On day 2 of Jack’s life the nurse came to assist me with our breastfeeding session as she and others had since his birth the day before. This nurse said “I don’t think he is getting anything.” A pang of anxiety shot through my chest. I’m not nourishing my own baby? How can my body do this to him? It …

Ask Anne Question: My baby girl is five months old and exclusively breastfed. She feeds every three hours during the day for short times (10-15 minutes), and sometimes I feed her once during the night if I can’t get her back to bed. I’d like to nurse for twelve months, but recently I noticed a drop in my production. I …

Ask Anne… Question: I’m due in two months, and I’m afraid I won’t have enough milk, because I had a hard time with my milk production when I went back to work after my first baby was born. I’m considering having my placenta encapsulated, but it’s expensive and I’m not sure we can afford it. Will ‘placenta encapsulation’ increase my …

Ask Anne… Question: I’m worried that I’m not producing enough breast milk. My friend told me that ‘lactation cookies’ would help. Will eating oatmeal cookies really increase  milk  supply? Answer: In a word, no.  Although you can Google “lactation cookies” and find tons of recipes, there isn’t any evidence based research that they do anything at all to increase your …

Although concern about not having enough breast milk is the number one reason that mothers wean their babies early, having too much milk can also be a problem. When you consider the fact that a small percentage of women don’t have the capacity to produce enough milk for their babies no matter what they do, then having too much milk is …

Nearly all nursing mothers worry at one time or another about whether their babies are getting enough milk. Since we can’t measure breast milk intake the way we can formula intake, it is easy to be insecure about the adequacy of our milk supplies. The “perception” of insufficient breast milk production is the most common reason mothers give for weaning …

The art of breastfeeding in something that you learn by doing, and it gets easier with practice. In the old days, young women grew up seeing their family members and friends nurse. Breastfeeding was the norm, unlike today where we live in a bottle feeding culture. In today’s society, many women have never seen anyone nurse a baby. The idea …

Ask Anne…  Question: I’m exclusively breastfeeding my three month old. Breastfeeding is going well, but I feel like my supply has gone down since I went back to work a month ago. My friend told me that drinking a beer at bedtime will increase my milk production. Is that true? Will beer increase my milk supply? Answer: Unfortunately, no. I …