The Boob Group
Unexpected Outcomes: When Baby Passes
[00:00:00]
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.
ROBIN KAPLAN: When Ronald Reagan proclaimed October to be National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month, he noted that when a child losses a parent. They are called an orphan. And when a spouse losses their partner, they are called a widow or widower. But there is no word to describe a parent who losses their child and unfortunately it is something that many families do indeed have to deal with.
Today we are joined with Rose deVigne Jackiewicz, an RN, an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant at Kaiser in San Diego California. Today we are discussing Unexpected Outcomes: When a Baby Passes. This is The Boob Group, episode 76.
[Theme Music/Intro]
ROBIN KAPLAN: Welcome to The Boob Group, Broadcasting from the Birth Education Center of San Diego. to The Boob Group is your weekly online the on-the-go support group for all things related to breastfeeding. I am your host Robin Kaplan. I am also an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and owner of the San Diego Breastfeeding Center.
Did you know that all of our episodes are now free? You heard me correctly; we have opened up our archives so that our listeners have access to all of our episodes anytime anywhere. Just download them from our website, www.newmommymedia.com , you can use our Apps which are available on iTunes and Amazon market place or you can subscribe to our podcast through iTunes and have our episodes automatically added to your account each week.
Today I am joined by two amazing panelists in the studio, ladies would you please introduce yourselves.
RACHEL REDHOUSE: Hi, I am Rachel Redhouse. I am 31 and I run a home daycare. I have 4 living children, Aden is 8, Kayah is 7, Olivia is almost 5 and Avery is 2 and I have also had two losses. One a full term loss!
ROBIN KAPLAN: Thank You! Jessica!
JESSICA R: Hi I am Jessica R. I am 33 years-old. I am a researcher doing brain cancer research. I have one living child, she is 6 and a half weeks old right now, Elise and I have one baby that passed away when we was 5 and a half weeks old, Griffin, about year ago.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Thank you for joining us.
[Theme Music]
ROBIN KAPLAN: Here is an email we got from one of our listeners. Hi Boob Group, I am currently breastfeeding my 11th month old baby and my family keeps asking if I am going to wean her once she turns 1 year-old. I just listened to your episode about how breast milk still has nutritional value after the baby turns a year old. I was wondering where I can find articles about these benefits so that I can share them with my family members next time they bring up the topic. Do you have any recommendations? Sincerely Rebecca from Washington.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Hi Rebecca, thanks for your question. Yes, there are many resources online that discuss the nutritional value of breast milk after the first year of your baby’s life. I have a few on my website actually which is the www.sandiegobreastfeedingcenter.com and it is a great place to start. Our article does breast milk have nutritional value after a year list a bunch of statistic form a research article by Dueeve in 2001 in the Pediatric clinics of North America journal. This article states that “In the second year of life, 448 mL of breast milk provides 29% of your baby’s energy requirements, 43% of protein requirements, 36% of calcium requirements, 75% of vitamin A requirements, 76% of folate requirements, 94% of vitamin B12 requirements and 60% of vitamin C requirements. That is a lot of nutritional value in that amount of breast milk.
Next, Kelly mom has a huge list of research articles on her website on a page title “Breastfeeding Passed Infancy”. Here you can find resources about the nutritional and immunological benefits of breast milk passed the year plus all of the additional benefits breastfeeding has for both mom and baby after a year.
After scanning over these 50 plus articles on her website, you should have all of the resources you need to convince your family members that breastfeeding beyond a year is a tremendous gift you can give to your baby.
Lastly I thought you might enjoy connecting with other moms online about their experiences breastfeeding beyond infancy. I feel my favorite articles are “Enjoy It While it Last” on The Slacker Mom blog, “Yes, She's 4, and Yes, She's Still Breastfeeding” on the Normal Like Breastfeeding blog and “The Last Time That Never Was” on the Blacktating blog.
I hope that these resources were helpful, thanks so much for our email Rebecca.
[Theme Music]
ROBIN KAPLAN: Today’s topic on The Boob Group is unexpected outcomes; what happens with a mother’s milk supply when her baby passes and one of the reasons we are talking about this is because October is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month. I am incredibly grateful to have Rose as our expert today and for our brave panelist on our show.
Rose is a Registered Nurse and an IBCLC at Kaiser in San Diego California. Thank you for joining us Rose and welcome back to the show.
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: Thank you for asking me. I am happy to be here.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Rose, I know you have spoken on this topic multiple times, what brought you to this specialty area?
