Breastfeeding 101: Proper Latch

May 23, 2012 By Leave a Comment

One of the most important things that we can discuss in the Breastfeeding 101 series is proper latch.  Your baby latching on properly is the key to the start of a successful nursing relationship.  As we have discussed in previous posts, breastfeeding is a learning experience for both mother and child.  In this post we’ll talk about what the proper latch looks like and how to help your baby achieve it.

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When I was preparing for the birth of our first child I took at breastfeeding class, which was one of the best decisions I made.  Before going into the class, I just assumed that the proper latch involved the entire nipple and areola being taken into the baby’s mouth.  I soon learned that this was not necessarily so.

The proper latch will have the baby’s lower gum well below the nipple, on the areola (the dark area around the nipple).  You will be able to see the areola above the baby’s upper lip.  It looks a little bit like a crescent moon shape.  The baby’s lips will be flared out on both top and bottom.  They should not be tucked into the mouth.  The photo above demonstrates this beautifully.  To facilitate this:

  • Get into a comfortable and supported position for breastfeeding.
  • Start by lining the baby’s nose up with your nipple.
  • You may need to encourage your baby to open her mouth wide by brushing her upper lip with your nipple.  You want to see the baby’s mouth wide open (as if she was yawning) and the tongue covering the bottom gums (see image below).  This might take a few times of encouraging the baby to open her mouth.  If the tongue is not covering the bottom gums and the mouth is not wide open, it can result in the baby chomping down on your nipple.  A newborn can chomp down pretty hard!  Also, the baby will not be able to take the nipple in at the correct angle, which prevents let down and results in a very unhappy baby.
  • Bring the baby to the breast, chin first, then nose.
Below is an excellent rendering of what the proper latch looks like from an internal view.

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You’ll notice that the nipple is angled upwards and goes far back into the throat.  Did you know your breast could do that???  Don’t worry, the baby will not choke.  The baby nurses from the areola and the nipple.  The nipple should reach all the way to the baby’s soft palette.

Touch your tongue to the roof of your mouth and you will feel the hard palette of your mouth.  If you bring your baby to your breast and your nipple stops at the hard palette of baby’s mouth, when she starts to nurse it will hurt like heck!  The baby will effectively be clamping the nipple between their tongue and their hard palette, which really hurts.

Now touch your tongue farther back against the roof of your mouth until you feel the soft area in the back.  This is the soft palette and this is where your nipple needs to be for the baby to nurse efficiently.  When baby starts to nurse, they encourage the milk ducts to let down (release the milk) by massaging the areola and stimulating the release of the milk.  This cannot happen if the areola and nipple are not far enough back in the baby’s throat.

How can you tell if you have achieved proper latch?

The first 10-30 seconds of a breastfeeding session can be a little bit painful as the baby starts to massage and the milk lets down.  If you feel pain beyond that first 10-30 seconds then chances are the baby is not latched on properly.  Gently insert your pinky into the corner of the baby’s mouth to release the suction and remove the baby from the breast.  Take a look at your nipple.  You may find that it looks pinched, indicating that the nipple was being clamped between the tongue and the hard palette.  Try latching again, and keep trying until baby gets a good latch.  Many breastfeeding problems can be solved with paying careful attention to the latch.  If you are having trouble achieving the proper latch, if breastfeeding continues to be painful for you or the baby seems frustrated and hungry all of the time, seek the help of a lactation consultant.  

Tips for achieving the proper latch:

  • Make sure you are in a comfortable position.  Use pillow to support you.
  • Wait for it.  If the baby’s mouth is not wide open, with the tongue covering the bottom gums, just try again.
  • Avoid using scented body lotions.  They can be too much for the baby and cause the baby to refuse the breast.
  • If you have large breasts, support the breast with your hand, if possible.
  • Take a moment to burp the baby before nursing on each side.  If the baby has any trapped gas, they will likely refuse the breast or fuss at the breast, even though they are acting as though they are hungry.
  • Do not wait for the baby to cry to be fed before you feed him.  A frustrated baby will have a harder time latching on correctly.

What questions do you have about proper latch?

Unbound Birth can now be purchased at the new power price of $2.99! You can find it at the Unbound Birth Store.

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Breastfeeding 101: Demand Feeding.

April 25, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Breastfeeding 101: Demand Feeding

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Feeding your baby can be one of the most rewarding things that you do.  We have covered a lot so far in the Breastfeeding 101 series, including the mother’s needs, the value of breast milk, how the baby benefits , and benefits to the mother.  Today we start to get into the nuts and bolts of feeding your baby, starting with demand feeding, and how often your baby should nurse.

