The Boob Group
Peaceful Sleep for Breastfeeding Moms

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Please be advised, this transcription was performed from a company independent of New Mommy Media, LLC. As such, translation was required which may alter the accuracy of the transcription.

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ROBIN KAPLAN: One of the biggest challenges that plagues new parents after their baby is born is how to manage and function on little sleep. That post partum haze can feel quite a feat when mom is caring for her night waking child. Today I’m thrilled to welcome back our expert to the show Dr Wendy Middlemiss. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of North Texas. Today we are discussing tips for a more peaceful sleep for breastfeeding moms. This is The Boob Group, episode 90.

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ROBIN KAPLAN: Welcome to The Boob Group broadcasting from the birth education center of San Diego. The boob group is your weekly online on-the –go support group for all things related to breastfeeding. I’m your host Robin Kaplan. I’m also an international board certified lactation consultant and owner of the San Diego Breastfeeding Center. Did you know that we had over eighty episodes ranging from breastfeeding newborns, infants and toddlers. Just download them from our website the boobgroup.com or use one of our apps available on itunes and amazon marketplace or subscribe to our podcast through itunesand have our episodes automatically added to your account each week. Today we are joined by two lovely panelists in the studio, ladies,will you please introduce yourselves.

RACHEL RAINBOLT: My name is Rachel Rainbolt. I am 31 and I am the author of this age parenting book and I have three wonderful little boys who are now eight, five and two.

CHRISTINA WILSON: Hey, my name is Christina, I’m twenty eight years old, I’m a stay at home mom, I have one son Gregory and he just turned a year on the second of this month.

ROBIN KAPLAN: And I’d like to very quickly just introduce MJ our producer and she’s gonna talk a little bit about our virtual panelist program.

MJ FISHER: Uhuh. Hi guys, I’m MJ. I’m actually a stay at home momas well to my two and a half year old son and then when I’m not busy with him I get and have the pleasure of working with Robin and producing the show which gives me amazing opportunity to help support mommas with their breastfeeding journey. Those of you who don’t know about our VP program its a great way to join our online conversation when we record if your not local or just can’t be in the studio with us but still wanna share your story or your opinion on our topic, you can. When we record, we post on our social medias the same questions we ask our in-studio panelists. Check out our website, the boobgroup.com under the community tab and you’ll find more info on being a virtual panelist and possible perks for participation.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Alright , thanks MJ.

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ROBIN KAPLAN: Alright so for our boob group, we were given an app to take a look at today for one of our upperviews and its called GS Pre- school Games and its for three to six year olds and it has lots of different games likematch the shadows, jigsaw puzzles, finding different letters of the alphabet and so if you just take a look at itgonna see what we think, Rachel do you mind sharing what you thought of it?

RACHEL RAINBOLT: Yeah, I have a five year old and a two year old, so i figured two of my kids would fit nicely in that little window. I found that most of the content was ah was ah it was sort of below where my five year old would be I mean he’s working on you know like reading books and things so like identifying letters and that sort of thing he wasn’t so interested in, uhm it was really bright and flashy and so it’ll capture my two year old’s attention which could be helpful you know if you got like a few minutes to color your nails and to be still and quiet for a minute or two, so that was that was pretty much the extent of our of our playing around with it.yes[laughter]okay—playing around with it [laughter]

ROBIN KAPLAN: So and my kid is a little bit older butI know there was an app that my son used to use, that’s fairly similar to this and it was also free -where he had to find the letter - so while he was learning his alphabet he did find that it would capture his attention for a yo -good five or ten minutes if your sitting and waiting in a doctor’s office or waiting to pick up his brother from school for example and he also did like the matching the pictures as well looking for shadows and seeing where the pictures went. So I think you know it's something that probably when he was closer to four?he would have you know had a good time with but really getting up to probably six?probably a little bit below what he was kind of used to working on say in school or maybe some other different apps that we were using so you know I’d give it, I don’t know if i’d give it a thumbs up or a thumbs down its kind of in the middle uhm but uhm it definitely was something i think he would have used a couple of years ago. MJ what do you think of it?

MJ FISHER: I definitely liked putting the puzzle together, I have a two and a half year old so I don't know if he necessarily captures attention very much but uhm you know I think that definitely in a in a bind be something that we could both maybe you know do together maybe I could teach him more about uhm you know and show him how to do things cause I mean he picks stuff up so quickly uhm and that the maze you know that it seem pretty cool. I think it would be something that uhmI wouldn’t mind trying in a bind definitely uhm but I think I would have to do it with him at this point.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Sure sure. Well so for our ratingsI think we will without giving it a thumbs up I mean its great that its free, its great that its safe we know that when they get on it that they’re gonna have a very limited amount of stuff that they kind of get into and uhm it is something that will keep their attention for a little bit, so thumbs up.

