Longterm Breastfeeding Benefits: Understanding your goals

In this episode of the Milk Minute, Maureen shares a fascinating study published in June that digs into the longterm benefits of breastfeeding—a question we hear often from our patients. We’ll break down the findings and chat about how science backs up all those reasons breastfeeding is so good for both you and your baby. As we wrap up the year, it’s the perfect time to reflect on what we've learned and how it connects to our breastfeeding goals. Tune in for some helpful insights and a little end-of-year reflection!

Work With Us!

• Book a Lactation Consult with Heather! Click HERE for the deets.
• Book a Lactation Consult with Maureen! Click HERE to get started.

THANKS TO OUR NEW PATRONS, Ali Hamlin and Sonya S!

THANK YOU TO THIS EPISODE’S SPONSOR:
Brownie House: Experience pure joy with Brownie House—where every gourmet brownie is “happiness baked from scratch”!

Listener question: I need help preventing an oversupply. My son is only a few days old, but my milk came in with full force. I’m so engorged and try to pump a little for relief. I do want a stash, but I know this early pumping can be an issue. How do I keep from getting mastitis without causing oversupply?

Mentioned in this Episode:
Pediatric Research Study  mentioned
Children's Hospital Los Angeles Blog Research
Ep. 39 - Child Custody and Lactation: interview with family court judge James Jeffrey Culpepper

Prefer to read the transcript? Click Here to read

Transcript

Welcome to the Milk Minute Podcast everyone. Hey friends. Welcome back. How you doing today, Heather? Well, you saw it. Poor Maureen has to witness my nighttime routine with the children.

They insisted we get our Christmas tree like 40 days before Christmas. That Christmas tree is gonna be brown. It's gonna be toasty. It's too bad because it's a really nice tree, Heather. We're gonna take pictures. It's a nice shape. They're gonna be over it. I don't, I just. You're gonna be over it when you are vacuuming up pine needles.

Yeah. I don't know. Every year I fail Christmas in one way and I thought, why not fail in a different way this year and just like, roll into Christmas morning with a brown tree. I had a really funny, bad, sort of bad mistake thing that I did this week. Oh no. Since you're talking about failures, I'm like, can't even talk about it without laughing.

It was so bad. Okay. So I had like a light clinic day. And I was off call and I had a bunch of morning appointments. And then the whole afternoon I had reserved for like updating my website and doing admin work. And so I walked down the road to get lunch and they had these drinks that were like Delta eight.

You know, oh, no drinks and, okay. For context, I have had like Delta eight gummies before and they really didn't do all that much. Really? Yeah. Okay. They tore me up, so I get this drink that's like kind of like a mid dosage and I was like, I'll have a sip and just maybe have a nice afternoon where I can like kind of get into the flow of writing my website.

and chill out, and like, I don't have the kids, and I'll play music, and I'll feel really good. That is not what happened. So I get back to my office, and I take one sip. Okay, and I think the mistake is that this was a liquid, and maybe I didn't shake it enough. Oh. Okay, because I think, like, cannabinoids float, probably.

Right? They probably float. I don't know. I mean I think it floats. It must have. Otherwise, you're the biggest lightweight I've ever met. Well, the drink, like, the whole bottle was like 10 milligrams. But like, you know, it says like, oh, you know, like, X amount and how, you know, this many doses in the bottle. And I was like, cool, I'll just have like one sip, which is like half of the recommended dose, you know?

Mm hmm. It was, it was not, it was not that it was a lot. And I did this and I eat my whole lunch. It was not an empty stomach. And I'm like an hour into writing a whole new page on my website. And I'm like typing and like putting in some affiliate links and stuff. And I just sort of stop. And I was like, wow, I feel kind of weird.

And I sort of forgot I'd even drank it at this point. You know, this is the problem with edibles, right? Is like they hit so late. And. I just like, I, I can't type anymore. And I like close my eyes and lean back and I'm like, what the fuck is happening? I don't know. This is like, I don't feel great. And then I like open my eyes and the drink is like eye level right in front of me.

