Latch On: Breastfeeding 101

Gina DiPietro 0:04 One of the most common anxieties of early motherhood is navigating the everyday difficulties of breastfeeding. Whether you're family planning or expanding your family, our experts are here to help. I'm Gina DiPietro, your host for Latch On: A Novant Health podcast series featuring breastfeeding content for women at all stages of their journey in motherhood. Novant Health is a Baby Friendly USA hospital where we consider breastfeeding to be the norm. Learn all about the benefits of breastfeeding both for mom and baby, skin-to-skin contact, how to pick up on hunger cues and navigate your postpartum experience, plus other expert advice. Stay tuned. Gina DiPietro 0:43 I'm here with Danette Anderson, a lactation consultant at Novant Health Pediatrics Symphony Park in Charlotte. And this episode focuses on positioning and latching. Danette, you've worked in this industry for more than 10 years. Can you explain what happens during the feeding process and why things like positioning and latching are important to breastfeeding success? Danette Anderson 1:06 Thank you for having me, Gina. First of all, I'd like to say I think the key to getting a good latch is proper positioning. And so we're also going to teach moms different holds to place the baby in. Cross cradle hold, cradle hold, sideline, football hold, biological holds. So there are different positions that we can teach mom to hold her baby in and you know, one mom may prefer one position then another mom. So giving her those options is very important. Once we get teach her how to position her baby at the breast, then we're going to teach her how to get a deep latch because the deep latch is really, you know, a key to not causing nipple damage. Because of a baby's latching on shallow a couple of things can happen. One thing we're going to teach mom to support her breast and bring the baby to the breast. A lot of times it's very natural for mom to kind of want to put her breasts into the baby's mouth. And so that can cause a shallow latch and cause mom to have nipple damage. So what we want mom to do is support her breasts and bring the baby onto her in order to get that deep latch. So that's going to, a deep latch is going to reduce that nipple pain and damage. If a mom gets damaged, then she's more likely to either give up on breastfeeding or at least say you know what, I need a break. Let me give some formula right now, or I just want to pump because this is too painful. So we really want to try and prevent that by teaching her how to properly latch the baby. Also, whenever a baby is latched deep onto the breast, they're able to remove the milk better. If the baby's just latched to the nipple, and very shallow, that can impact how much the baby is able to pull from the breast. Achieving a deep latch and for the baby to have efficient milk removal helps that mom to establish and maintain that milk supply. Gina DiPietro 2:56 Okay, and speaking to that point of nipple and breast pain, is there a point where a mom would experience a degree of pain that she needs to rest and perhaps find an alternative until that experience is more comfortable, and if so, what might be a safe alternative? Danette Anderson 3:14 There are definitely times whenever a mom may get damaged from latching her baby, she'll become cracked and bleeding and it really is just too painful for her to latch. And we're of course going to support her with that. One thing we would do is refer her to her OB if that damage is so bad that we feel like she needs an antibiotic cream to help with that healing so she doesn't become infected. And you know, give her time to see, you know, was this successful? Did we, you know, maybe we were able to increase her supply to, you know, at least where she can give, you kno, 50 to 75% of breast milk. And so, you know, even with that, some women who are aware that maybe because they had a breast surgery that that's going to have an impact on their milk production. Even if they're able to give some breast milk to baby, you know, that makes them feel good because they may have been told, oh you're you might never be able to breastfeed your baby or your milk supply may be low. You know, sometimes we may see a mom with a breast reduction surgery and and talk about, you know, you may not be able to give all breast milk you may be able you may have to supplement with some formula and I've worked with many moms who even with breast reduction surgery make end up making a full supply. So we never really know until we kind of put them on a feeding plan to try and optimize that supply by doing the pumping, the latching the baby to the breast, skin-to-skin. Like I said, there are some herbal supplements that we can recommend for that mom. You know, I always tell moms that whatever amount of breast milk you give your baby is a benefit to them. You know, even if it's not a full supply, it's always beneficial to the baby no matter what amount you can give them. You know, other reasons for a low supply maybe if you have a baby that was born early, a premature baby, so that baby's not feeding well at the breast. And a mom may have no other indicators for low supply, no medical indicators, because we know there are several medical indicators that can impact supply. If she, you know, has hormonal imbalances. And so if you have a mom that has no history of that, and the only thing is that she has a baby that is just a poor feeder, that can impact her supply. Once again, we try and, you know, optimize that supply by initiating the pumping, talking about things that we can do to try and increase supply. And so sometimes it is very successful for some moms, and sometimes it's not as successful. And these moms really work very hard and try very hard. And I would say that's probably the most difficult thing as a lactation consultant to see is that a mom that wants this so bad, and you've done everything for her, but it comes to the point where, you know, we have kind of topped out of where her supplies going to be. And you know, that can be upsetting for mom. And so that's why it's so important to have that support there by everybody around her, you know, a whole healthcare system, the doctors, lactation consultants, and of course, her family and friends to help her through this because they're, you know, these women work really hard to make this successful. And so it really is an honor to be a part of this and to help them through this journey. Gina DiPietro 6:38 Great, well thank you, Danette. Danette Anderson 6:40 You're welcome. Gina DiPietro 6:47 Thank you for listening to this episode of Latch On, a breastfeeding podcast series under Novant Health Healthy Headlines. Find lots of other episodes under the Healthy Headlines channel ... everything from flu season to COVID-19, mental health advice and other great resources to keep you and your family healthy. We're on Apple, Google, Spotify or anywhere you listen to podcasts. I'm Gina DiPietro, your host, and we hope to see you back here real soon.