A new baby may not be strong enough to take in an adequate amount of food in a single feeding, and as a result he or she will need to nurse more often.  Compared to a formula fed feeding, a breastfed baby will eat at more frequent intervals.  Why, you may ask?  Breast milk is more easily and quickly digested than formula is.  It is, after all, made by the mother specifically for this purpose!  While a formula fed baby may take a bottle every few hours in the first days of life, a breastfed baby may nurse every 1 1/2- 2 1/2 hours, and at least every 3 hours.  Even if a baby does not cry, you should still offer the breast at frequent intervals.

It’s very important not to limit the time that you nurse.  Sometimes women will experience sore nipples, and thinking that the pain is brought on by nursing for too long, they cut short the feedings.  The real reason for sore nipples is actually an improper latch, not the length of time that you nurse.  Proper latch will be explained in detail in a later post.  It is important to drain the breast at each feeding to avoid milk becoming stagnant in the ducts and to allow the baby to get the nutritious hind milk that comes later on during the feeding.  Demand feeding facilitates this.

Allowing your baby to nurse freely may result in:

  • A more content baby
  • Plentiful milk supply.  The more you nurse, the more milk you will make.
  • Increase of blood to the baby’s face and head, which may contribute to proper development of the brain.

Nursing your baby frequently will also reduce the chances of you developing mastitis, an infection of the milk ducts.  Mastitis is something that you want to avoid at all costs.  Symptoms are flu like (achiness and chills), with fever over 100.4 and hot red lumps or sore areas in the breast.  These symptoms will put you in bed and make it extremely painful to nurse.

If you do come down with mastitis you can massage the milk ducts, especially while the baby is at the breast, use warm compresses in between nursing for pain relief, increase your amount of rest as much as possible, take 1000 mg of vitamin C and an oderless garlic supplement daily.  Continue to nurse while you have mastitis.  Your baby cannot get sick from your milk.  If symptoms continue to worsen after 24 hours,even with the natural treatments, call your doctor.  Your doctor will prescribe antibiotics for the infection.  While on antibiotics make sure to take a probiotic as they can cause thrush in the baby’s mouth and on your nipples.  There are also children’s probiotics that you can administer to the newborn.  Make sure you have an infant probiotic though.  Put a little bit on your nipple before putting the baby to the breast and your baby will safely ingest it.

A sufficient milk supply is so important, and demand feeding will help your body produce the amount of milk that your baby needs.

Signs of sufficient milk supply are:

  • a happy baby
  • 6-8 wet diapers a day
  • frequent yellow, soft curd stools
  • your milk may leak or drip, especially during the let-down reflex
  • baby will swallow frequently while nursing
  • sufficient weight gain, with the baby regaining it’s birth weight by 2 weeks, and doubling it’s birth weight by 6 months (generally)

Your baby will experience a growth spurt at about 3 weeks and 6 weeks.  At these times, he or she will want to nurse even more frequently.  Nurse as often as the baby desires and do not supplement with water or formula. Your body will adjust it’s milk production with the increased demands of your baby.  During this time you may feel a bit full or engorged while your milk supply is increasing, but your breasts will adjust in a couple of days!

Unbound Birth can now be purchased at the new power price of $2.99! You can find it at the Unbound Birth Store.

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Breastfeeding 101: The Value of Breast Milk.

March 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment

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If you’ve been reading along with the Breastfeeding 101 posts, then you know the benefits of breastfeeding when it comes to your own health and the benefits to your child.  These are obviously important factors in your decision to breastfeed.  They have a significant impact both immediately and in the future.  But have you given any thought to the value of breast milk?

Feeding a child throughout their life… do you have any guess as to how much parents will spend to feed their child while the child is living under their roof?  I cannot even imagine what that total is, I just know that with three children in our family, our largest household expense is food.  That’s a lot of money.  When I think of breast milk, from a practical standpoint, I think of the money that it saves during the first year of a child’s life, and possibly longer than that, depending on how long you plan to breastfeed.

My children have never had formula, so I have never actually spent a dime on it.  I don’t know firsthand how much it costs to formula feed.  I did some research though.  When I looked at brand name formula (not the fancy shmancy kind, just basic formula) and then estimated how far one canister would last I found the cost to be staggering!  You can easily spend $75-$80 each week to formula feed your baby.  Multiply that by 4 and that comes to $300-$320 each month.  Multiply that by 12… that’s $3600 for the first year (give or take).  Then you have to take into account the cost of bottles, and all of the other accessories that you might end up buying.  This adds up.  If you can breastfeed for free why wouldn’t you???  You will spend a little bit of money investing in a two or three good nursing bras, nursing tanks, and nursing pads (you can purchase reusable pads), and perhaps a decent breast pump and a few bottles if you plan to be away from your child for some feedings.  These costs related to breast milk are very small in comparison to the cost of formula for one year.