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: My background is high risk labor and delivery and I used to work with moms in labor when we knew things like this are going to happen. But that was like 35 years ago, we won’t do the math here. But as a lactation consultant, working with moms in the hospital, in the NICU and as well outpatient, I can remember my very first patient that I was asked to see to teach her how to position her baby at breast and I found that this was a baby that had terminal illness and that mom was taking the baby home to pass at home. It was one of the hardest consult that I have ever had to do. But when I saw the mom holding her baby and it was the one thing that only she could do. It is like – I have had an interest in it ever since and over the years I have worked with moms that either knew their baby was not going to survive or the baby had just passed away, because mom’s need the extra help because when we are talking about milk supply, it is something that’s so very near and dear to me that I am there to help mom’s through this time.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Thank you. Rose how common is infant loss and what are some of the different reasons why an infant or baby might pass either before, during or after birth?
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: There are lots of different reasons and probably a very good website to look at is March of Dimes and according to March of Dimes, there is anywhere from 10-15% of babies that will miscarry before 20 weeks. After 20 weeks, between 13 and 19 weeks about 1-5%, they don’t always know. It could be a variety of reasons from chromosome problems, hormonal issues, still born’s occur 1 in 160 pregnancies, most occur before labor starts. There are other situations where is conditions incompatible with life and there are too many, well not too many but it not easy to list all those because they vary.
We don’t always know, sometimes we know but either way it is something that is very unexpected and when the moms find out and sometimes they don’t find out until after the birth that they discovered that there is something that is not right.
ROBIN KAPLAN: That is great. Thank you! So ladies would you mind sharing your story and then we will talk about the choices you made for your milk supply.
RACHEL REDHOUSE: My son Jonathan Taylor, we called him JT, he was born at 32 weeks and we had an emergency C-Section and we knew before he was born that he had Posterior Urethral Valves that is basically blockage in the urethra. He had no amniotic fluid. They put him on life support and I immediately started pumping. As Rose said that is something that I could completely control. So they gave me a nice big pump and I pumped immediately and brought my little bit of Colostromen and on day three they told us that he was not going to make it. So I had a little bit of Colostromen saved up in their freezer, didn’t seem like much but I am sure that it was enough. Unfortunately we had to take him off life support and at that point I was told by doctors and lactation consultants to just kind of let myself drop. I was never told anything differently, so I went home and they told me, okay, take some hormonal birth control just kind of wrap your breast really, really tight which now a days is not, this was about 10 years ago, so they don’t really do that anymore. My milk came in actually I think the day I went home from the hospital and it was very painful, it was stressful. I wished I had known then what I know now about what to do with yourself as far as you know drying up and all that stuff.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Thank you! How about you Jessica?
JESSICA R: So my son Griffin was born at 41 weeks. I was induced perfect pregnancy, perfect labor delivery, he was taken to the NICU about 5 minutes after he was born because he wasn’t breathing quite right but we assumed everything was fairly normal. Over the next couple of days everything seemed okay, we were talking about bringing him home fairly soon, everything the doctor has told us seemed like it wasn’t going to be anything major. So I started pumping, I was able to breastfeed him about 18 hours after he was born. He eat amazingly, he looked perfectly normal, healthy baby and about 2 days after he was born we had (unclear) assess him, not our choice, it was something the doctors recommended. We found out that there was probably something wrong but we weren’t sure. When it was supposed to be fatal but there is only six other cases in the world so we didn’t really know too much about – 5 days after he was born, he was rushed to Ready Children’s Hospital from Scripps Memorial and we knew, he almost didn’t survive that. We knew there was something really wrong and so this whole time I was either breastfeeding him or pumping. I was told to pump 8 times every 24 hours, at least 15 minutes, I produced a lot of milk and so I just started freezing whatever – once I had enough I start freezing whatever he wasn’t eating.
Every time we talked to the doctors it was like when you bring him home he will be on oxygen for this longer, he will be on this medication and gradually just got a lot worse. He had (unclear), Calathorax which is fluid around the lungs, serious of problems and we found that his Lymphatic systems didn’t develop properly which controls all the fluids in your body. So he could never regulate that and his hearth started to fail and so I producing almost a liter of milk a day and I was pumping maybe 10 minutes, 8 times a day and I kept thinking well this is going to be great because I am going to get him home and at some point I am not going to have to keep breastfeeding him. I will feed him what’s in the freezer and I can slowly wean him off through that.
