Always ready for use, at the right temperature, it is the main food, the best you can offer your child to ensure excellent growth.

For the World Health Organization and for Unicef, just to name a few, breastfeeding is a fundamental right of both children and mothers who must be supported and supported so that they can nourish their babies in the most natural and healthy way. own children. Breastfeeding is also good for them: in addition to its essential emotional value, it prevents some forms of breast and ovarian cancer, and reduces the risk of developing osteoporosis. However, WHO data reports that, globally, only 37% of children under six months are fed exclusively with breast milk.

In the photo: bamboo elastic band

Bring and benefits for breastfeeding mothers:

Reading the Ministry of Health's information leaflet on breastfeeding, I found a sentence that I really liked: “Breastfeeding does not stop you and your baby from leaving home and enjoying life”.

That's it!

I know mothers who have, however, locked themselves in the house, or who in pleasant situations, such as a meeting between friends, would suddenly run away with their babies saying: "the time has come, I have to rush home to breastfeed him". Such a pity.

Depriving yourself of your personal life by separating it from your baby in this way can become burdensome, inhibit the continuation of breastfeeding and increase the risk of feeling frustrated.

Breastfeeding is natural and is certainly not "scandalous", as are many images that we are forced to see around us. Equally true is that everyone makes their own choices, which must be respected.

Forcing a mother to adopt this or another behavior is a form of violence that I don't think leads to much. Holding her hand and supporting her can be gentler and more effective alternatives. There are support groups, where you don't feel alone and deeply understand how much good we can do for our baby by breastfeeding him.

Baby carriers are fantastic for this: they allow you to breastfeed almost without being noticed. When I used Mei Tai, I would turn up my collar and no one would notice anything.

Pictured: Mei Tai Limelight

The benefits of carrying when you have made the choice/have the opportunity to breastfeed do not end here: mother-baby closeness also increases milk production. We have already seen how this little miracle happens with premature babies, and how the experts interviewed confirm that this also happens with full-term babies. The vertical position assumed in some types of support also helps a lot in case of post-feeding reflux. (...) Children often fall asleep exhausted and satisfied after a good feed. In a baby carrier they will be ready to take a nice nap, relaxed and happy in their mother's arms.

Brings and benefits for mothers who do not breastfeed: Not breastfeeding can be the result of a more or less conscious choice, or an unexpected meteor that falls on you. And it can do a lot of harm. The scientific literature, including the documents cited in the previous chapters, tells us that physiologically there are very few women who are "without milk". But we know well that being predisposed by nature to breastfeed is not enough to be able to do so. The psychological component also counts a lot in this area. Even government policies, aware of all this, encourage help for the mother to facilitate the first breastfeeding. In fact, when a woman gives birth she can be very weak, live in a state of total confusion, be at the mercy of her emotions, cry for no (apparent) reason. All this greatly influences milk production. For me, the sensitivity of a midwife who took me by the hand was precious. Inadvertently, a colleague of hers, a couple of days earlier, had risked doing the opposite: in those moments very little is enough, one way or the other. Faced with my efforts with the breast pump (I felt pain but no milk), she turned and in German - perhaps she thought she wasn't understood - said to another woman: " there's no point in insisting, this one has no milk ". That sentence petrified me and hurt me a lot. Furthermore, it didn't help that I had to separate myself for several hours a day from my baby, fortunately a nice healthy 4.5 kg bull, who was however born with a hint of jaundice which forced him to stay in a thermal cot and put up with lamps for several hours. of UV rays. If there hadn't been the loving care of my colleague, her drops of lavender placed on my pillow before sleeping, her comforting embrace and her loving encouragement, I really don't think I would have made it. I felt a feeling of inadequacy for not being able to take care of my baby as I would have liked, mixed with a sense of guilt for not being able to nourish him with my body. It was very painful. I am close to those mothers who didn't make it, equally loving mothers even if deprived of this experience. Carrying can help, as testimonies also tell us, when the desire to breastfeed has not been fulfilled. In fact, it establishes a deep contact that instils a lot of well-being. Sometimes it can also happen that, although it started well, the breastfeeding experience has to be interrupted, and this new situation causes discomfort. Feeling close to your baby can bring relief in those moments. Then there are mothers who decide not to breastfeed, and this does not mean they will enjoy the closeness of their baby in sling any less. (excerpts from my book: "Let yourself be embraced!" , ed. Trevisini).