It has also been well documented that breastfed babies get few ear infections and sicknesses, due to the nutritional make up of the breast milk.  As a result, you pay less in medical costs during that first year.  Not only that, but working parents of breastfed babies will miss fewer days of work when their babies are healthier.  Fewer copays, fewer prescriptions filled, fewer days of lost pay equals more money in your wallet!  If you took the $3600 that you might spend on formula in that first year and invested it in a good growth stock mutual fund, you could double the amount in 12 years to $7,200, or quadruple it in 24 years to $14,400.

The value of breast milk is far reaching and very significant.  When the health benefits and the economic benefits are seen together (and there are more than what I have listed here), it’s easy to see that forgoing formula for breast milk is the logical choice.  Even if a mother can breastfeed for 4-6 months she is helping her baby and her family in so many ways.

Are you planning to breastfeed?  What influenced your decision to do so?

In the next Breastfeeding 101 post, we’ll take a look at the nursing mother’s needs.

 

Unbound Birth can now be purchased at the new power price of $2.99! You can find it at the Unbound Birth Store.

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Breastfeeding 101: Benefits of Breastfeeding for the Baby.

February 28, 2012 By Leave a Comment

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Breastfeeding is one of the best things that you can do for your baby.  The other week we looked at a few ways that the nursing mother benefits from breastfeeding and today we’re going to see the benefits of breastfeeding for the baby.

There really is no substitute for breastmilk.  No matter how hard formula manufacturers try to sell it as such, there is nothing that compares to mother’s milk when it comes to nourishing the baby.  The lactating mother’s body takes it’s cues from the baby and adjusts itself accordingly, and that is something that canned formula cannot do.

Colostrum is the baby’s first food and is produced prior to the baby’s birth as well as during the baby’s first few days of life.  The mother does not produce much of it, which sometimes leads women to think that they are not producing enough for their babies, but rest assured, it is enough.  My husband jokingly referred to it as Momma Yarbrough’s Liquid Gold while I was nursing our newborns (maybe that was too much information, LOL!).  Although colostrum is produced in small amounts, it is concentrated and contains exactly what the baby needs.

  • It is packed with antibodies that the mother passes from her own body.  These antibodies retard bacterial growth.  Breastfed babies have seven times fewer the number of infections than formula fed babies.
  • It is high in protein and vitamins and low in carbohydrates and lipids.
  • It acts as a natural laxative, facilitating the elimination of meconium (the baby’s first bowel movement) and excess bilirubin, which in high amounts causes jaundice).
  • Colostrum provides the baby with significant protection against allergies.

After the first few days of the baby’s life, the colostrum transitions to what we think of as traditional breastmilk. At this point the mother’s milk “comes in”.  The mother produces much more of this milk, it is thinner and changes a bit in it’s makeup, providing what the baby needs for continued growth.  There are many benefits from continuing breastfeeding.

  • The act of breastfeeding naturally satisfies the baby’s need to suck (some of you who have nursed know this all too well, perhaps).
  • Neurological stimulation starts earliest in breastfed babies.  The New York Times cited research showing that prolonged breastfeeding resulted in improved scores on childhood intelligence tests, though it was difficult to conclude whether that was due to the breastmilk itself or the interaction, both physically and socially, that is part of the breastfeeding experience.  Either way it is a good thing!
  • Breastmilk helps prevent tooth decay.
  • Breastmilk is easier for your baby to digest than formula.  This results in more efficient use of the milk and also accounts for the fact that breastfed babies eat more frequently than formula fed babies.
  • It provides every nutrient your baby needs for brain growth and good overall physical development.
  • The bonding that comes from the nursing relationship is second to none.

I breastfed each of my three children exclusively for 12-14 months.  They have never ingested one ounce of formula.  My first and third would drink my breastmilk from a bottle if I needed to be somewhere when it was time to eat, but my second child would not have  bottle under any circumstance.  This meant that I did not get out much on my own for the first 12-14 months, but I worked around it and it didn’t affect my life in a negative way.  I have always been thankful to be able to feed my children in this way, and let me tell you, it wasn’t always easy, but the benefits of breastfeeding  outweighed the cons at every turn.

