Maybe I am just dense, but I don't understand what the problem is.  Are growth spurts (by any name-- those days when baby wants to nurse all the time and never seems satisfied) so mysterious or threatening?
Here, women speak of "losing their milk" and having to start supplementing for that reason.  I try to get across the fact that BF, in all its magnificence, is not a static process any more than the baby's growth rate is constant.  If you suddenly are having a terrible deja vu feeling (like postpartum day three or four is repeating itself) it isn't because you forgot your milk at the mall and it was lost before you made it back to pick it up.  Babies grow so well on mother's milk that their needs increase, especially noticeably in the first 3-4 months when growth is rapid and energy needs per body weight are highest.  So milk production is unchanged, but the amount that was enough yesterday is not enough today, and the baby is doing what s/he has to do to fix things up.  Anyone remember the old Malvina Reynolds song "Magic Penny"?  "Love is something, if you give it away, (give it away, give it away), Love is something if you give it away, you end up having more..."  a notion easily grasped by preschoolers, but somehow too complex for us lactating females.
I see the most dramatic weight increases in the first week of life every summer, when mothers seem to be more generous with their breasts, thinking the baby must be thirsty as well as hungry.  These are hospital-born babies being weighed when they return for their PKU tests around day 5-6.  Never fails, in the summer they routinely weigh 4-6 ounces over birthweight by then, and the rest of the year they are more often about at birthweight or a little below.  Don't have any documentation for this theory, it is pure speculation on my part.  But I have noticed that babies who are slow to start at the breast (taking 2-3 weeks to recover to birthweight) seem to wake up straight into the first growth spurt when they finally do figure out what it's all about.  And some babies stretch first, and then fill out, while others just rise like a yeast dough and occasionally lengthen, but almost no babies grow equally rapidly in two dimensions (length and weight) at once.  I find this helpful when working with the slow gainers-- it boosts confidence no end to see that despite a total standstill on the scales, the baby has outgrown all sleepers, overalls etc.
Rachel
PS  If anyone out there has advice for how I can increase my own longitudinal growth to keep pace with my (alas) unabated growth in girth, by means of breastmilk or anything else, I would be grateful to hear it!  This list is wonderful!

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