So, what are you all telling the mothers who come to you, *weeks* after birth, with what you've figured out is low supply due to inadequate milk removal in the early days?  
 
These moms are often at their wits' end.  There has been a blur of feeds-at-breast, and pump use, and supplementation, and weight checks, and weeping babies and weeping moms.  As the IBCLC, I'm now suggesting *regular* and *systematic* removal of milk (that darned pump!!) -- lots of skin-to-skin --  and information about herbs or medicinals to boost supply.  Often by this stage of the game the moms are overwhelmed by the demands of "getting back to normal" (whatever that means), Dad/partner is back at work; toddlers are tearing through the house, etc etc
 
And every single one of these moms asks me:  when will I see more milk?  
 
Hence my query.  I can "soothe and encourage" with the best of them, but I'm haunted by the thought that the majority of receptors in their breast tissue are too far involuted to make this labor-intensive care plan plausible.  Am I off my rocker here?  I never make promises, and I never-say-never ... but I also believe mothers are entitled to the dignity of a realistic picture of what the future holds.   
 
So -- what is the realistic picture that *you* paint with moms like this?
 
 
Liz Brooks, JD, IBCLCWyndmoor, PA, USA
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