. We aren't where we would like to be, but we're on our way, and because of that more and more women aren't starting out where I was- they may be familiar with breastfeeding from an outsider's perspective, they may have already had that "icky" feeling taken away by an interaction with a loved one. Hey, maybe they never had that feeling in the first place! If anyone is in this category than this blog post is still meant for you! First of all, you may still need a door opened that you don't even know is closed. Are you nervous about supply? Or latch? Medication interactions? Laws? None of those? Well, there may be something that comes up that you hadn't even thought about.

I am so thankful for a class that I never wanted to take. It changed so much in a short period that is having everlasting effects on my family, don't cheat yourself of these perks! Go!

For more information on the WIC breastfeeding support program visit: WIC Breastfeeding Support

Joyfully, Jess

*American Academy of Pediatrics recommends a minimum of 6 months of exclusive breastfeeding and 12 months total
The World Health Organization recommends a minimum of 6 months of exclusive breastfeeding and 2 years total