Breastfeeding can be a wonderful, easy time for some mothers, with Baby latching on right away and nursing like a champ, with no problems from the start. But more often, learning to breastfeed can be full of emotional frustrations, challenges and stress. So how can you overcome the emotional obstacles, the challenges, and beat the stress? Your baby is counting on you to succeed at breastfeeding. That’s where Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) comes in.

More on Breastfeeding Using EFT

As with everything in life, there’s a way to breastfeed that is safe and effective, and a way to do it that is dangerous. What makes the Ezzo “Babywise” breastfeeding schedule potentially dangerous is that while it seems to work for some babies, for others it could possibly cause serious harm, in the form of dehydration and weight loss. More on Ezzo’s Dangerous Breastfeeding Schedules

Question:

Hi, my name is Tania. I’m a young mommy, and I have a little girl who’s almost 5 months. How I feed is both breastfeeding and bottle feeding.. But, I’m trying to cut her off the bottle. She likes her bottle in the day time and she only takes the breast when she wants to sleep. Help me, what can I do? I want her to breastfeed more often. More on Building Up Your Milk Supply

The following video is of an interview I conducted with Caroline van Veldhuizen, IBCLC, regarding her research and experience with breastfeeding oversupply syndrome. I myself have suffered from an overabundant milk supply, manifesting symptoms like leaky nipples, engorgement, and mastitis, so this interview was very helpful for me to fully understand the problem and how to manage it. More on Breastfeeding – Oversupply Syndrome

Overabundant milk supply: an alternative way to intervene by full drainage and block feeding

By Caroline GA van Veldhuizen-Staas, IBCLC
Private practice, Merkelbeek, The Netherlands
www.eurolac.net

Background:

Too much or too little milk production are common problems in a lactation consultant’s practice. Whereas underproduction is widely discussed in the lactation literature, overabundant milk supply is not. In my practice I work with women who experience moderate to severe oversupply syndrome. In most cases the syndrome can be successfully treated with full removal of milk followed by unilateral breastfeeding ad lib with the same breast offered at every breastfeed in a certain time block (”block feeding”).

Case presentations:

Four cases of over-supply of breast milk are presented. The management and outcome of each case is described.

Conclusion:

Overabundant milk supply is an often under-diagnosed condition in otherwise healthy lactating women. Full drainage and “block feeding” offer an adequate and userfriendly way to normalize milk production and treat symptoms in both mother and child.

Read the complete paper on the International Breastfeeding Journal website.

You can also watch my interview with the paper’s author.

Question: How often should I breastfeed my baby?

I created the following video to answer that question:

In this video you can listen to the sound of my daughter breastfeeding to hear what a nursing baby sounds like when latched on the breast properly. In the video I also discuss what sounds you might hear if your baby is not latched on properly.

When Hannah was born, I noticed that she had a propensity to seek out and try to suck on her hand. She wasn’t my only baby to start swiping at her face as a newborn, but she was the only one who successfully developed a thumb-sucking habit over time. More on Breastfeeding My Thumbsucker

Proper latching and unlatching techniques are crucial to the success of your breastfeeding experience. Done improperly, your baby will not be able to nurse correctly, and you will end up with sore nipples. Here is a short tutorial on how to latch and unlatch your baby from the breast. More on Breastfeeding Latch Steps