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ROBIN KAPLAN: So last time we had Dr Wendy Middlemiss on the show we chatted about the science behind breastfeeding, bed sharing and sleep training. Now I’d like to take all of that research and use it to offer tips for how moms, breast feeding moms in particular can get more sleep. Our expert Dr Wendy Middlemiss is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of North Texas. She is also the co editor of a brand new book called The Science of Mother- Infant Sleep-current findings on bed sharing, breastfeeding, sleep training and normal infant sleep. So, hi Wendy and welcome back to the show.

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: Hi Robin, how are you?

ROBIN KAPLAN: We’re great , we’re great. We’re so glad to have you back. Wendy first let's start with what normal sleep looks like and what babies needs are around the sleep. When I was reading your book I found one super interesting fact was that compared to other animal neonates, humans are still fetuses for nine to eighteen months after birth. What does this mean in terms of a baby’s needs during this time period?

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: Well basically what that means is that a baby can’t take care of itsel for himself,a need to care of others and that is some very obvious for you know for all of us .We all understand that a baby can’t find food or warmth or do any of the things that lead to survival. What we don’t see so easily but we’re learning very quickly as we’re able to explore more about the human brain and the nerve resistance is that a baby also needs as much support in terms of regulating all those bodily systems. So being able to calm down, being able to transition to sleep , a baby can begin to give us clues about what needs are but the systems that will eventually be our emotional wellbeing and our social well being are elements that intended the caretakers have to kind of maintain. And that it takes a little bit of time for the brain to develop those circuits. In other mammals because, because of our because we stand on two legs and given the physiology of birth, our human infants are born with a very immature brain. And for that, we need to develop over time and thats really what caretakers need to provide during that time period.

ROBIN KAPLAN: And so with relating to sleep time why obviously babies need to wake up in the middle of the night and so what are normal night wakings for babies at different stages for example 2 weeks, 6 weeks, 3 months, 6 months, a year and toddler head cause I know that these really changes.

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: It changes a great deal and it changes individually, really for each baby. Their patterns and their expectations you can have, but each baby will be a bit different so you know moms will have more than one child know that ah that they feel great differences in sleeping patterns and other types of you know developing behaviour for their for their children. But by two weeks of age you know, when after a baby is just born and all the way up actually to about a month of age, the patterns, many of the patterns that governs sleep and patterns of sleep that we think of as natural but its really just adults pattern of sleep are developing.

Our circadian rhythm, under you know that physiological sense of night and day, havinglonger periods of sleep at night really doesn’t develop for that first, for that first month, so that you know thats just a pattern that begins to develop. In the beginning, babies are much more like creatures that spend a couple of hours sleeping, a couple of hours you know variations of awake stage and then back to sleep and awake. A lot of waking will be govern by when they are hungry, so they may eat and then fall back to sleep but its, its very rare that that there isn’t justa continuing cycle of that waking and sleeping. And that will happen through the first month or two months.

Someplace between three and four months, you begin to see an average longer periods of sleep during the nighttime so that, that circadian rhythm. And there’s a circadian rhythm as well that governs patterns of sleep and they will become more regulated over time and their cycles will become better develop, and so by six months, most parents will see a much longer for the most, pretty much longer period of sleeping at night. Infants will you know, vary a great deal both individually and across different infants in how much help they will need each night in returning back to sleep because we all sleep and then wake and then fall back to sleep, as adults and as children and as infants.

Infants very often will wake and require some level of assistance to return back to sleep whether they’re hungry, whether they’re uncomfortable, whether they are startled and so its common for and normative for infants to require that attention when they return back to sleep. And the more we attend to that, the better regulated that cycle become and even though people will talk about you know,” If I attend to my infant at night and they’re going to be in a habit of needing care”,for a short period of time that will be the case but then as that system regulates and develop then that will that will pass away.It will be all the way up until about three years of age for many infants before there’s a real sleep pattern where they don’t wake up at night and they won’t require attention.