Then we found out that the genetic condition he had we made the really difficult, I don’t really think it is the decision, but we moved him to Hospice. There is nothing they could do for him, he would have needed a heart and lung transplant. He probably wouldn’t have that side of the hospital if he did that would have been constant trips to the emergency room. So a bunch of the milk I had pumped was Ronald McDonald house where we were actually staying across the street in freezer and then I had a lot of milk that was stored in the freezer at the NICU and they told me that I was actually taking over space of other peoples because I was producing so much. In the process of moving to Hospice, some of the milk came with me, some of it stayed at Ronald McDonald. He passed away about a week after we got to Hospice which was actually amazing because we had some really great days with him. Anybody that saw him other than the oxygen tube, he looked completely health. So that was very special, very hard though but very special.
I breastfeed him again actually and then after he passed I talked to a lactation consultants about donating milk and I got all the paper work on it, I brought home what I could keep in our freezer and the rest of it stayed at Hospice and over the next couple of weeks, I just couldn’t handle all the stuff that needed to be done for donating milk between finding about vaccines and getting paper work and doctors signing off and all of that. It was just way too much for me.
So the milk that was at Hospice actually got thrown away and the milk that we had in the freezer was – I think it was about 150 ounces approximately. I kept that until December, I just didn’t know what to do with it and I couldn’t handle the paper work and I couldn’t throw it away and eventually I went online and I thought that there has to be – even if I sell it for a penny or something I thought there has to be something I can do and I found a website called Human Milk 4 Human Babies with a numeric 4 and I got on their local facebook page and immediately found someone that needed milk. She couldn’t physically produce enough, she had a condition and two days later she swung by my place and I gave her all of this milk and she had a 4 week old baby. It was extremely emotional but at the same time, I saw her and I think we said “hi” and we just hugged and she wrote me a card and gave me a gift card, she said I know this is nothing compared to what you are doing for me but I just wanted to show how grateful we are and so I was happy that I could do that and I was happy that I was able to provide that for someone else. I just wish that all the other milk that got thrown away, I could have done something with it I guess.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Absolutely! Rose if a baby passes before or during or soon after birth will mom’s milk supply still come in maybe even if she is not pumping?
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: Unfortunately all her body knows is she has just give birth and with the delivery of the Placenta, the shift of the hormones, the milk supply decides I am suppose to come in sometime between day 2 and day 5 and knowing that is what a natural thing for the body to do is, we need to be talking to these moms about how to prevent or what they can do about that. But unfortunately, YES, it does come in.
We have had women who had lost a baby at 20 weeks pregnant and 5 days later they are engorged leaking with milk. So YES, unfortunately it does happen.
ROBIN KAPLAN: And you had mentioned some options, so what and obviously the ladies in the studio have talked about some options and so what are these options for mom who is lactating after her baby or her child has passed?
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: Definitely several options and one of them which we have already have heard here is donating to a milk bank. But yet, like she said just doing the paper work, having to get all the lab work result was just too much. You can still donate to the milk bank even if you don’t fill out all those paper works and provide all the results. What they will do is you use that milk for research which is awesome because more research is needing to be done on breast milk and what is in it. But if you want it to be used for other babies through the milk bank you do have the fill out that information and the milk is then pasteurized and then distributed to whoever is needing that milk.
She found a private organization, the different with those are – they are issues with health and what is in the milk and what is not in the milk but those are definitely avenues but the other things too is talking to moms about what options are. I mean if I see a mom prenatal we can talk about these options. Trying to prevent the milk supply from coming in is probably the most common things because mom’s go “I don’t need something to remind me” and so there are ways to try to help prevent or to minimize the breast engorgement. The birth control pill that was mentioned here, how long does it take a pill to kick in? It takes days, by then your milks are already in. So working with an experienced lactation consultant to find out how can I minimize what is coming in. If it does come in then instead of quitting cold turkey which then you are miserable for days. On top of the misery you are already having to go through then what an option is to gradually pump off to comfort and that way you are not so miserable.
The options are drying up right way, pump and donate or pump gradually to decrease if your full milk supply comes in.
ROBIN KAPLAN: And Rachel you had kind of talked about how you are very uncomfortable with the binding and just didn’t feel good. So your milk has started to coming in , you mentioned that you were kind of guided into saying “that this was your only option” essentially so how did you feel about that?
