After the birth of my second child I posted on a Facebook milk sharing page (human milk for human babies). I had a surplus of breast milk, more than enough for my own baby, so I wanted to donate some to women in need. A friend of mine noticed the post and reached out to me. She had a nine-month baby girl who she was , and she was also pregnant at the time. As a result of the pregnancy her breast milk production had dropped dramatically, and she also had a severe type of morning sickness, called . She felt she would really benefit if she had a break breastfeeding her baby, but she still wanted her baby to continue to get the immunological benefits of breast milk. Instead of asking me to provide milk she could use to bottle feed her baby, she asked if I would consider breast feeding her child. She didn’t want her baby to get used to being bottle fed as when her second child was born, she was hoping to tandem breast feed the two children.
I remember feeling quite privileged to be able to provide this nourishment to her daughter. Because I already knew this woman and her daughter, it actually proved to really help the wet nursing as her daughter was already comfortable cuddling me. I remember the first time she latched onto my breast it felt distinctly different to my kids latch. I couldn’t tell you exactly why, but it was just different.
From then on, it clicked that my option for sharing breast milk with babies wasn’t just to donate expressed milk. Wet nursing seemed to be beneficial to everyone. I didn’t have to spend the time pumping to maintain my extra supply on the days I could just wet nurse, mothers could really get a break from their baby if needed, because heating and cleaning bottles can be time consuming. And babies tend to be less fussy after a breastfeed because they’re not taking in the air that they often swallow when they’re feeding from a bottle. I provide this service free of charge as I know that we all need a helping hand sometimes and I'm happy to do.
However, it felt that what we were doing was part of an underground network. It wasn’t something I would discuss with women I didn’t know, or in groups I wasn’t familiar with.
Because I was involved in a lot of natural minded parenting groups, the topic of breastfeeding was freely discussed, and in those groups it would be more common to see a woman feeding someone else’s child than it would be to see a woman feeding her baby infant formula. It wasn’t that these women thought that formula was bad, it was just that they saw formula as something that was only useful if there was no human breast milk available. However, it felt that what we were doing was part of an underground network. It wasn’t something I would discuss with women I didn’t know, or in groups I wasn’t familiar with.
Of course, some family and friends were quick to pass judgement when they either saw me breastfeeding another woman’s baby, or heard about it. Most of them were shocked that I’d do such a thing and even more shocked that these mothers would be open to having a wet nurse. Some family thought I would form a bond with the children, some of the less mature members of my family even said that it was gross for another baby to be at my breast.
These reactions were hurtful. It wasn’t that I felt personally attacked, it was just disappointing that so many people couldn’t normalise breastfeeding, and thought these babies were better off having infant formula. For those who thought it was gross, it made me wonder if these people were sexualising breasts, which says a lot about societies views on women’s bodies.
I would love for milk sharing to be normalised, as well as breastfeeding in general. If more people witnessed breastfeeding, instead of making women feel they need to hide away and do it in private, I’m sure the rates of breastfeeding success would improve dramatically. And if milk sharing and wet nursing were normalised it would mean that mothers who value the act of breastfeeding would realise that switching to infant formula wasn’t their only option when needing to supplement their baby, or if they had to be away for a period of time. Having the option of family and friends willing to breastfeed would also foster the ‘village to raise a family’ notion that families really need in this disconnected age where postnatal depression and feelings of isolation are so evident.