And for some that comes earlier and then goes away and then some it doesn’t stay until you know about three years. Its a real variable pattern for three years which isn’t fun to hear but then that means that if thats normative then expecting that is, is normal, normative as well and then what parents can do is try to figure out how they can fit that best into what they need to do.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Absolutely andI’d had no idea that it's up to three years and that really makes a ton of sense. I think we ‘re near in the thick of it, it seems like- oh my gosh how am I gonna do this for three years but knowing that its normal,I think makes things seem a little bit more reasonable. And especially, also thinking just about when kids are teething or they’re learning how to walk, and they’re sick I mean even my seven and eight year olds when they don’t feel well like they’re back in bed with us and they wake a ton in the middle of the night just like we do when we have a cough as well and so attending to those needs, everyone needs their mom(chuckles)I still call my mom..yeah I don’t live with my mom well.. I still call her when I don’t feel well.

MJ FISHER: When you know that other moms are going through the same thing it kind of just lets you ahh you know I mean just feel better too you know, you’re not feeling like you’re so alone and I’m the only one.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Exactly. So Wendy how would parents know if their baby sleep pattern and night wakings are a problem like they’re not normal, they’re they’ve been exacerbated.

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: Well I think that’s very hard to tell in the first year of life and I know that there’s a sense that if babies are waking a certain number of times a week or are requiring attention during the nighttime that is indicative of or predictiveI guess of later sleep problems. But science doesn’t support that very clearly or very strongly. There will be infants who have had problems in the first year who will continue to have problems, but its a very small percentage and I think for parents one piece of information that may be helpful for parents who were going through that is that waking can be normative and waking can change a good deal.

So infants who have been sleeping through what you know what parents would consider to be through the night may then stop doing that for a while dependent upon you know developmental changes, physiological changes all such different things. So if parents can go in with you know face this as a change in a sense that they are very changeable and that may help them not necessarily see them as long term problems. Having a baby waking between six months and a year doesn’t suggest that, that they’re going to have a problem sleeping later on. If a baby is having very serious sleep problem it it's how much waking in that first year I think that would be very difficult to identify that solely.

And I think that you would also see other sort of difficulties as well. But if your baby when they’re waking, is relatively happy during the day they can become frustrated and they can, you can help them calm down if they’re, you’re not new as toddlers as their your not if they’re not showing excessive sleepiness cues when they’re awake then probably their sleep is fine.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Okay. Alright, I’d love to open up this conversation to our panelists in the studio so ladies I really see you‘ve a one year old and two year olds and a little bit older but are your toddlers still waking at this point in the middle of the night and were there times when you feel that their night wakings were more than normal. Rachel how about you?

RACHE RAINBOLT: When I had my first baby I just thought that all babies were supposed to sleep through the night. And I think they were broking and not broken , I was doing something wrong but then you knowI sort of did my research and figure out that surprisingly thats not at all the case. And now with my two year old I have no idea how much he wakes during the night cause he goes asleep and I know sometimes he rolls over the mattress and then rolls back over and falls back to sleep. But I think, for us shifting that focus from getting the baby sleep through the night which really means like sleeping like an adult to just trying to get the most like harmonious rest together like just a game change for us and now I don’t even know how often he wakes which is nice.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Absolutely. How about you Christina?

CHRISTINA WILSON: We , we budge the [?] to the crib, so first part of the night he’s in the crib and he’s normally I’m gonna exclude the last three weeks since he just got his two front teeth, but normally its about every two hours he goes to bed about six thirty and we get him back to sleep within five minutes. And then, once we go to bed he comes to bed with us, and like Rachel I’ve no clue how much he wakes up in the middle of the night because he latches on,I fall asleep. Then there’s a few times when papa you know he’ll sprawl him in the bed but so I’ve really no clue for the rest of the night since we’re bed sharing.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Well thats good I mean at least you guys, you guys are getting good sleep so thats nice. Wendy, night waking is, night waking is often exhausting especially if mom is back to work and she might feel like her needs are not being met ,what tips do you have for mom in this situation?

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: It is very true. You see, it is very difficult for parents and you know it is one of the factors that can make parents feel very stressed in that first year. And if I do have a sense that you know my baby is you know as one woman say is broken, if they’re not sleeping through the night I’m doing something wrong then that can add even additional stress. But with, with many parents both working during the day, that sleep at night is very important.So the two, the two people in, panelists who were talking have devise a way, both of them, to find the pattern where they, they can sleep very well and their infants sleep fairly well.