And I was like, Oh no, you don't did it. It was too much. It's not good. And I proceed for the next two hours. to basically feel so fucking high I cannot function. I don't understand how Delta 8 is legal. Me neither. I really like I mean, I don't think No, no. I don't think THC should be illegal. No, no. But like Comparatively, YS1 No.

It was so bad. It was so bad. I texted Ivan and I was like, help! I fucked up! I fucked up! And I texted my friend. I was like, I'm In my office, I had to like, like, okay, so most of my, a whole wall of my office is windows and most of it is privacy filmed, except for the door. I literally got so freaked out that somebody would like look in and see me.

I like taped paper over the door and then I turned the music up really, really high because I was like, if the music stops, I might just die. I'm not sure. And then I laid on my couch with the lights off with like a pillow over my face. Oh my God. And finally I've been like, was doing stuff and he was like, no, I can, I can stop by like before I pick up Lyra.

Just, just to hang out with me and a friend. Yeah. Yeah. It's been so long since I've been high. I forget that you don't want to be alone. It's been so long. You're so cute. I've been that high. You're like, Oh, I'm going to do my website. But the minute you get high, you're like, I can't be alone. It was so bad.

I mean, I thought I was going to vomit. And like, I felt, I mean, at least for an hour, I was like, I remember now what it's like to be so high you think you might have to go to the hospital. Now I remember. And I didn't want to remember that. What are they going to do for us there? And I, yeah, they do nothing.

They give you an IV and they say, really sorry this happened to you. And now you wouldn't even get an IV. And so Ivan came and like sat next to me on the couch and like petted my leg. I was like, please just. Just touch me, but only there. Just right there. Just my pinky toe, please. And got me through like the last of the worst of it.

And then he had to go get Lyra from daycare. And he was like, are you gonna be okay? I was like, I just, I need some snacks. And then he went and bought me a dozen donuts. Oh my god. And I ate six of them. Oh my. And then I felt way better. But then I still had to stay there, because I couldn't fucking drive myself home.

Oh, buddy. I had to wait for like four more hours till I felt like fine again to drive home. What a day ruiner. It was bad and I was like to the point where I was like, Ivan, what if we just leave my car at the office and you drive me home? And he was like, you're gonna regret that in the morning. I was like, I don't think I will.

Stop being so reasonable. You're like, actually, I'm never working again. And then I just watched Bridgerton for like four hours. And that, that made me feel, and then I was like so happy. Maybe it's what needed to happen. You know, that I hit the really part of the high that I wanted, where I was relaxed and like just chillin It's just a shame that as a woman we have to go through that to get to relaxation.

It's not great. It was not good. Oh my god, that sounds awful. And I would rather go to like a fight club and get beat up. So I could relax. I think my mistake was that I got a drink and not like a gummy, which was just like such a bad dosing problem, you know? I don't do well with any of the THC products. I usually really like micro dosing basically, so I can just like chill out and relax for a couple hours.

I like that with other things. Yeah. But the THC does not bode well in my system, I will say that. It's not great. Poor baby. You poor little high baby. Yeah. Yeah, you probably couldn't have cared for a child. No, for sure not. If I had done that when I was at home with the kids, I would have had to call back up.

Yeah. And like, please come take my children. Here's your hot tip, y'all. Don't trust edibles if you have to take care of children within eight hours of taking them. Yeah, it's so long. Just in case. It's so long for edibles, yeah. Anyway. Well, you made it through that. Welcome back. I did. And then I felt great that evening.

I was like, this is like, this is what I wanted. So anyway. You got it. I'm fine now. Like a week later. Great job. I'm so proud of you. I kind of miss that big experimental phase of life. And now I feel like I'm a little too old to I don't. I don't miss it after that. I was like, right, this is what it's like.

I did try, What's it called where you I want to say freebasing, but I know that's not it. It's not what you mean. With weed oil where like you there's a piece of charcoal and there's like a blowtorch involved. I have no idea what you're talking about. What is it called? Dabs. Dabs. That is not how I would have described it.

How do you describe dab? I don't know. Not like that. That's really funny. I will tell you this, and this is totally TMI, My husband doesn't listen to the podcast, so this is his punishment. I did dabs one time with a really hot rock climber that I was sort of hanging out with, you know what I mean? Yeah, I do know.

