Kate is from Ohio and still lives there. She is the oldest of 3 girls. My father was a phys ed teacher and a coach.- Typical family structure I grew up in. Traditional family structure with the father that goes to work and the mother that says at home. I was the athlete in the family. My father taught me how to fix cars. I would mow the lawns and I would travel with him to tennis matches and he also taught me to fix cars. I remember we went on vacations with the money my moter saved. My mother was an avid couponer with the basement filled with her coupons which were labeled and categorized and this is the money we used to go away on vacations. Kate tells us that her mother and grandmother did not breastfeed and while they were supportive of her desire to breastfeed, they did not know how to really help and support her. She entertains us with many stories of her breastfeeding days with all 3 of her children, from very difficult breastfeeding start with her first baby to a very easy, pain free, carefree breastfeeding experience with her third child. As the Executive Director of Mom-mentum, Kate tells us about her initial interest in joining the group, the positive impact it had on her role as a mother and how this led to her current role within Mom-mentum. I am very excited to learn about all the projects Mom-mentum is working on and that the organization is alive and kicking so 40 years later to be there for mothers and families. What she has loved being able to do this last year is working on is supporting and growing Mothers Groups. We are piloting a programming in Toledo, Ohio with a local MC group with a couple of organizations that service youg others who have yet to graduate HS we are working on useing a grant and is taking trained MC faciliators and give them back through them offering facilitated groups. with these younger mothers. It is spreading their mission and goal to spread the news that everyone has these challenges and everyone has succeses. and that it is really good to talk about them.we are taking ourm others who are interested in getting back to the work force and finding an experience that can pay them through the skills that they learn through their MC groups. I am Really hoping to build that program. We are seeking funding for this. Feel free to contact Kate Finiske for funding info.
Lori talk about how badly she needed to find a peer support group of other New mothers in her community. She talks about the excitement and joy of being a new mother and at the same time of being lonely once she stayed home all day with her daughter. She did not have any mom friends in her neighborhood and craved the friendship and support of other moms. Lori shares the lengths she went to so that she could find her peer group and how she finally found her way to Mothers Center groups.
Julia grew up in a family with one brother. She really had no idea what she wanted to do as a career when she grew up. She did always know that she wanted to be a Mom. She decided to take on the challenge of law school and this is what she did before opening up the birth center. Julia is the Executive Director of Babymoon Inn, which is a free standing birth center in Phoenix, Arizona. Her first breastfeeding experience was really hard and quite painful. She did get through it and it worked out. With her other 3 children breastfeeding went fairly easy and she was grateful for this. Julia talks about how she practices child led weaning. As the Owner of Babymoon Inn a free standing birthing center in Phoenix, AZ, she has the pleasure of meeting and working with hundreds of families who take the tour of the birthing center and decide to received midwifery care and plan on a birth at the Center. Julia shares times when she has witnessed breastfeeding mothers respond to calls to action of offering their pumped milk and donating it to moms in need. She shares with us all the services that the birthing center provides to the community, which include classes for birth all the way through postpartum, as well as fun classes for moms and babies.
Lori worked Full time for quite a few years before becoming pregnant with her first baby. She was very excited for her baby to be born and really looked forward to the time she should be staying home with her baby during her maternity leave. Lori is quite crafty and loves to cook, however, working Full time did not allow her to spend time becoming really good at a few of the crafts that she was teaching herself. She had several projects that were long and drawn out and other projects she was aching to start. Lori assumed that there would be plenty of time to work on these, during her babies nap time. She worked right up to the day of her due date. It took another 3 full weeks for Alisha to be born and during that time she took care of all loose ends and was truly ready for this birth. Alisha was born on June 27th and discharged from the hospital when she was 3 days old. Lori talks about the first few weeks postpartum and how the death of her beloved grandmother during this time impacted her postpartum experience.
Anastasia had a planned homebirth with a midwife in attendance. She gave birth to a beautiful daughter named Vivian. She was awake and active and yet remained very uninterested in breastfeeding her first 24 hours of life. Each time she was brought to the breast, she showed no interest in sucking. This began a very long journey with major breastfeeding struggles. Poor feeds and several bouts of vomiting up any milk she had taken in from a bottle, sent Anastasia and her husband Matt to the hospital with Vivian. This began what turned out to be quite a few months of pumping and bottlefeeding. Anastasia spent quite a few months working with Vivian, trying to help her learn how to breastfeed. The night in the hospital and seeing her newborn with tubes and wires, Anastasia talks about feeling scared. She was traumatized and now lacked the confidence that her baby would get enough milk from breastfeeding. She talks about how her emotional health was greatly affected by how hard breastfeeding was. She shares some of her deepest and darkest feelings and how she finally overcame such a difficult start to new motherhood and early breastfeeding and how she came to enjoy breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is so normal for us now and so easy. Vivian is 17 months old now and she nurses 3 or 4 times a day. It is so completely normal and I don’t even think about it much anymore, in the sense of worrying and having it take over my day.
Lori will be sharing her personal experience when she nursed her first baby, in public for the very first time. If you would like to share your “My first time” story with our listeners, go tocontact me page and send us your story. We will share your story on our website and perhaps read it out loud on a show – with your permission, of course!
Fiona shares her journey into becoming an IBCLC. Like so many of us who came into this profession, it was the birth of her first son that sparked her interest in helping other mothers breastfeed. When she was in the UK, Fiona worked in maternal health. The standard of care at that time was for moms to breastfeed for 6 weeks. She was living in Toronto at the time she had her first baby. The expectation was for her to breastfeed for 6 weeks. Fiona shares in detail how she broke that mold, went on to breastfeed longer than expected and increased her breastfeeding knowledge as she had more babies and grew into motherhood. Fiona gives very detailed information on the roles and titles of the various breastfeeding helpers and how she has been able to clearly define the roles to mothers she meets. We also learn how a chance meeting with a representative from GOLD Online led to her current position with GOLD.
Not knowing anyone who breastfed their baby, or never having seen another woman breastfeed her baby, I had no frame of reference , no role models in the breastfeeding arena. There was 1 book on the library shelf and it was The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding, written by a group of woman from La Leche League. I did not get this book until after my daughter was born. So, the breastfeeding class was the only place I received information on preparing for breastfeeding and what to expect when my baby was born. There were many days and nights that were filled with painful breastfeeding and major sleep deprivation. I learned a lot along the way. Humor was helpful. My baby getting bigger was helpful. It took us a while, but soon breastfeeding became enjoyable and easy. Through my experience I learned to work hard to not judge another mother for the choices she makes. We are all doing the best we can. I choose to focus on education and support.
Come along with us on Tressa’s breastfeeding Journey. She shares with us personal stories of the early days of breastfeeding her first baby, breastfeeding during a pregnancy, what life was like tandem nursing, night weaning her toddler and child – led weaning with both her girls. Tressa really gives us a window into her early mothering days and humbles us as she shares her personal story of going through postpartum depression and how she helped herself get through it.
As a lactation consultant, I have long since recognized the lack of information mothers have about breastfeeding. Not only about early breastfeeding difficulties, but also how this impacts their postpartum lifestyle. Breastfeeding comes fairly easy for some mothers and I want them to know that it may not come easy for your sister or best friend. I want you to know that you can be of great help to them. You can provide emotional support, practical help and suggest they seek professional help. For some mothers, early breastfeeding is more challenging than they thought it would be. It is very emotional and exhausting for some mothers. When this happens, we tend to become very overwhelmed, isolate ourselves and some mothers become depressed.