There will be people who choose not to bed share but then one of the things to do is to try to set up a system where you can deal with that you know night wakings without generating an extreme amount of fatigue. That might be making sure that the baby remains somewhere in the room so that you can attend to the baby quickly when they wake up and then put them back down and have them sleep. The more , there’s research that suggest that the more quickly your response to a child when they wake up at night and do the things that are needed to make them comfortable then they can go back to sleep more quickly. So, that might be one thing to do. Having one parent who attends to them on one night and another that attends to them on the next night can help as well if you know depending upon you know if you have breast milk on a bottle , if you’re or how you’re feeding the baby.

But I think its just that every family has to make those choices and try to figure out a waythat will both address the fact that the baby is likely to wake up and thats just one of the aspect of, of early sleep and how they can attend to that in a manner that gives them the best sleep.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Okay and what should a parent take into consideration when deciding where their baby should sleep? So we have moms in the panel who co- sleep but also Christina does a little bit of crib as well, what, what are some tips for deciding this when parent are kind of jumping into this what they should do?

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: Well, I think there are two big considerations and then the rest are, are just things that each you know, each family needs to decide particularly when the baby is very very young they really need to, the baby really need to be close with the mom you know. The American Academy of Pediatrics would say that the you know, up to a certain age the baby needs to stay with the parent in the parents room wherever the parent is sleeping. And thats protection against any event or [inaudible], just being aware of the infant’s breathing through the night.

And those really are you know the breathing through the night is the other criteria for the parent in terms of deciding where the baby sleeps. The baby needs to be in a space where their breathing, their airway is clear and they’re sleeping on their back there aren’t tools and such anywhere around. That should be the other criteria. Once you have and able to take into account all of these safety concerns for infant sleep and keeping the baby nearby then, then the rest is really is up to the parent.

Whether they have the baby in bed with them, whether they do them more than one type of sleep location its just very important that whatever location you’re going to use that you make sure that they are safe and its kind of like baby proofing a house you would want to do that before you use them. I think one of the places where risk is often introduced is if you don’t normally bed share for instance and then one night you choose to because then your bed probably isn’t safe location for your infant. So attending to those things first are probably I think, I see, as the biggest key in terms of deciding where your baby should sleep.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Okay and ladies you know one of the questions we hear a lot is -well if I bed share my kids are gonna graze all night and I may not get sleep- but it actually sounds that the grazing is probably taking place and you all are getting a heck of a lot more sleep than other families and so how, how does this work for you? Rachel.

RACHEL RAINBOLT: Well, we have a bed that sort of side card with our bed so there’s a twin size bed that’s right up next to our king and they’re gonna push together so he has his own sleeping space. If he will fill for the first half of the night where he attain that first cycle of sleep which is usually the deepest and the longest, so he sleeps there after he falls asleep andI’ll slide him over and he’s there for the first half of the night and thats where I can really shut down and get that really deeper sort of sleep. And then at some point he sort of scurries over as well you know latch and then snooze some more and i’ll be drowsing and sleeping and cuddling along with him and thats kind of what works for us . I think what also helps is that he falls asleep later, my kid falls asleep later and wake up later which is sort of my natural rhythm so then we are sort of on the same sleeping rhythm.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Sure. How about you Christina has, do you find that your son kind of grazes and how do you sleep through it.

CHRISTINA WILSON: I don't know. I don’t know.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Was there ever a problem?

CHRISTINA WILSON: No, I’ve always been, I mean I’ve noticed I used to be a really deep sleeper. When he’s in the bed with me now, I’m a much more of a light sleeper but him its usually if he punches me or he kicks me then I wake up. But if he just latches on I , it doesn’t bother me and I sleep you know sleep pretty well.

ROBIN KAPLAN: How about you MJ?

MJ FISHER: I was gonna say we have the same set up as Rachel. So the twin up against the wall and then our queen up against that so kind of the same thing but I actually wasn’t sleeping very good when we first started to really bed share cause we’re close in bed a lot, just bring him in but then, we just completely started bed sharing and but what I found was I wasn’t, I was like tense when I was nursing you know so I, and I was trying to make sure that the latch was good and when we first started doing it so I found I told one of my momma friends and she said put a pillow behind your back so that you’re not you know just all tense and not you know having obviously restful sleep. And it really helped because I just kind of you know knew that I was getting you know some sort of.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Support behind you

RACHEL RAINBOLT: Yeah. Training wheels for bed sharing

MJ FISHER: Exactly.