And he was like, do you want to do dabs? And I was like, yeah, sure. Yeah. I'm divorced and totally chill. So chill. And so I smoked out of this giant glass thing with the blow torch and the charcoal. And then what happened was I came to suddenly and he said, are you okay? And we were in the middle of having sex.

And I was on top and I went, ah. I forgot you were there! Oh my god! So god knows I was just bouncing around on top just like enjoying the hell out of myself. You were having the time of your life. Totally forgot he wasn't even a person. Don't even know how I got there. It was consensual, trust me, but like Oh my god.

Whoa. And he was like, whoa! And I, I sort of like screamed and I said, I forgot you were there! And he goes, Thanks.

I mean, that would be a hard thing to hear during sex, I forgot you were there. I was like, no, sorry, I'm totally into it. My face is melting. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't do that. I should probably read you the text that I sent Ivan when I was experiencing this, because I'm sure they're really funny. Oh, I'm sure they are.

I'll read you them later. We do have some more. Breastfeeding stuff to talk about. We do, yes. Not our pathetic attempt at drug use. And, and we want to thank a couple patrons before you, we start talking about the serious things in life here. Yes. Big shout out to Ali Hamlin and Sonya S. Thank you so much for your support on Patreon.

Your support means the world to us and it really does help keep this project going. And we couldn't do it without you. So today's question is from our Facebook group. And this person says, I need help preventing an oversupply. My son is only a few days old, but my milk came in with full force. I breastfed my last for three and a half years.

I'm so engorged and try to pump a little for relief. I do want a stash, but I know this early pumping can be an issue. How do I keep from getting mastitis without causing oversupply? Well, that's a great question. Yeah. And I've actually had A lot of people recently experiencing this like intense primary engorgement.

So I thought it'd be nice to chat about quick. Yeah. So the best way to prevent primary engorgement is feeding on demand. So those small frequent removals of milk, but if you're just one of those people where milk just comes in full force and your baby is eating normally, but. Not, it's just not keeping up with whatever your boobs are putting out.

You can remove a little bit. I don't recommend a ton of suction. Like you can use the Haka, but sometimes that can even be a little bit aggressive on the, the sensitive tissues that are really tight and they're, already having a hard time. So putting that Haka on there can create more inflammation, but like the Haka ladybugs are a little bit more gentle.

You can just kind of do the collection cup without putting a lot of suction on it. You can just take a little bit off. And by a little bit, I mean no more than like three to four ounces per day. So that's per 24 hours over what probably like half of half an ounce per feed at the most at the most. I also like to really recommend that early mastitis protocol at this point where I'm like, Hey, you're already a couple of days postpartum and probably taking ibuprofen anyway.

How about you set an alarm, make sure you're doing 800 on every eight hours and cold compresses after feeding and also reassuring people that This kind of engorgement really is like self-limiting and it typically does not last more than two days, three days. I mean, it's really short usually. Yeah. And also something to note, if your milk is just falling out of you into a burp cloth and you're just letting it run out, you can do that a little bit.

Okay, but if you are fully saturating a burp cloth every single time, you may want to just let a little bit come out, but then take that burp cloth and apply gentle pressure to your nipple back towards your chest wall to send a signal to your body that like, no, we don't need this much. Thank you very much.

But no. The milk that falls out, your body doesn't know how it was removed, it just knows that it was removed and it will replace it. So, take a little bit of that pressure off, but then you can also send that pressure back as a message. Which I highly recommend if you are one of those people that is like soaking through burp cloth left and right.

And honestly, this is kind of instinctive for a lot of people, like you start leaking and you just sort of grab your boob. Yep. And just make sure you're not doing it to the point where it hurts. I honestly, I kind of think of it like as the amount of pressure, you know, like when you have a bruise and you kind of bang it and you just like press a little bit against it and it feels better.

That's kind of what I think of as that amount of pressure. Super gentle. I always think like, what would the cave people do? Like they didn't have collection cups or milk stashes or, you know, freezer bags or hakas. They didn't have any of that crap. So if they didn't want to be wet all the time, they'd probably just apply gentle pressure if they didn't have 14 babies to feed.