RACHEL REDHOUSE: I think at that time I was – it was like I didn’t have any control over it. I mean it was going to come in no matter what and that was fine with me. I think the biggest problem I had was that everybody was not very sensitive about the situation; they just didn’t want to deal with it. So they said “All well, you know you can do this or this”. I remember having a lactation consultant come in and her asking what I needed from her. Well I said I need some advice on how to dry up or you know what I am supposed to do at this point. I have never had a baby, this was my first baby, I don’t know what I am doing. She said what did the doctor tell you and I said well you know I could take hormonal birth control and she said “Okay well that is good and just wear a really tight binding” and that was the end of it. I said “Okay thanks”.
I think it was difficult because I was dealing with this emotional and physical pain from having surgery and then I was – I mean really painful to be engorged and there was nothing I could do about it and I had no control over it. I think it made it a lot worse, the grieving process, it was so physical, it was that physical aspect – it was compounded.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Jessica your situation was a little bit different. So your milk supply was obviously was already in. Did you chose to continue to pump after your has passed or did you gradually start to wean like Rose was talking about.
JESSICA R: So once we decided to move him to Hospice, I started pumping less and less, part of it was that also took away from my time with him when he was in the NICU. So I was actually somewhat better about pumping so much and I was mad that I had this huge supply in the freezer that I was never going to get it used for him that took me away from him also. So I started to sort of wean myself off pumping and I don’t remember when but I know I got down to pumping twice a day but I could not get passed that point and it was already so painful and I was having you know felt like rocks in my breast. I didn’t feel that I got the best advice from all the different lactation consultants at the NICU before I moved to Hospice. I tried cabbage leaves; I went to the whole foods and got this sage tea extract. I didn’t know about birth control and I just kept trying to pump less and less but I had to pump something. I tried cold pump presses and then I ended up talking to a woman who is a lactation consultant also did our prenatal birth class and she is amazing, Dianne Randle and she told me about Sudafed and Sudafed worked like magic, compared to everything else and maybe I had already tapped off so much that I was at a point where it would help but within three days I was so much more comfortable and not having the pump.
ROBIN KAPLAN: When we come back we will discuss with Rose the options that mom’s have to deal with their milk supply after her baby, her child passes. We will be right back.
[Theme Music]
ROBIN KAPLAN: Welcome back to the show, we are here with Rose deVigne-Jackiewicz, and a RN and IBCLC in San Diego with Kaiser and we are talking about Unexpected Outcome: What to do with a mom’s supply after her baby passes.
So Rose, we had spoken about these options where mom’s can either dry up or partially start to dry up as well as or continue to pump. For the mom who is going to dry up her milk supply after a loss and she wants to do it quickly, like Rachel was saying she was dealing with engorgement and been really uncomfortable – she said for about 2 weeks and so clearly that is concern for moms. What is your advice for how to quickly dry up? You had mentioned Sudafed; some of the mom’s had mentioned cabbage leaves, birth control pill. What other things can a mom do help dry up her supply.
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: Mom’s will become engorged and many times they are told if you are engorged you are going to get Mastitis. Theoretically she is at risk for Mastitis, I don’t see that happen often in this kind of situation. But mom’s vary which is why I think working individually with lactation consultants because some mom’s are going to dry up more quickly but for some mom’s who the milk supply just keep coming and coming they need maybe some more aggressive. But typically a snuck (unclear) but not binding, some mom’s are also told don’t drink fluids, well that is not a good idea. You want to continue to take care of yourself and stay well hydrated.
The cool compressor, cabbage, many times can work but you do need to use the green cabbage 24/7, change it every couple of hours which helps to decrease the swelling and dry it up but when that doesn’t work then pumping to comfort but minimizing the stimulation where as Sage tea my work for one mom. Sudafed has been extremely helpful because often mom’s would call in to say “I have got a cold what can I take”, well we don’t want you to take this, this and this because it will decrease your milk supply.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Sudafed been one of those.
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: Sudafed been one of those, absolutely. Birth control pills have been used the combination, but sometimes it takes a week or so for that to kick in. But my suggestion definitely is to work with an experience lactation consultant, if you are not beginning to feel better within 24 to 48 hours, you need to call back and say “what you are having me do is not working” and if she has no other options maybe asking her does she have a colleague or somebody who is specialized in loss. Some of the agencies at work with mom’s and families sometimes will have expertise. Like Empty Cradle for example, they are going to have somebody there who has been through this and is going to be able to sometimes give you maybe even better advice, more helpful advice than a lactation consultant who maybe hasn’t work in this specialty.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Rachel, you had mentioned that it took about 2 weeks for you to feel more comfortable, so what do you think did work and how did you feel during this process.
