The lovely people from Family Friendly Working have a draw for a Boppy breastfeeding pillow that ends today at 2.45.

All you have to do is comment on the page here:

http://www.familyfriendlyworking.co.uk/2010/08/27/win-a-boppy-breastfeeding-pillow/

Should Breastfeeding Be Taught In Elementary School?

From http://blogs.babble.com/being-pregnant/2010/09/07/should-breastfeeding-be-taught-in-elementary-school/

Here’s how it should go: As a part of the basic biology curriculum, children are taught about breastfeeding. How the milk comes in. What’s in it. How it helps the baby.  Students see pictures of women of multiple ethnicities breastfeeding. There’s a homework assignment and several questions on a test. Twenty or thirty years later these kids, now fully grown new parents, may not even remember Ms. Morris’ biology class, but there might just be one less mental hurdle to breastfeeding.

The website Nursing Freedom ran a piece last week called, “Why Children Should Witness Breastfeeding in Public.” Here’s a line I liked:

“We need to make nursing in public so boring, so quotidian, that it garners no more of a glance or second thought than seeing someone drinking a coffee or hugging a friend in public.”

I read this on Friday and over the weekend kept thinking about public breastfeeding. Usually this issue comes up when some ignorant manager of a mediocre eatery stupidly asks a nursing mother  to cover up and then has to endure all kinds of grief, including being read to from state laws concerning breastfeeding in public and/or local press coverage of a “nurse in” in which a posse of breastfeeders show up and breastfeed in front of or inside the establishment.

I support a woman’s choice to breastfeed in public. If breastfeeding is kept out of sight, no one sees it. No one sees it and it’s mysterious. It’s mysterious and people feel weird about breastfeeding. And on the feedback loop goes. More exposure would make the sight of breastfeeding “boring.” Or normal.

But then I saw a new mom in the park nursing under a kind of nursing tent/cover-all. It was a pretty cool-looking gizmo and propped up so that the baby could nurse privately without a blanket literally plastered over his or her face. I thought about the feedback loop and wondered whether this mother should just toss this fancy tent aside to help the rest of us get over our baggage.

Then I thought back to when I first had my baby.

I was quite engorged and it wasn’t the hot kind of engorged, the fake boob kind. It was the, Wow, how’s your back doing? kind. I won’t tell you the cup size, but let’s just say many people I do tell had no idea that size even existed. My over-supply meant that milk would often squirt out all over the minute I started unfastening things. The idea of doing all of this in public– as much as I supported the idea in theory– was hard.

After a few months when I’d gotten it all down, I nursed at friends’ houses, in restaurants and parks discreetly and without much fuss or a blanket. But at first I felt like this was all nobody’s business. I also felt a little cranky about the situation. Why do I have to change attitudes about public breastfeeding??  It’s hard enough learning all these new things. Do I have to change public opinion at the same time?

This is how I came to the breastfeeding in school concept. If Bill Maher and others had seen breastfeeding when they were kids, and been taught that it’s a normal part of life, like digesting or breathing, maybe there wouldn’t be so many snickers. Get to the kids before they get to the giggling stage– teaching teens about breastfeeding is also a great idea but by then too much squeamishness has settled in. The sooner the better.

“I am a nearly 37 year old mum with two children (Connor nearly 4 and Katie nearly 2). I gave up teaching in a primary school (which I loved) so I could look after my son and haven’t looked back. Although money is tight, my husband and I are content with our lifestyle choice which is just as well as we are going to home educate our littlies and so won’t be bringing in much money any time soon.

I like being creative, when I get the time, and I am not looking after children, cats, dogs or chickens. I enjoy cooking/baking, making jams and chutneys, making ring slings and clothes, making cards and my latest Sok Doodes. Sok Doodes were sock dolls that I made for my children but after I put photos on Facebook, I had lots of friends and family asking me to make them all kinds of creatures. My midwife loved them and asked if I could make a breastfeeding doll and I accepted the challenge as it was something that I had wondered about in the past myself and so Boobee Mamma was born!

As I posted the orginal photos on Facebook, a friend suggested I make a toddler as well as a baby so she could be a tandem feeding doll. Already she has created a lot of discussion at a family party and if I don’t get the opportunity to feed my daughter in my efforts to normalise breastfeeding (which to be honest, happen fairly regularly )  then at least I have something else to help the cause!