So there you go. Well, I hope that helps you and anybody else out there listening. Okay, so we're not doing a full commercial today, but I do want to remind you that if you need last minute gifts for Christmas, you should absolutely go to yesbrownies. com and get your special someone a gourmet brownie box and you can curate whatever flavors you want in there.

There's tons of different flavors. There's even gluten free options. If you have people that are experiencing dietary restrictions and you can send a nice little personalized note, it's great. It's great for employees. It's great for like your father in law. Like what the hell do you even get that guy? So if you know any chocolate lovers in your life, go to yes, brownies.

com and order a nice little gourmet brownie box. And they'll know that you care and that you love them. There you go. You're welcome. All right. So I wanted to talk about another study, I know we kind of just did this, but we're like kind of wrapping the year up and this is when I always want to look back and kind of figure out what have we learned this year.

Yeah, what did we do this year and why does it apply to our breastfeeding goals? Exactly. And we haven't chatted about the benefits of breastfeeding for a really long time. So, when I was like noodling around, reading new studies, you know, two weeks ago or whatever, I found this one that was published in June of this year about the long term benefits of breastfeeding.

And it's really great to see these kind of continue to roll in, right? Because we've had studies on this for a very long time, but we also have concerns about the validity of some of those older studies and like how they control. Oh yeah, they've been questioned a lot. And particularly around the socioeconomic status and that impact on long term quote benefits of breastfeeding.

So this study actually like specifically addressed that, which I love. This is also great because I have had a I've had a nice run lately of patients whose partners think breastfeeding is the problem and so they've been asking me to ask their pediatricians to explain to their husband the benefits of breastfeeding for them in this roundabout way because of course they won't come to the lactation appointments either because that's women's business.

So, you know, we'll leave that there, but it's going to be nice to have this all in one place. So everybody can kind of pull from it if you need a nice refresher when these patients and their partners ask you point blank, okay, so what are the benefits? Well, here you go. Let's do it. Yeah. And before we really dig into it, I do want to acknowledge that when we talk about benefits of breastfeeding, inevitably some people end up feeling guilt for what they fed their babies and how they fed their babies.

So to frame our show today, I wanted to bring in a quote from the lead researcher on the team, who is Dr. Raja Gopalan. And she said in an interview, quote, This kind of research is not to shame anyone for their choice, but to uncover more about human development and understand what we can do better to give our children the best chance at growth.

If that includes breastfeeding, then as a country, we need to develop stronger health and social policies to make breastfeeding more accessible to everyone. Hell yeah. And I love that. And I read this really wonderful interview with her about the study, so I have a couple of good quotes from that interview in here.

That's great. I love that. I love that somebody that has that outlook on it was also a person that wants to do research on it. Yeah. I know. Thank you for being that blend of a person. She has some really good commentary on the study. That's great. So it was very nice. So this study is from the Children's Hospital of Los Angeles.

And they looked at development and wellness of 9 and 10 year olds who were breastfed. And it was published in the Pediatric Research Journal, so we'll link all that. So, this study looked at more than 7, 500 children. Oh, wow. So, pretty big data set. And they were hoping to be representative of sort of like the general U.

S. population, like as many different kinds of people as possible. And they used this public data set and they were That included brain and body scans, socioeconomic history, family history, etc. of kids who participated in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study or the ABCD study. And that was the largest long term study of brain development and child health in the U.

S. in the United States so far funded by the National Institute of Health. Whoa. Yeah. So they took information from that for this study and then like analyzed it in a new way. Great. So the two main areas where the team saw the most significant statistical benefit to breastfeeding was in brain development and a healthy weight.

Now again, we're looking at nine and 10 year olds, right? So we're, we're, We're looking at these really long term benefits of pre-adolescent kids. They also saw lower obesity risk and brain white matter development in infancy. Their results found longer breastfeeding duration to be associated with lower adiposity indices.

So the body adiposity index is like an alternative to the BMI. And it's a method of estimating body fat in humans. It's like better, not perfect, but whatever. And it found their study found greater cortical and subcortical gray matter volume in these kids and cortical surface area during that like peri adolescence group that we're looking at.