Panelist: how cool

MJ FISHER: Exactly so it sort of definitely help me cause I wasn’t, my body was hurting the next day and really just not, not getting restful sleep. So I you know, Ikind of corrected it with that and with I dont use the pillow now not just because he’s two and a half he does the same thing he will nurse then puff up and roll over and I did the same thing all the other way and we’re butt to butt. So ,we’re good now.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Very cool. Alright when we come back we will continue this conversation in the end where we will discuss some more tips for some peaceful sleep for mommas. I will be right back.

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ROBIN KAPLAN: Welcome back to the show. We are chatting with Ms Wendy Middlemiss and we are talking about peaceful sleep for the breastfeeding mom. So Wendy when moms are told not to nurse their babies to sleep or they will always have to breastfeed their babies to sleep, is this true? If babies are used to this as part of their bedtime routine will this routine be difficult to break if mom no longer wants to do this?

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: No not really, there are, y’know any changes, if you know if a mom were breastfeeding her infant to sleep and then decided that it was time to wean the baby or to change the sleep practices that can be done. It takes time and patience and you know its its something that needs to be done in a response succession.But if the question that moms have is you know- If I’m you know, are the sleeping with my baby now or I’m breastfeeding my baby to sleep, and then putting them down, is this the only way they will ever transition to sleep?

The one true answer to that is no, no they will what you’re helping to build very often are the regulatory systems and changes that help an infant learn how to go to sleep and how to transition to sleep. And if you’re breastfeeding a child to sleep or if you’re just holding them or rocking them to sleep that does become part of that cycle of how they learn to calm down. But then as moms want the transition out of that, if that’s the choices they’re making, then they begin to take that calming and create that calming without necessarily the breastfeeding or without the rocking and then you transition in you know away from that type of calming to a different type of calming.

It would be something that would you know, you would need to plan forward and you would need to just you know create that change. But it isn’t as though if you’re holding your baby while you know until they fall asleep or breastfeeding your baby till they fall asleep thats going to be the requirement for them be able to enter that stage of sleep. That calming is actually that physiological transition is very important but there are other ways to replace that calming if you know if the parent and the baby are beginning the transition into a different choice or routine.

ROBIN KAPLAN: That actually kind of jumps into my next question. Toni had posted on our facebook page that her eleven- month old will not sleep on his own at all. When she puts him in his crib, he’ll sleep for about an hour or two and then wake up wanting her again. And so she was wondering how she can correct this issue or help him without him screaming non-stop and she doesn't want to be mean either and so for parents who don’t bed share what are some tips for dealing with this nigh-waking without having a cry out?

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: Y’know its just something that, everything has to be done, in stages and small steps. And I think that when we approach changing, in changing a pattern in an infant in that manner then it's much more successful because we’re not asking for big change. If my, if I’ve always been there when my baby wakes up then my baby is going to expect that I’m going to be there and with that expectation they may well become distressed, cry when , when that isn't the case.

So if that has been you know Toni’s baby wakes and won’t go back to sleep on his own you know be put down, you know it may way too much of a transition just to put the baby on the crib and leave the baby there to settle even though they’ve been, the baby has been, he’s been sleeping there on his own.

So I know that there are sleep programs where moms are helped to settle babies by, by you know providing comfort without picking them up. So, that would keep the mom present, that would keep the comfort present and then you can begin to build you know less contact, the most you know just more presence and less contact you know when the baby’s awake. But it's really you know, it's a process a baby has an expectation and you have to change that expectation without necessarily taking away the responsive care.

The responsive care is important physiologically and in regard to regulatory processes so its just a matter of trying to you know to make that transition. And know if we talk about sleep training, you can extinguish an infant’s crying but that doesn't replace the , that doesn't necessarily read to a lack of physiological distress or help with that regulatory system. So the other way to do it and you know she points out that she doesn't want to be in that position, the other way to do that is to find ways to slowly decrease, the amount of responses lessen so he becomes comfortable with her not being there.

Even if just you know putting him down and rubbing his back for a little bit for [inaudible] you know just rubbing his back a little bit then picking him up then you know little by little that he will begin to feel the comfort of just that presence and then she can build on that.in terms of a change.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Okay. Great great. Rachel I have a question for you since you have a couple older children. So what did you find was helpful for replacing that kind of nursing to sleep as your children got older? What kind of routine should you build into this to help them go to sleep peacefully?

RACHEL RAINBOLT: Well our nighttime routine included things other than breastfeeding so like when we do bath time I will do a massage or rubbing their backs and then we will read lot and lots of stories when we were all cuddled together and then whichever right now my youngest he’s nursing he’ll just nurse during the story time so there’s kind of this whole ritual around nighttime of which breastfeeding is one component of it and i would say that I never really l like wean the other ones off the breastfeeding, I’m just part of their night time routine just sort of as they you know grew and develops that just sort of you know they sort of age out of it and found that they didn't need it anymore and are more excited about the stories and the boxing and then and then just sort of naturally unfolded that way.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Yeah. Christina how about you? What’s part of your night time routine?

