From Barbara: People often ask me what are the differences between breastmilk and formula? The short answer: a million. The long answer: are you ready for a whole lot of science? Often I will write about the benefits of breastfeeding but often people will say, “but I was formula fed (or I formula fed my …
Blog
Green Poop: When Should You Worry?
From Nancy: Green poop? Baby poop is high on many new parents’ worry list. How often should baby poop? Does baby’s poop provide clues to how breastfeeding is going? What do color and consistency mean? When should you worry? Normal Color and Consistency Baby’s first stools are the black and tarry meconium that was in …
The Clock and Early Nursing
From Nancy: Time and nursing? The clock looms large in the lives of many nursing families. When a new baby is born, some parents are told or make assumptions about: How many minutes their baby should nurse How long their baby should be satisfied between feedings The longest stretch of time their baby should sleep …
Clicking During Nursing: What Does It Mean?
From Nancy: Clicking during nursing? What does it mean? When a baby makes clicking sounds while nursing, parents often worry. Is this a sign of a major problem? Should they be concerned? No matter what the cause, if nursing is comfortable, baby is otherwise healthy and gaining weight normally, clicking may not be a problem. …
NEC and Breastfeeding
From Barbara: How are NEC and breastfeeding connected? They aren’t really. But NEC and formula feeding are. A jury on Friday, July 21st, 2024, found that Abbott Laboratories’ specialized formula for premature infants caused an Illinois girl to develop a dangerous bowel disease, and ordered the healthcare company to pay $495 million in damages. “Illinois …
Use you as a pacifier?
From Nancy: What Does It Mean to ‘Use You as a Pacifier? Nursing parents are commonly warned: “Don’t let your baby use you as a pacifier.” Although often said, this is an incredibly curious statement. After all, which came first, nursing or the pacifier? Nursing, of course, long predates the pacifier (aka “dummy”), a man-made …
Hand Expression: A Beautiful Tool
From Barbara: What is hand expression? Great question! Basically it means getting breast/chestmilk out of a lactation breast without a baby or a breast pump. At LactaLearning, hand expression is a typical tool we value and teach about because you never know when you might get caught with no baby, no pump, and a full …
When is pumping too much?
From Nancy: When Is Pumping Too Much, Not Enough, or Just Right? I’m often asked the question: “Do nursing parents need to pump in order to make enough milk?” The short answer is no. Effective breast pumps have been available for only about the past 70 years. Clearly humans have successfully nursed their babies for …
Why do Babies Spit Up and What can we do About it?
From Nancy: Spitting up can trigger a host of worries in new parents, some related to their role in this behavior and others to do with baby’s growth and health. Was it something I did? Was it something I ate? Will my baby’s weight gain suffer with the loss of so much milk? Does my …
Fathers and Breastfeeding
From Barbara: Happy Father’s Day to anyone who identifies as a father! With breast/chestfeeding the bulk of the focus is on the birthing parent, typically the mother. But what about Dads? Where do they fit into this picture? From research, we know that father support is important to breastfeeding success. In a 2022 study looking …