I mean, in layman's terms, that just sounds like you have a juicier brain with more stuff in it. Yes. I'm going to pull another quote from Dr. Rajagopalan again, that kind of explains this in. So part of this she said gray matter areas are like the computing centers of our brains. We know from past scientific studies of the developing brain that higher gray matter surface area correlates to better performance on cognitive tasks.

So we have kids with healthier weight and more gray matter. Yeah. Love that. Now, of course, the connection between the brain and behavior is like multifaceted. We're still studying it. But the researchers in their sort of like big discussion area of the study said that, you know, this is helping us find a clearer picture.

and better cognitive performance is observed alongside larger global brain metrics that they were linking to longer breastfeeding duration. So how did they study this? Was it just like, Oh, I breastfed a little bit. Cause that's where a lot of the studies in the past kind of got hung up. It's like any breastfeeding or breastfeeding beyond six or 12 months.

Yeah. So they measured the effects in three duration categories. So they had people who breastfed from zero to three months. Or up to three to six months, or twelve months or longer. And they do, you know, I have a bit in the end about this, but they do kind of state in their limitations, like they didn't have a great way to differentiate those who were exclusive breastfeeding in the first six months from those who combination fed, but all of the participants were breastfed in some way, or some amount.

Now, you know, the big question of why breastfeeding does this and shows these benefits is, is still a question, like, we don't have positive answers about that. The hypothesis, of course, is that breastfeeding impacts early brain development by increasing physical and social interactions for the infant, because there's a lot of touch and, like, interaction when we breastfeed, and by improving general nutrition and gut health.

So remember that study back in the day that said that breastfeeding led to higher IQs in children and how people freaked, freaked out the hell out about that, dug their heels in and they weaponized this thing. And like, I really almost feel like the fed is best movement, like came from that. Yeah. That the, the way that study was used as sort of traumatizing.

Yeah, yeah, and it's, I like the way this is framed a lot better, because it's also like, IQ is, again, like, they don't mention it in this study, yeah, but like one of those indicators that's like, so what, like, your kid's got a super high IQ, are they functional? Right? No, do they know how to make friends? And, and they really didn't talk about IQ.

They just talked about, like, hey, these are brain scans, and this is what we saw, and this is very measurable. Yeah. And here are some hypotheses about what that could mean, but we don't actually know if that means that. Which is, I mean, it's kind of refreshing to read. Yeah, I like it. It's, it's a little bit more mature, I think, than the last one.

It is. And less, like, buzzword y. Yeah, it, no, it really is. One of the things I liked the most about this study is that they problematized socioeconomic status as like a compounding factor for benefits, you know, just for kids who do better, right? Like that was the biggest criticism of many of the huge cohort studies that, you know, the WHO uses to promote breastfeeding.

It's like, okay, these didn't control for the fact that kids who have. More money and more resources are the ones who are breastfed longer and better insurance, right? How about West Virginia? Medicaid does not pay for lactation. It doesn't. Yeah. And like, obviously that's going to change these kids trajectory, right?

Yep. So Dr. Raja Kapalan, in this interview, Basically said that she understood that it's super hard to separate the benefits of families who simply have more resources from the benefits of breastfeeding itself, and that the reality of many lower income families is that they're going to wean sooner simply because of their circumstances.

Particularly because they often have to return to these really inflexible jobs that don't support breastfeeding. Yeah, and also they might not be able to afford a pump or all of the Or postpartum leave. Yeah, or all of the stuff that's required to do it. So they, the team really did make an effort to kind of clear up the data there.

And the researchers added another layer of analysis to that. to this data set. I guess they used a mapping tool to categorize the socioeconomic conditions of the neighborhoods like that these participants lived in relative to the regional cost of living. So they sort of had a measurement by which they could compare different areas based on the same set of features, right?

So they could, these patients didn't have to self-identify as poor. No, that's So then, you know, they had this analysis where they could group. Participants into different economic groups. Okay. And so the added analysis confirmed that breastfeeding provides brain and body benefits for people in all socioeconomic classes represented.

