08/02/2025
IT’S WORLD BREASTFEEDING WEEK!!!!!!
Whew. Motherhood. Can look so feminine, gentle, beautiful, and delicate… and it can also hit like a truck.
I have been fortunate enough to have had the support to successfully breastfeed my babies for 6+ cumulative years.. that’s a lot haha
It didn’t start easy. It started with Giuseppe in the NICU with low glucose, and I was being pressured to supplement with formula and “keep him on a schedule” to bring his sugar up. It worked, and it was a battle for breastfeeding. Luckily, I’ve got a screw loose and a really supportive partner that helped us battle that stretchy gut syndrome babies can develop in the NICU with this approach. He nursed until he was 3y2mo.
Lala was born easy. She was my VBAC baby with no drama. She did not go to the NICU. But she didn’t love latching. Fine. She got lots of milk from a bottle, and around 6 months old, she turned a corner and loved being on the b**b 🤪 she was very acrobatic and very expressive. She nursed until she was 3y3m.
Breastfeeding and my babies consuming breastmilk was so important to me because of a strong genetic past with autoimmune disease. There are plenty of other reasons why I decided breastfeeding and breastmilk worked for us, but that’s not to say it wasn’t hard. It was. I wasn’t myself again until I weaned these babies. My endocrinologist looked at me with crazy eyes when I told her I still got up to nurse my toddler over night and asked when I last got a full night’s sleep, to which I had no answer. I leaked through shirts, I had mastitis, I was cranky a lot, I missed out on adult time outs… but you know what… every drop was worth it ❤️❤️❤️
Breastfeeding is both a privilege AND a right. In IL, breastfeeding is protected in the workplace for the first year of your baby’s life. The WHO recommends breastfeeding for a minimum of 2 years with exclusive breastfeeding for up to 6 months. Benefits include and are not limited to:
- 50% reduced risk of SIDS
- reduced risk of gut autoimmune disease development
- stronger cognitive development
- reduced risk of dehydration
- reduced risk of allergy development
++++benefits for mom!
Go BF parents, GO!!!