I KNOW birth matters. I had the privledge of being an independant midwife
for 12 years.  Most of my births were low risks in a birthing centre (about
70%), some home births (5%) and some hospital births (the rest).  My
breastfeeding rates at 6 weeks on discharge have consistently been around
the 90% mark. Even with a hospital birth, as soon as that baby is born I am
able to get in there and normalise as much as I can.  This matters!

A good friend and colleague of mine (Dr Alison Barrett) has just finished a
speaking tour of Australia alongside Catherine Watson-Genna and others. One
of her talks was on how birth matters to breastfeeding.  If you are back
Catherine, I would love to know how that was received.

I think it is safe to say that the fight to protect birth as a normal
process is just the same as the fight to protect breastfeeding as a normal
process. My 96 year old grandmother had some classic sayings and one comes
to mind here.   "You can be too clever for your own good".

I have recently started a new job in a secondary and tertiary  hospital
setting, working just with breastfeeding and not birthing.  I am having to
learn some brand new skills to cope with the stress these mothers and babies
have gone through. They have all had problematic births for various reasons
which is why they are in a base hospital.When I left work yesterday I heard
a very distressing noise down the hallway.  It was a baby screaming his
lungs out.  The cry was extremely distressing and he was just having his
nappy changed!  I havn't heard a cry like that for a very long time.  Poor
wee mite - it is going to take a lot of time for him to regain his balance.
I must check on how he is feeding tomorrow.

Karen Palmer
IBCLC
New Zealand
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