Additionally, the team found there was some correlation for the effects of breastfeeding on brain body development that were stronger in families with lower socioeconomic status. So, and they, and they acknowledge, like, it's kind of a weak connection, like, however, there was still, like, a statistical standout in this group of lowest economic status that the benefits of breastfeeding were potentially even greater for them.

I mean, honestly, even those confounding variables that I'm thinking of are interesting. Yeah. Like, I mean, Okay, what's different about that family that they chose breastfeeding, right? Or like who was close to them in their life that recommended breastfeeding or were they breastfed? And it's like a cultural thing.

Yep. You know, that's pretty cool. If they could even group and do like small little, subgroup studies on those little mapped areas. That would be really neat. I mean, that's kind of the cool thing about these observational studies and these really big data sets is that it gives us a starting point for like more specific questions to ask, which I love.

And of course, like In all of this, in their big discussion, they were like, Hey, take this with a grain of salt because, you know, some associations based on socioeconomic status in like these meta analyses, these other studies, show the direction and the strength of association between breastfeeding and benefits changes significantly.

on, based on how we are modeling these studies and how we are measuring socioeconomic status. You know, it's like, so they did it one way, studies that do it another way have slightly different results. It needs to be really standardized to get like solid answers, you know? So is it like the amount of breast milk exposure correlates with a higher brain function or is it?

So the big takeaway from this study was its duration of breastfeeding and not necessarily how much breast milk. Oh, that's good news. Yeah. Like just stay in the game, folks. That's what I tell my patients all the time. Like, hey, it's a long game. So if we have to supplement right now in order to keep the breastfeeding relationship going for the longer term, Let's do that.

Yeah, because the cool thing about this study is it basically supports, you know, avoiding the all or nothing mindset, right? That people, a lot of people get stuck there and like, yes, it shows longer duration has, you know, more measurable benefits, but it also, once again, tells us that any amount of time spent breastfeeding has a positive, measurable effect on a child's development and health.

Well, yeah, yeah, and also the mom's health. That's not the study, but right. That's not the study Yeah, we can talk about that in another episode. But if duration seems to be more important It's kind of the thing right now. It is and this Particular piece of information has been consistent across many studies for a long time Well, yeah And it you have to know that that's the case when the American Academy of Pediatrics Changes their recommendation to breastfeeding to two years and beyond.

Let's talk about that because actually You This lovely doctor, she talked about that again. I love her so much. I'm going to meet her one day. Maybe I love this study. You can probably just email her. You're kind of a big deal. So the research team noted that maternal perceptions of breastfeeding are critical to initiation and duration, right?

Like What parents are thinking about breastfeeding matters because it impacts their choices and reports, recent reports show that parents really struggle with kind of the new like standard medical recommendations, which are exclusive breastfeeding for six months and breastfeeding for two years in general, right?

Like that big jump from the AAP from one to two years, people are having a hard time getting their brains around. Understandably, because it's. Frickin hard to breastfeed here. And so the research team was recommending advocacy and education aligned with lengthening breastfeeding duration, but without specific time limits.

And that that would actually improve breastfeeding rates in general if we were like, Hey, as long as you can do it, like longer is better, but no, you don't have to do it for two years. It doesn't have to be one year. It doesn't have to be six months. We're just going to take it a little bit at a time though.

But yeah, like for legal reasons, for advocacy, for like the leave that you need and like your work stuff. We need it for a lot of reasons, but you know, I think their point is in those one on one counseling sessions, which we know to be true that like, we're not sitting there saying, okay, so you're going to breastfeed for two years.

We're having these really nuanced conversations with parents saying, okay, you know the guidelines. I know the guidelines, but here's you and your baby right in front of me. Here's what I see now. What would you like to be happening? How can we help you move forward so that we can really get as much out of this as possible?

I think a lot of times what I kind of do now is when people come in around like the 10 month mark and they're like, okay, so I guess it's time to start talking about weaning plans. And I'm like, yeah, sounds good. What'd you have in mind? And they're like, well, what do I have to do? And I'm like, well, You don't have to do anything.

You could keep doing what you're doing or, you know, just knock out the ones that are bugging you. Or you could just, you know, do morning and night if that's what you want to do. And they're like, okay, but for how long? And I'm like, as long as you want. Yeah. And they're like, so do it, does it have to be two years?

