National Breastfeeding Awareness Week 2011: how I'm celebrating

The deparment of Health has stopped funding National Breastfeeding Awareness Week (read Guardian's article here).... so it's again down to breastfeeding charities or the goodwill of health professionals to support this initiative that could save the NHS a lot of money. Breastfeeding comes with proven health benefits for mum and baby, and financial benefits for the whole family as it's free. It has also a low carbon footprint (you don't need products to breastfeed and you can hand express if you want to feed your baby from a cup).

With no stalls or other local initiatives, I'm celebrating by doing what I usually do most weeks, provide help and information at breastfeeding dropins. I find volunteering there very satisfying, especially when tearful mums smile at the end of the session.

If I have one tip to share with breastfeeding mums is this... learn to breastfeed lying down, it helps with latching (you don't have to worry about how to hold the baby), is kind to a C-section scar and gives you and your baby a well-deserved rest (you might well fall asleep and have a snooze).

Here are my favourite bf sites, with lots of information on breastfeeding and breastfeeding problems:
www.breastfeedingnetwork.org.uk
www.llli.org (La Leche League International)

Happy NBAW!

Battle of Breast versus Bottle

 Michela having a go at one of my fun bags

 Here we go again, after the furore following the TV promotion of 

Breastfeeding Older Children by Ann Sinnott, mothers have 

again divided in two camps after some ladette-style, 

anti-breastfeeding comments by the deputy editor of a 

parenting magazine. As perhaps intended, the article has opened 

the floodgates of controversy among breastfeeding organisations, 

mums and media commentators. Click here and here for two 

articles of horrified journalists, including a bottlefeeding mum.

Having freelanced for the magazine in question a few years 

back, I'm a bit puzzled that these comments have been published, 

especially since the publication was the first baby consumer 

mag in the UK to have a breastfeeding mum on cover last 

year, plus a positive feature. Click here to see it.

Is it a question of courting advertisers of formula products or 

controversy? It certainly happened at an awkward time of the 

year, during National Breastfeeding Awareness Week. Read the 

article here, make your own mind up and leave comments if you 

wish. There is a link to the Facebook group, too.