RACHEL REDHOUSE: I think the hormonal birth control definitely did help, obviously it took some time because that takes time to get into your system and start working. Other than that I think it was just time. I wasn’t pumping at all, I didn’t have a pump at home so I didn’t have that option even to relieve it or hand express. It was difficult because it was a constant reminder of the loss. It was a process that I wanted it to be done and be over with. Although I wanted to remember him I didn’t want to remember that physical aspect of it and the pain. So it was a long drawn out process and it was about 2 weeks till I finally started to feel some relief and then probably a month before it was dried up and I didn’t really pump that long. I only pumped for a couple of days when he was in the NICU and once my milk came in he already passed. So after that I never pumped. So it was a little shocking to me that it took so long to dry up.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Jessica how about you? How long did the drying up process take for you? And what worked for you? You had mentioned Sudafed you found really worked well.
JESSICA R: I felt that the Sudafed worked extremely well, I think I was tapering off for so many weeks because I was producing so much milk and I had such painful breast the whole time even when I was just pumping 8 times a day, I still had a really painful breast. I think my lack of experience and I kind of got different advice depending on what lactation consultant they talked to. So I just kept trying different things and I think from the time I started to tapper to the time I was actually not pumping anymore and made it more comfortable is probably 4 weeks.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Rose for mom who decides to continue to produce milk, what are her options for donating and how often should she pump?
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: Part of those is going to depend on what mom’s goal is. One of the mom’s that I met, her baby actually died before birth and she had talked to a friend and decided that she wanted to pump and donate to try to make something good out of this horrendous experience and so when I met with her, her goal was just and she had gotten very engorged as well. But her goal was just to pump to relieve the engorgement and provide that milk to the milk bank and as far as how often she would pump, she would pump when she got full. So instead of that you got to pump 8 times a day, if you don’t feel full until 5 hours – 6 hours, wait 5 hours- 6 hours and then again if you are wanting to produce as much milk then you would basically still pump more often but many of these mom’s want to donate that milk but without working on – let’s see how much milk we can make and so they would pump anywhere from every 3 to 4 or 5 hours and as that stretched out it became 5 to 6 hours and then 7 to 8 hours but this one mom she ended up producing and donating to the milk bank over 2000 ounces and she said it was very, very satisfying for her because he was able to do something positive.
So it really kind of depends on what mom’s goal is. If she says my milk is in, I am going to pump to donate to where it be local agency or milk bank, pump when you feel like you need to. As you pump less and less, your milk supply decreases more and more. So part of it is really, what is mom want to do and in that I think it is the lactation consultant’s role is to help her decide what is going to best for you, not what do I think is best for you but what is going to be best for you.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Have any of our virtual panelist want to share anything.
Mj FISHER: Yeah, actually I do have one momma who is shared her story a little bit and she actually mentioned back to the drying up the supply after a loss, Earth Mamma Baby…
ROBIN KAPLAN: Earth Mamma Angel Baby!
Mj FISHER: Yeah there we go, I am trying to bring up right now, but she said that it worked really well and she it is a loving internet friends and Earth Mamma Angel Baby, no more milk tea, I was skeptical but it helped a lot. I drink three cups or so a day for 6 weeks and one for at least another 4 weeks and then after that it generally dried me up. It was soothing and it even tastes good. So you know of course she didn’t donate but that was what she did in order to dry up.
ROBIN KAPLAN: That is great to know. Ladies what advice do you have for mom who is trying to decide what to do about her milk, whether she should or not necessarily what she should do but what her options are and what might be helpful. Rachel how about you?
RACHEL REDHOUSE: I think that maybe consulting people who have been through it before, obviously with a group like Empty Cradle, you have lots of people who have been through this experience and just knowing all your options, getting as much information as you can on either drying up or donating because I don’t feel like I had those options and if I did I may have made a different choice. So getting the options and really making sure that you make the decision based on your emotional state. Not what you think you should do or what everyone expects you to do.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Can you tell us a little bit about it Empty Cradle.
