As a lactation consultant, my ultimate goal is to enlighten women about the benefits of breastfeeding and to help them achieve the goal of breastfeeding their baby with ease.
Many people, whether or not they choose to breastfeed, are aware that breastfeeding is beneficial in ways that bottle-feeding with formula simply can’t match. But beyond that, the details can become a bit fuzzy.
Here are some breast milk facts, as outlined by the United States Breastfeeding Committee (www.usbreastfeeding.org) in their publication Benefits of Breastfeeding.
Breastmilk…
- contains an ideal balance of nutrients that the infant can easily digest
- changes over time, and even over the course of a day, to meet the changing needs of the growing child
- contains substances essential for optimal development of the infant’s brain, with effects on both cognitive and visual function
- supplies growth factors that combine to mature the infant gut
- provides the infant with immune factors manufactured to fight allergens and illnesses specific to the mother’s and infant’s environment.
Quite miraculous when you think of it!
Along with modern society’s wonders – instantaneous communication by way of satellites, the internet and blogs – the pace of everyday life seems to pick up just as quickly. Days speed by one after the other and before you know it weeks have passed! Such is my case, and my blog has fallen along the wayside.
With life spinning around us at a chaotic and hectic pace, it’s often necessary to just stop and find repose – in the simpler more natural things of life. Spending a quiet winter night by a crackling fire, taking notice of the wonders nature has to offer, like a lunar eclipse and star-filled skies, just stopping and noticing that there is stillness around us that provides peace and refuge.
Breastfeeding a baby can bring that same peace and repose - a reason to stop all else, sit down and relish in the wonders of nature. With each breastfeeding moment, the hormone oxytocin flows and fills mother and baby with the wonder of love – the feeling of being in love, compounded thousands of times. Those who have breastfed a baby know that it is so much more than simply feeding your baby with food. It’s nourishment for both mother and baby on a physical, emotional and even spiritual level. A symbiosis that nature has created to assure survival of our species – perfected over eons of time.
So next time your baby’s crying and life is screaming and all seems overwhelming – welcome the moment you’re being given to just stop, sit down, look lovingly into the eyes of that little being demanding all of life from you … and feel the peace breastfeeding can bring you; let go and listen … and find the wisdom and peace in the stillness.
