Hi everyone!  Here I am, breaking away again from my normal "lurking"
routine!

In my experience, the majority of calls I receive from fathers are
because the mothers do not speak English.  This is so common, infact,
that (after reassuring the father that he has reached the correct number
for La Leche League) I ask,"Does your wife speak English?"  The answer
is almost always, "No", or "Just a little."  I then ask if she is
nearby, as I will have questions for her.  Throughout the phone call, I
ask questions and can usually hear him translate them to her and her
responses in her own language.

I give alot of credit to these fathers.  Generally speaking, they have
stepped beyond their familiar cultural boundries into the territory of
"women's affairs".  The reality for most of these couples is that the
extended family of female relatives (the people the mother would
naturally approach with her questions) may be thousands of miles away.
For many of these women the childbirth experience and early postpartum
weeks are especially lonely and difficult and I find that this often
leads to breastfeeding problems.

After I answer their most pressing questions and ascertain if the baby
is doing OK, I try to provide the mother with resources in her own
language.  I ask the father,"What languages does your wife read?"  I ask
about *languages* in plural, because I find that while these women may
not be English speakers, many do have reading ability in more than one
language.  La Leche League International has a fairly extensive
catalogue of non-English breastfeeding resources, but of course as a
LLL Group, we can't afford to keep them all on file.  I find that it
works well to take the mother's address then call LLLI and have the
appropriate materials sent to her home.  It usually arrives in just a
few days if I stress the importance of the material to the LLLI Order
Dept.  Of course, my Group ends up paying for this service, but that's
why we have fund-raisers  :-)

Also, I try to connect the mother with someone who speaks her own
language.  We have several LLL trained Peer Counselors attached to our
La Leche League Group who speak a variety of languages. Alternatively I
can introduce her to a more experienced mother at my La Leche League
meeting who speaks her language.

If none of these approaches will work for the mother, because she speaks
a less common language, the father and I just get to be good friends
through our frequent phone conversations.

Sarah Chaikin in Atlantic City, NJ