Breastfeeding Resources

It's been a while since I last posted because things have been going just fine in the breastfeeding and working world. Breastfeeding with Aaron is a snap these days. He's pretty quick (typically less than 15 minutes) and flexible with places and positions. This period must be the reward for making it work early on. Sometimes I think I can feed Aaron faster than it would take to even prepare a bottle of formula.

My problem started about six or eight weeks after I went back to work, when Aaron was about four months old. The day care providers were using frozen milk to supplement what I brought. Whereas I had been pumping 10-12 ounces a day, now I only got 7-9 ounces. I don't think it was every day, and it took me a while to realize there was a definite trend. I was starting to wonder what to do about this when I opened the freezer and there was no stash--I hadn't even monitored how much we were going through.

I was talking with my brother-in-law the other day about why it's important to him that his babies are breastfed. (Did I mention I come from a well-informed family?) And I realized that although we all have the same set of macro reasons that drive us, we prioritize them differently. So, inspired by a similar list in The Milk Memos, here's a list of what I love about breastfeeding.

"I just wish that HUMAN milk, mother's milk, was not designated "breast milk," as if other organs lactated."

--tohosa, in a comment to the article Breasts at Work on Salon, an interview with MilkMemos authors Cate Colburn-Smith and Andrea Serrette.

Ha! Just figured out if I’m sitting on the couch nursing Aaron, I can put my feet up on the coffee table and rest my laptop on my legs and type with both hands. This is monumental. And how long did it take me to figure out? 3 months!?!