Hi,
I just joined Lactnet and am overwhelmed with the amount of mail I'm getting
but can't stop reading and will have more than my share of input so I
thought I'd introduce myself.  I am a LC who is just coming back into things
after taking a break after having number three son. (He's four now and
finally weaned so maybe I can spend a little time in the field again!)  I
was a LLL leader for a number of years and had a private practise but was
put out of work because our health care system finally recognized the need
for Lactation Consultants (yeah!) so we have a Breastfeeding Clinic staffed
by public health nurses who became IBCLC's.    We are very lucky here to
have a wonderful group of people fired up about breastfeeding and very
effective in their approach.  You probably know some of them as their
profiles are getting larger everyday.  However we still work with physicians
who are uninformed and parents who believe everything uttered by someone
with Dr in front of their name, even if he/she is a doctor of philosophy !

I have a suggestion I would like to propose that would bring LC's together,
provide much needed LC help where it's needed, or at least wanted, and allow
us to travel less expensively.  I'd like your input on whether we could
arrange a work exchange type of travel plan .  The only thing required by
the host LC would be accommodations, and I'm not talking Taj Mahal here,
just somewhere clean and enough room for extra's (family?)  That of course
would be defined by the host LC depending on how much room he/she has or can
arrange. I'm willing to co-ordinate it until it becomes unruly, if ever.
Maybe people think it's a bad idea but it's a place to start.  If you e-mail
me that you're interested please let me know what you're needs are (how many
LC's you can accommodate and for how long you feel is necessary or that you
can put them up etc.) Your location of course would be important and where
you would like to travel to and for how long etc.  If there is enough
interest I'll make a form of questions etc.  Of course the visiting LC would
be working for free.

Yours in the Saskatchewan prairie snow!
Jennifer