And I'm like, why don't you just do it for one more month and then reevaluate if it's still serving you. Yeah, and they're like, oh, I didn't realize I could do that. I'm like, there's no boob police that's gonna come to your door and be like, you're not working on your baby's gray matter long enough. And really like psychologically this works because if we sit there in an appointment and you're, you know, it's 11 months and you're like, oh next month is a year, everything's gonna change and we're like, well you have to breastfeed till two years.

If it's not working, if you're having a hard day, you Your brain is going to be like, two years is too long, you should just stop now. Mm hmm. Versus, you know, if we're sitting there in an appointment and we're like, yeah, two years sounds great, but I don't know, see what this month does, and then let's check back in.

If you're having a hard day, you're going to think, okay. I'll just get through another day another month and we'll see that usually has better results. And also just reminding people that it's not like in the beginning of breastfeeding. If you don't remove it at a certain amount of time, you're going to lose it.

It's like, yeah, you might lose it if your kid doesn't nurse for three days and then they get sick and they nurse a bunch and then it kind of comes back a little bit. But also we're not pumping. So like you won't have that stress of like seeing your output at all. Yeah, I really like. You know, I, I do actually, this is one of my favorite things about lactation visits, is having the process of visioning with people, you know, at any time in their journey.

Say like, they come in and they're like, here's, you know, I'm like, tell me what's going on. They're like, we're exclusive pumpings at the one time a day we breastfeed and we're measuring this and we're doing that. And they lay it all out. And I'm like, cool. How's your baby doing? Your baby's good. Okay. So.

Are you good? Like, do you want to change anything? What do you want to be happening? And they've got that wild look in their eyes. And they're like, what do you mean, what do I want? I'm like, what do you want though? This seems hard. And they're like, it is too hard. And you're like, okay. Cool. Too hard. We can work with that.

Then I'm like, all right, what's the hardest part? I love that process of like whittling away the BS, you know, where we're like, cool. So now at the end of this appointment, you, you know, we figured out that you would like to be breastfeeding for half the feeds and pumping for the other half. And that is a great goal we can work towards.

Yeah. I love that. And then they leave feeling like, okay, I built that plan. I can do this. These are my boobs. These are the babies going to be fine. So smart. And my favorite thing is when they leave and I'm like, do less. Yeah, don't do that anymore. That thing that you told me you're doing, stop today. Yeah, if we're doing more, we better be doing more with a timeline.

Exactly. With an end point. Exactly. One of my pet peeves, y'all, if you're out there doing this, you need to quit it. Do not ever recommend triple feeding or sending home a patient with an SNS and syringes without, without a follow up appointment. that same week or no more than seven days. Those people will just, they will either stop breastfeeding altogether or they will triple feed or SNS feed for the next three months.

You know, it's like there is no in between. Yeah, you cannot let those people go and that if you don't feel comfortable managing it after that recommendation, you don't need to be giving that recommendation, you need to be referring out to somebody else. I agree. It's I think it's like, I don't know, it causes so much trouble for parents and babies.

And it's so preventable. Yeah, so avoidable. I think you're right. So like the expectations that we have on ourselves and our breastfeeding goals. are some of the biggest limitations for extended, not even extended breastfeeding, but just like longer duration of breastfeeding. It really is. Because we're so like that.

I'm like that with working out or eating healthy or like being a better partner. It's like you have one bad day and then you're like, well, why even try? Why even try running on the treadmill? You know, and then you're like, no, just make the deposits. Like it doesn't have to be a big deposit every day, but just make the deposits and remember your goal.

And if and reevaluate the goal. Is it still worth it to me? Or is like weight loss, not the thing, it's strength. Okay, great. That's what we're going for. It's fine to change your mind. It's fine to edit the plan. And just remember, Everything is the long game, because someday you'll be dead. Wow! What a positive note to me wrapping up our episode.

It kind of is. Like, some people find peace in death, you know, where they're just like, and someday I won't have to do any of this shit anymore. It's like when I told Heidi. But she was asking about Elsa's parents and I was like, well, they're dead. Yeah. She was so excited. Heidi was so excited to get a new Anna and Elsa silverware set.