RACHEL REDHOUSE: Empty Cradle is a local organization at San Diego County and we have four meeting a months and we help moms and dad and families who have had a loss with Miscarriage, Stillbirth, SIDS or an Infant Loss. We have monthly meetings like I said, we have a walk in November and it is just we have phone support, internet support, facebook support and it is all run through volunteers, amazing people who do it and a lot of people who get the support through the group end up going on and helping later on but we just offer a lot of different support for those who have lost a baby in one way or another.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Thank you! Jessica how about you what advice would you have for mom trying to make the decision of whether to dry up or continue to pump.
JESSICA R: I think I just re-irate what Rachel said, it is really about where you are at emotionally and what feels right for you. I think in the sort of baby loss community a lot of – what we say to each other is there is no right answer, there is no right thing to do, there is no right thing to say or how to feel or nobody can tell you any of this thing. It is very personal. I could have the exact same experiences as Rachel and we would handle it differently and that is completely fine. So really it is up to the individual and how she is feeling. Some people find it a positive experience, other people find pumping very degrading. Everybody is different and that is okay.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Rose what would you add.
ROSE DEVIGNE JACKIEWICZ: That is what I would say, my job as a lactation consultant, if you have not met anybody like from Empty Cradle, is to share with you hear what some other mothers have done. But some moms are ready to talk to somebody from Empty Cradle right away other go you know what I need sometime. But to be able to say here what your options are and I think you are exactly right, there is No right, there is No wrong, it is extremely individualized and personalized and just to let mom know I am here to help. Call with any questions and to be there with her and that I think is something that doesn’t happen a lot. We are afraid of you, we are afraid to come into room, we don’t know what to say to you and what we need to be willing to do is come and just sit with you, cry with you and acknowledge this is a horrendous thing. I can’t possibly know because I haven’t had it. I can only imagine what it must be like, I have had family members who have lost babies to be to able to come in and be with you and sit with you and cry with you and just be there for you and help you. But there are agencies out there that are amazing and extremely helpful and working with you over the next year, 2, 3, 4 years however long it takes.
ROBIN KAPLAN: Thank you! Alright well thank you so much to Rose and to our incredible panelists for sharing this immensely valuable information about what a mother can do with supply after her baby passes. For your Boob Group club members our conversation will continue after the end of this show as Rose will discuss some online resources for mothers who are dealing with a loss of a child. For more information about our Boob Group Club please visit our website www.theboodgroup.com
[Theme Music]
ROBIN KAPLAN: Before we wrap things up here is Amber Mccane talking about the best online breastfeeding recourses.
AMBER MCCANE: Hello Boob Group listeners I am Amber Mccane, an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and the owner of Nourish Breastfeeding Support just outside of Washington DC. I am here to answer some of your most common questions when it comes to finding quality breastfeeding resources online, such as I have got a freezer for milk that I have pumped, where can I donate. I once had a mother called me to tell me that she was so proud that she pumped so much milk that they were having to pour it down the sink. Nothing takes care in the heart of lactation consultant quiet like that.
Many breastfeeding mothers are also pumping and can gather an excess of milk. I have heard of mothers who need to purchase new upright freezer for all their milk. If you are ever in a situation where you have more milk than your baby needs would you consider donating some to HMBANA designated milk bank. HMBANA standard for The Human Milk Banking Association of North America and they are attached with gathering, processing and distributing donor milk to NICU all over the country.
For these fragile infants, donor milk can literally be a matter of life or death. Wouldn’t it feel really good to be part of that miracle?
One note: Please understand there are a number of other milk bank that take donations from mothers and sell the milk at a profit. Check to make sure that the bank you are considering is a HMBANA designated one.
Please check them out at www.hmbana.org . Thank you for listening. I am Amber Mccane, I would love for you to check out my website at www.nourishbreastfeeding.com for information on my business and a little bit more about where to get connected with great online breastfeeding support or join me on my facebook page at www.facebook.com/nourishbreastfeeding and you have a great online breastfeeding resource you like us to know about please send me an e-mail, you can do it to amber@nourishbreastfeeding.com or share it on The Boob Group facebook page. You sure do listen to The Boob Group each week for more fantastic conversation about breastfeeding and how to find great breastfeeding support.
ROBIN KAPLAN: This wraps up our show for today. We appreciate you listening to The Boob Group. Don’t forget to check out our sister shows, Preggie Pals’ for Expecting Parents and our show Parent Savers for Moms and Dads with Newborns, Infants and Toddlers.
Thanks for listening to The Boob Group; Your Judgment Free Breastfeeding Resource.
[Disclaimer]
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.
[00:39:45]
[End of Audio]
