Breastfeeding is Hard

Katie interviews Maddy Sands about the struggles that new parents encounter with breastfeeding—and how the solution to the problem is a community one.

Breastfeeding is described as the “most natural thing in the world,” but many parents come home from the hospital to find it’s not the innate skill it was billed as—and our lack of discussion of how hard breastfeeding can be leaves parents feeling guilt, shame, and frustration when it does not, it turns out, come naturally. Maddy is the director of Help Me Feed, a foundation focused on supporting new parents with breastfeeding. She understands that for new parents to meet their breastfeeding goals (while feeding their babies and maintaining their sanity), they need skills-building, advice, and support that is personalized to them. Maddy details the insights from new parents which led HelpMeFeed to design an innovative new app that creates an on-demand, professionally qualified community of support for parents, at no cost to them. It’s normal to struggle with breastfeeding, but in our connected world there’s no reason scalable solutions shouldn’t exist so that new parents don’t have to navigate these challenges alone.