And she was like touching them gingerly. And she said, I love Elsa and Anna. Why do you think those are their names? And my son sarcastically says, why do you think your name's Heidi? And Maureen says, Because that's what her parents named her. But they're dead. So you can't ask them. And Heidi just goes, Yeah.

Like, okay, this went dark. I really didn't mean for it to come out like that. It was a rough dinner for everybody. And then Maureen shed some other wisdom for Theo, and he said, Well, aren't you wise as an owl? I was like, Alright, we need to wrap this up. There's a little too much personality at this table.

Oh, man. Yeah. Anyway, I'm assuming you all are out there doing your best. So just keep doing that. I pretty much assume everyone is doing their best. Yeah. So just keep doing that. So if you've been breastfeeding for three days and you're listening to this and you're like, Oh, wow, that seems like a really long time six months, a year, two years, just maybe tomorrow.

Just get through tomorrow, shorter term goals, if you're feeling overwhelmed, phone a friend. Absolutely. We can be your friend. We can be your friend. We can. I hope we are your friend. Yeah. We're friends now. I know. I did have somebody tell us that she would garden and listen to us and that it felt like we were all hanging out.

I love that. And I was like, that's the closest I've come to gardening in years. So thank you so much for bringing me along with you. That's so sweet. You're welcome. Nice. All right. Well, shall we close out with an award in the alcove? We shall. Shall we? Let's shall? We shall. Okay. Today's award goes to Jeff Culpepper, the family court judge that we interviewed long ago on the podcast.

Oh, I forgot about him. How's he? He's fantastic. Yeah? So, he was not a family court judge anymore for quite a while, and they roped him back in. Oh, of course, because he's so good. And so he is taking the bench again in our state of, you know, West Virginia. And he came to me and he is concerned as many judges are about the law changes that have been happening all over the country, where it's 50 custody from the minute you walk in.

And the judges really don't have a lot of leeway, but he did tell me that in the statute in West Virginia, that they do have a six month wiggle room. Like if the baby's under six months of age, the judges do have a little bit of leeway where they can, you know, edit the plan, but they don't know what to do.

So for him to you. Yeah. So he. is asking to collaborate to talk about what that actually can look like, what the judges can do to make the best decisions for these people. And I mentioned like, what if you just sent them to mediation, but the mediator was a lactation consultant and the state paid for it.

Yeah, let's do that. And I was like, I'd be happy to do that. And we could do it on zoom. So the couple wouldn't even have to be in the same room. And he was like, no, this is great. So anyway, I love his proactive nature. I love that he's thinking about this. His daughter Tess had a baby and she worked with me for a while in the beginning.

And she's so, I love that. So he got to experience it personally through his daughter. And so he, I'm just so impressed with him as a person, like he's a probably 50 something year old man has to be at least 50 something year old man who is like, I just want to do the best I can in his position of power.

I'm so glad he's back at it. I know. I know. I'm what a great for West Virginia families. Yeah. What a relief. So if y'all are out there thinking that like the system is stacked against you, please know that there are a few people like Jeff who actually do care and want to do better and they're willing to make the time in their busy schedules to try to make it happen.

I feel like I'm going to go to sleep so happy tonight. This was such a fun episode. Think about how many people that would change. Their lives. Anyway. Let's give him the Juicy Justice Award. . That's good. Jeff, you get the Juicy Justice Award. Love it. You're welcome it. Thank you, Jeff for thinking about breastfeeding babies.

Hell yeah. Absolutely. Just love him. All right, cool. Well, thank you all for listening to another episode of The Milk Minute. The way that we change this big judicial system apparently is by educating ourselves and our family and our friends and just talking about lactation all the darn time. Yeah, there's power in service guys.

I know. And when you've been in the service industry long enough, and you've, you've met and touched these people's lives, they start to realize the impact and it bleeds over into other people's lives. other disciplines. So there's my little positivity for you. If you are feeling like what you're doing doesn't matter in your sector, please know that if you do it with your whole heart and you do it long enough, you will make a difference.

Thank you so much and have a great night. I'm going to bed now. We love you guys. Good night.