Boobee Mammas can be found on Facebook as well as my website www.lil-treasure.co.uk. If anybody wants to buy a Boobee Mamma, they can contact me through Facebook or email: boobeemamma@littleave.freeserve.co.uk

Tracey”

The Bundle Jungle are pleased to announce that their charity auction in aid of Cheshire and North wales human milk bank is officially open for bids!

Items on offer include:

- Lactivist T-Shirts
- Modern cloth nappies from cheeks and cherries, Issy Bear, Fluff and Stuff and many more.
- Chambers and Beau charm bracelet
- Professional Photoshoot with Penny Wincer (London Area)
- Holden’s Landing Nappy and Knittybugz Wool Collaboration
- Designer maternity clothes
- Designer baby clothes
- SO much more!

All items start at just 99 pence with NO RESERVE. Come on over to The Bundle Jungle pregnancy and parenting forum now, sign up for your FREE account and get bidding! It’s all for a great cause and there are some serious bargains to be had.

Elle
www.TheBundleJungle.com

If you look at the right hand side of www.lactivist.net under the links to our lovely sponsors you can see the new auction in action.

Every week I’ll be auctioning a different thing, sometimes I’ll be donating the proceeds too so if you have a breastfeeding friendly group that needs to fundraise let me know!

This week I am auctioning a beautiful soft organic ‘I like milk from my mum, not from just any old cow’ baby t-shirt in size 4-6 months and the proceeds will go to help the Boobs for Babes, Tits for Tots – Pro Breast Feeding Calendar

Postage is always free on the auctions but they are for the UK only.

Originally posted on http://www.rcm.org.uk/midwives/blog/saying-no-to-breastfeeding/ Royal College of Midwives online

15.27, 19 August 2010

A poll of young women finds a third would shun breastfeeding because they want to avoid saggy boobs. For some, vanity is the overriding factor when weighing up the pros and cons of breastfeeding. It seems a sad indictment of young women’s priorities when a baby’s health comes second to their looks. Or is it?

The survey of 1228 women between 18 and 25 follows the recent furore caused by model Gisele Bundchen who proclaimed there should be a law to force mothers to breastfeed their babies for at least six months.

Half of the women polled by BabyChild.org.uk would fall foul of Gisele’s law because they had no plans to breastfeed. And 32% of them said the main reason was because they did not want to ‘ruin the look of their breasts’. Half of them were afraid of their partner finding them less attractive should this happen.

Another 19% felt ‘uncomfortable’ about the thought of breastfeeding, a quarter of whom said they viewed their breasts as sexual and therefore deemed it inappropriate.

All these arguments seem feeble and bizarre when stacked against the benefits of breastfeeding. What about protecting the baby against obesity, asthma and childhood diabetes? What about helping the baby avoid ear, urine and gastro-intestinal infections?

I suspect that another benefit of breastfeeding would hold greater sway for those polled, which is that it can speed up weight loss during pregnancy.

My reason? Because the young women surveyed were childless and, at their stage of life, sexual attractiveness and looks are of great importance. They have no particular reason to know about the benefits of breastfeeding – more than three quarters of those who were against the idea believed their decision would not harm the baby’s health.

The findings of the poll would be much more worrying if they were the views of pregnant 18 to 25 year olds. But for childless young women to voice an uninformed opinion on breastfeeding is, perhaps, unsurprising.

Thank you to Jenny’s mum Sue for these lovely before and after photos. Jenny is 6 months old and I love the difference in the pictures, you can see the power of mummy milk!

Love it!

For the whole of September 2010 Lactivist will be donating £1 for every full price t-shirt bought from www.lactivist.co.uk to Boobs for Babes’ and watch out for fundraising auctions on www.lactivist.net

Boobs for Babes‘ mission is to raise the profile of breastfeeding both in the UK and internationally, lending support to those who wish to start breastfeeding, continue under difficult circumstances and educate those who have never considered it as an option.

They will be promoting this with their first ever calendar of breastfeeding mamas and their little ones which will be available from our online shop ready for the New Year.

Please email  mail@boobsforbabes.com to find out more or to help with the campaign.

There were some technical problems with the last poll but I am hoping that this will work now. I’ve deleted the old poll so this one starts fresh – please vote again if you have voted before.

The poll is in the left sidebar of www.lactivist.net. If you have problems voting please let me know and I’ll do my best to sort it out.

You can vote for up to 3 forums and the poll ends on the 31st October 2010.

