Jessica said...  "Letting moms know that their baby will lead the way to their personal "normal" way, and for moms to watch for signs of good feeds, weight gain, diaper output and hunger cues lets mom learn their own baby's feeding behavior.  This helps give them confidence that things really are going well even if the baby isn't nursing both sides for exactly 15-20 minutes as they had been led to believe as the way all babies feed."

Where I work (central USA), letting baby lead the way to their own personal "normal" can be scary and nebulous.  For most of the families I've worked with, a very clock / schedule driven lifestyle is normal.  This generation of parents has instant access to boatloads of parenting advice and there is a lot of pressure to "do it right."  So, when they aren't taught any other way to concretely judge DURING the feed that they are indeed doing it "right," arbitrary time frames help fill the vacuum.

So, when I teach, I give analogies to adult situations that lessen the need to watch the clock.  I always talk about the first breast as the main meal and the second breast as dessert.  We don't eat the same size meal every time we sit down the table and we may have no dessert, a little dessert or a LOT of dessert.  And, I show a funny picture of a big plate of enchiladas and a big plate of pie positioned next to each to look like breasts.  Inevitably, at least one person wants to know how they can know when baby is done eating the main course, so I give them things they can easily visibly observe -- baby has stopped nursing, unlatched, fallen asleep, etc.  Then, when I get the next inevitable question about how much "dessert" I always talk about relaxed, open hands and overall reduced muscle tension.  I contrast "pump arm" (bent, sort of stiff, closed hands) of the baby who needs more versus "noodle arm" (limp, floppy, open hands) of the full and satisfied baby.

I also talk about adult eating styles -- "We all know someone who can belly up to the table and Hoover down the food in 5 minutes and someone else who takes their sweet time."  No one worries about how long it takes an adult to eat or times adult meals and thinking about it in this context seems to lessen the need to time.  With humor, I ask them to picture a waiter at a restaurant standing over them, tapping his wrist, then snatching the plate away at the prescribed time.  This always gets a laugh and puts timing breastfeeds in the same category of silliness.  Obviously, I teach all the other standard signs of enough to eat, but these are the ones I teach specifically to combat clock watching.  I always repeat, "Watch your baby, not your watch."

Brenda Carroll, MA, IBCLC
Lactation Solutions

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