I think it’s important for women to know the facts about breastfeeding, and how the baby benefits from nursing, so that they can make an informed decision about how their baby will be fed.  I will never judge a woman for the decision that she makes, but I do think it is very unfortunate when women make decisions based on formula commercials and what their doctors tell them exclusively.  Please take the time to think about the options and educate yourself about breastfeeding and formula feeding… it will be time well spent, I promise you that!

Next Breastfeeding 101 post we will be looking further into the value of breastmilk.

Unbound Birth can now be purchased at the new power price of $2.99! You can find it at the Unbound Birth Store.

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Breastfeeding 101: Benefits to the Mother.

February 15, 2012 By 1 Comment

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Breastfeeding has many benefits.  The benefits that a baby receives are pretty common knowledge, and I’ll be listing some of those next week, but the benefits to the mother are just as great, and not as widely known or as thoughtfully considered.  Breastfeeding is very beneficial to a mother’s health, both immediately and in the long term as well.

Nursing your baby releases two natural hormones, Oxytocin and Prolactin.

  • Oxytocin is sometimes called “the love hormone” because it is the same hormone that is released during sexual intercourse.  It is also released during labor and is responsible for stimulating contractions and moving labor along.  After giving birth, Oxytocin causes your milk to flow through the nursing duct system, the milk ducts.  When you nurse your child following the birth, the release of this hormone causes your uterus to contract back down to it’s normal size.  This helps with expulsion of the placenta and prevents the loss of too much blood.  This amazing hormone can also act as a mild natural tranquilizer, helping the mother and baby to relax during the nursing periods.
  • Prolactin is the hormone that actually causes your milk to be produced.  It is sometimes called “the mothering hormone” because it causes the warm fuzzy feelings of attachment that you have for your baby during nursing, also called “bonding”.  Prolactin also causes lactation amenorrhea, or the delay of menstrual periods.  Keep in mind, however, that this absence of your period does not mean that you cannot get pregnant!  Breastfeeding is not a form of birth control!

Here are several other benefits to the mother:

Breastfeeding can help you lose weight after the baby is born.  If you are nursing your baby several times a day, the extra 600-800 calories that you burn each day is a significant help in reaching your weight loss goals.

Breastfeeding reduces your risk of breast and ovarian cancers by up to 50%!  One 2009 study found that women with a family history of breast cancer were 59% less likely to develop breast cancer if they breastfed their babies.  That is a wonderful find!

The financial savings that come with breastfeeding are huge!  You can easily spend $75-$80 on one week’s worth of brand name formula.  Breast milk is free.  Enough said.

Breastfeeding is convenient.  Breast milk is sterile, warm, portable, does not require a bottle or any mixing, and it’s ready at a moment’s notice!

Breastfeeding promotes bonding. The frequent skin to skin contact with your baby that happens during breastfeeding plays a very important role in the bonding process.

The majority of these benefits are only available when you breastfeed your child.  Formula feeding cannot provide the physical and emotional perks that nursing your child provides.  You’ve heard it said that “breast is best”… well, it’s the truth.  If you are able to breastfeed your child, (and sometimes there are reasons why a mother cannot), I truly believe that it is in the best interest of you and your baby’s health to do so.

Next week we’ll be looking at the benefits that breastfeeding provides for the nursing infant/child.

Unbound Birth can now be purchased at the new power price of $2.99! You can find it at the Unbound Birth Store.

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Breastfeeding 101.

February 8, 2012 By 1 Comment

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Pregnancy and birth are life-changing events to be sure, but there is more than just the birth of the baby to prepare for.  If you are planning to breastfeed your baby, then it is necessary to prepare for that as well.  Unfortunately many women are ill-informed about what to expect during their breastfeeding experience.  Although breastfeeding is the most natural way to feed your baby, it does not always come naturally and there is much to learn before you begin.

There is so much to tell you about this subject.  I think it would be best to break it up into several posts and give you everything you need to know to get a great start to your journey as a breastfeeding mother.  I’ll be covering all of these subjects over the next several posts:

I’m really excited about sharing these posts with you.  As a mother who exclusively breastfed all of my children for a minimum of 12 months, I have a lot of experience and have learned a whole lot over those combined 40 months of breastfeeding.  I hope it will be a help and encouragement to you!  We’ll start next week by learning about benefits to the mother.
Tell me, are you planning on breastfeeding your baby, or have you already?

 

Unbound Birth can now be purchased at the new power price of $2.99! You can find it at the Unbound Birth Store.

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