CHRISTINA WILSON: We , we really don't have one. It's pretty much we just breastfeed when he starts getting sleepy, we start breastfeeding and he gets sleepier and sleepier finally he falls asleep. We put him in the crib and thats that. We dont have much of a routine yet.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Oh Thats okay. It's working.

CHRISTNA WILSON: It's working. We’re not fixing whats not broken.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Exactly. Wendy , you know we have so much pressure as new moms dealing with others opinions on what babies sleep pattern should look like and how the baby who sleeps through the night is just this you know good baby thats you know what we were aiming for, how, how can we challenge these sleep myths and our changing cultural world. There are so many people out there who believe that babies must become self reliant at such an early age?

DR WENDY MIDDLEMISS: It is a huge problem. And because they what we’re doing really is defining sleep as good when it's not really very normative in terms of patterns of sleep.And I think we change by the types of words that we use and the expectations that those words suggest. I imagine particularly having young instances y’know where young children consistently ask “ so hows your baby sleeping it just it seems to be the comfortable question that we can ask socially of new parents. And so it I, and so one of the things that I’ve done is I refuse myself to ask that question(laughs) because it then becomes the focus of the child.

You know, are they sleeping or are they not sleeping. And the other just to keep in mind what normative patterns are and when people ask” hey were they sleeping, you know they’re sleeping pretty well for four months old you know or we have a fairly good pattern instead of focusing on the amount of the sleep, focusing on how its working for you. Is it something that you’re working on or you know its working really we’re working y’know we’re trying to change just one part and we’re trying to learn and having it more of raising an infant is really helpful I think.. We’re working on this together. It's a fallback into that, into that fence that infants aren't doing this on their own and is there waking up and it isn't because of something that parents are doing it's just that we’re figuring how it works.

ROBIN KAPLAN: Alright that sounds great. Well, thank you so much Wendy and to our incredible panelists we really really appreciate you guys coming into the studio today as well. So thank you for discussing this very important topic thats on the minds of pretty much all parents of small children. And for our Boob Group club members our conversation will continue after the end of the show as Wendy will discuss her top tips dealing with nap time struggles. For more information on our Boob Group Club please visit our website at www.TheBoobGroup.com

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ROBIN KAPLAN: So we have a story from one of our listeners-This is from Shelly Rogers and this is what she wrote ”I have a very positive breastfeeding story to share. When I had my first child four years ago, my mother was not the most supportive person while I breastfeed my daughter. She was an outright against it but didn't understand why i didn't give my baby a bottle and let anyone else feed her.

I tried to educate my mom on breastfeeding and I was formula fed and tried to normalized breastfeeding for her as much as I could when I was around her. I just didn't know that she got it until this past December. My mom volunteers at an outpatient clinic at a local hospital. Last month, she and another volunteer noticed a mom nursing her baby while in the waiting room. The other volunteer asked the woman to nurse in a private area so that she wont make the men in the waiting room feel uncomfortable to which the woman obliged.

When my mom found out she told the other volunteer that her daughter, me, still nurse her four year old granddaughter and that she shouldn't have told that lady to nurse somewhere else. Then my mother went to the volunteer’s supervisor and actually tattled on her. Hah, I’m so glad that my mom understood how important breastfeeding is to me. And I cry every time I tell someone what she did”. So thank you so much Shelly we really appreciate you sending this up.

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ROBIN KAPLAN: That wraps up our show for today. We appreciate you listening to the Boob Group. Don't forget to check out our sister show Preggie Pals for Expecting Parents, Our show Savers for Moms, dads with newborns, infants and toddlers and our brand new show Twin Talks from parents of twins. Thank you for listening to The Boob Group your judgement for breastfeeding resource.

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This has been a New Mommy Media production. Information and material contained in this episode are presented for educational purposes only. Statements and opinions expressed in this episode are not necessarily those of New Mommy Media and should not be considered facts. Though information in which areas are related to be accurate, it is not intended to replace or substitute for professional, Medical or advisor care and should not be used for diagnosing or treating health care problem or disease or prescribing any medications. If you have questions or concerns regarding your physical or mental health or the health of your baby, please seek assistance from a qualified health care provider.

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