a midwife friend asked me for help recently and i'm hoping some of you can offer some suggestions because nothing i have suggested has helped at all.

she is nursing a 32-month-old daughter who probably nurses once during the night and 4-6 times on a normal day (sometimes as little as 2-3 times a day, sometimes as much as 10...you all know how nursing toddlers are!).

her husband was just diagnosed with a malignant, inoperable brain tumor (anaplastic astrocytoma...they did remove a small part of it surgically but most of it had infiltrated brain tissue too much). she wanted to begin pumping breastmilk for him to drink to enhance his immune system as he goes through radiation and probably eventually chemo (depending on what the tumor looks like after radiation...apparently chemo isn't terribly effective against brain tumors because it has a hard time getting past the blood-brain barrier).

she purchased a good quality electric double-pump and began taking fenugreek capsules, 3 caps tid, and pumping every 2-3 hours during the day. she says she definitely increased her milk supply as she began to feel full of milk again, even engorged after a few days. her daughter tells her there is more milk there, also.

the problem is that she can't produce any milk for the pump. she gets literally 2-3 drops from her left breast and 6-7 from the right.

i know the pump is working because i tried it and got 6 oz of milk without effort.

has anyone had this experience? what might help? she's very upset--this was the one thing she could do for her husband and now she feels useless and hopeless to get him through this.

i did suggest he just nurse but she says he doesn't suck right and she can't figure out what to tell him to change. he wasn't comfortable with me observing his suck :)

also, any information available on BM's benefits for adults or against cancer would be much appreciated...i have a couple of articles.

thanks!

Maka Laughingwolf
breastfeeding peer counselor
studying toward eventual IBCLC
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