Thank you to all the people who nominated their favorite breastfeeding friendly websites. I have sorted them out into categories and the first one is

The Most Breastfeeding Friendly Forum.

The forum with the most votes at the end of October 2010 will be awarded a prestigious Mothers Milk Marketing Board Seal of Approval! There will be runners up awards too!

Here, in alphabetical order are more details about the nominated forums.

Breast Buddies

http://www.breastbuddies.nice-forum.com

Breastfeeding Support Forum and Natural Parenting Forum. Topics ranging from Newborn feeding and full term feeding (extended breastfeeding). We also cover Babywearing, Cloth Nappies and other Natural parenting topics. Help for all mums

The Bundle Jungle

http://www.thebundlejungle.com/

The Bundle Jungle is friendly and welcoming to those trying to conceive, pregnant women, fathers to be and parents from all walks of life. What makes our forum different to other mainstream pregnancy and parenting forums is, not only our focus on community support but, also our interest in challenging the way we look at parenting.

“With the breastfeeding guru system, advice and support section, breastfeeding stories section and upcoming charity auction for Cheshire and North Wales Milk Bank we are huge breastfeeding fans!”

Cloth Nappy Addicts Forum

http://clothnappyaddicts.co.uk/forum/index.php

A forum run by Natasha, a WAHM and total cloth nappy addict and assisted by “SaraSeahorse” a woolly WAHM and “puddlepants” a nappy, woolly and clothing WAHM.

The Green Parent Forum

http://www.thegreenparent.co.uk/forum

The Green Parent is the UK’s leading green lifestyle and natural parenting magazine. A truly inspiring read, TGP is like nothing else on the newsstand, with insightful intelligent journalism covering topics from babywearing and attachment parenting to home-education and alternative medicine. Each issue features regular columns on Organic Gardening, Seasonal Food and Drink, Green Travel, Ethical Fashion and lots more. The magazine is produced by a small team of passionate experts who live and breathe the positive message of the magazine.

“So full of other mums who have the same ideas on breastfeeding and other topics. Always someone there to offer help, advice and support I always point breastfeeding mums there.”

I want my mum

http://www.iwantmymum.com.

“I’m someone who’s found the information and support there invaluable in successful breastfeeding, helping me meet other like-minded mums IRL, and having a great resource to recommend to expectant mums. Without their support I may well have stopped ( or at least tried to stop, my daughter would have a lot to say about it!) feeding my youngest, but instead we’ve past 2 yrs, still going strong and still finding the info there fab.
Knowing that info on there is evidence-based, moderators include fully qualified breastfeeding counsellors who DO check the veracity of statements made. The emphasis is information, not advice, and a very friendly place to ask important questions.”

Mad Mums

http://www.madmums.com/

Parenting and Pregnancy can be very daunting and sometimes, it can really help to speak to people who have been or are going through the same things that you are. The Madmums Buddy Scheme has been designed to put you in touch with other Mums who have experience in specific areas of Pregnancy and Parenting. You can use this free and confidential service on a “one to one” basis away from the forums to get in touch with one of our Buddies who will then contact you personally.

Mama Pack Forum

http://www.mamapacks.eu/forum/

Mama Packs are the United Kingdoms ONLY ethically influenced, trade marked Mum & Baby sample pack. A pack you wont find nasty chemicals in, a pack you will love receiving!

“The ladies there have such a wealth of experience and a geniuine love for the benefits of breast feeding that I have been greatly encouraged to keep breastfeeding, despite my child being seriously ill and in an incubator when born and later whilst she underwent major surgery. Now I am BFing past the age I had previously thought ‘normal’ and my child is thriving!”

Natural Mamas

http://www.naturalmamas.co.uk/

A natural parenting forum with an emphasis on babywearing.

“It’s a natural parenting forum with an amazing breastfeeding support board. Members who contribute are lactation consultants, midwives, breastfeeding peer supporters as well as breastfeeding mothers. The range of breastfeeding topics covered is second to none and the support is phenomental, with lots of experience as well as good non-judgemental evidence based advice. I love it!!”

Rollercoaster

http://www.Rollercoaster.ie

Pregnancy, having a baby and parenting can all bring you to the heights of joy and the depths of despair – all within the space of a few minutes! RollerCoaster.ie accompanies you on this exciting journey.

“A great community of people with a dedicated breastfeeding board”