Breastfeeding
My breastfeeding journey, from newborn to toddler nursing and weaning, plus experiences as a certified lactation counselor and La Leche League leader.
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Weaning Zara
📍 ColoradoThis week, my “baby” officially started preschool. Since we’re a Montessori family, Zara had the benefit of a long transition period as she moved from the toddler to the preschool class over the summer. She’s been spending parts of days and whole days in the preschool class since early June, but September 1st marked the…
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World Breastfeeding Week After La Leche League
📍 ColoradoToday is August 1st, which marks the first day of World Breastfeeding Week. For the first time in 5 years, I did not plan a big celebration or orchestrate a walk. I didn’t attend a single breastfeeding event, and I haven’t been to a La Leche League meeting in months. Last summer, as my business…
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Post-Op Notes and Breastfeeding After Surgery
📍 ColoradoIn case you missed my note on Facebook, I got the best news possible when I awoke from surgery: the nodule was benign, which means I still have half a thyroid and am not expecting to have to deal with radioactive iodine. I couldn’t have imagined anything better to hear through the fog of anesthesia as…
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Why I Am Waiting to Start Giving My Baby Solid Food
📍 WyomingIn a national survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and released last April, 40 percent of parents surveyed said they gave their baby solid food before they were 4 months old, with 9 percent starting as early as 4 weeks. Doctors recommend breastfeeding as the sole source of nutrition for babies for…
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Building a Parenting Library — Recommended Reading
📍 WyomingI mentioned awhile ago that I received a $500 grant to start our La Leche League library. I had a lot of fun thinking about the books I would recommend to local moms and what was helpful to me the first or second time around. Of course, there were significantly more books that I wanted…
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Nursing in Public
📍 WyomingYes, that’s an arbitrary nursing picture with ***gasp*** a boob in it. Given the topic of this post, it only seems appropriate to share a picture of my little Zara Bea doing her favorite thing. If that offends you, then you might not want to read this post. Every now and then, a news report…
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Pumping and Time Apart
📍 WyomingTonight, I pumped for the first time since Zara’s birth. I sat on my bedroom floor, answering question after question from my curious preschooler as I followed a ritual at once both familiar and foreign. Unzip the black bag that was once my daily companion: in the office, on the train, through airports, and across…
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Weaning Nora
World Breastfeeding Week is coming to a close, and after a busy three days of classes, speakers, and events on Nantucket, I was exhausted (and, frankly, remembered exactly what it was that I didn’t like about working full-time while parenting). As much as I love, love, love sharing breastfeeding information and was excited to learn…
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Extended Nursing and Being Mom Enough
Unless you’re living under a rock, you’ve probably heard about last Friday’s Time Magazine cover story on attachment parenting and the “controversial” image of a 26 year old mom from Los Angeles, Jamie Lynne Grumet, breastfeeding her three year old son. Depending upon who you might ask, the photograph of Grumet and her son is either…
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Teaching (and Debating) Breastfeeding
At 9:30 a week ago tonight, my cell phone rang. By the time I was down the stairs and into the dining room (praying the ring wouldn’t wake up Nora), it had stopped. I didn’t recognize the number, and so I didn’t bother to listen to the message. Ten minutes later, though, curiosity got the best…
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Doing “Mop”
First a note: I meant to get this post out last week, for World Breastfeeding Week. This post is a reflection on my breastfeeding experience so far and includes photos of breastfeeding and personal details about my breasts. If any of that makes you uncomfortable don’t read it; click away and come back tomorrow. 🙂 —– Today…
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Report Card
I feel sorry for my poor neglected blog, but it seems like it’s been one thing after another these past few weeks. And this last week was all about World Breastfeeding Week. I spent all my spare time before and after childcare planning and executing. It all started with, last Saturday, an informational table at the farmer’s…
