Wendy is so right in her post as she recalls:
"When I had my first baby, the most useful help I got for breastfeeding was
1) the cleaner in the maternity ward who had breastfed triplets and just sat
with me one night giving me encouragement and 2) the lavatory attendant in
the Ladies at the Cumberland Hotel in Marble Arch where I had come off the
street with my baby to find a comfortable place to sit and breastfeed and 3)
the other mums in my postnatal support group."

My own belief is that support for breastfeeding can be completely societal.
Etched in my memory, I can tell you everyone who encouraged me, a first time
age 27 not yet feeling maternal, sleep deprived, somewhat post partum
depressed mother to keep on breastfeeding?  My mother who had breastfed me
was already deceased so I could not ask her.  My local LLL leader, whom I
had not yet met, fixed the latch over the phone by asking me:  How much of
your areola is showing with your baby on the breast?  That was my *ah-ha
moment* and I had no more discomfort. 
 
But who were the peripheral people in my life who told me: 1. I should
breastfeed, 2. I was lucky to be breastfeeding, 3. My daughters colic would
end, and 4. Be proud to breastfeed  

1. While still pregnant:  A neighbor woman I bought a $10 toddler wood
rocking chair from who came from a dairy farming family.  She asked me, Are
you planning to breastfeed? then shared this interesting fact as a dairy
farming expert. She told me both human babies and cows both grow much better
by directly sucking on the mother than even getting their own mother's milk
fed back to them from a bottle. 

2. When baby #1 was 10 days old, I was at home still in my robe when I
complained of sleep deprivation: The local carpet installer (whose name I
can still tell you) whose baby could not tolerate artificial formula (they
tried six kinds) and who was obviously still upset his wife was not
breastfeeding their baby.

3. When she was just 2-3 weeks old: Elderly electrician/antiques dealer and
his wife from whom we bought our dining table told me colic ends at 3
months. (Their home was where I rocked her to sleep in the day.)

4. When she was 5 weeks old: My visiting Hungarian father who said to stop
looking around, just pull it out and feed my baby like my mother did me and
don't be embarrassed when the baby needs to eat.  Then when we went to town
he voluntarily said to everyone we met in his thick Hungarian accent:  She's
breastfeeding--the best milk in the world!

After finding LLL, it took me many weeks to even get to a LLL meeting-I had
to force myself to go once.  I was not a *herd* type person as I had been a
self sufficient only child for so long.  Even the childbirth classes were
not for me (pregnant women on a floor with a pillow) though I read
everything I could get my hands on about birth and breathing in labor.  I
perceived myself as a career working person rather than a stay at home
person.  In fact, after having daughter #2 and gasoline still being very
inexpensive, we were gone every day.  Breastfeeding helped me keep my active
lifestyle.

For years when people commented on my still breastfeeding (a total of 4
years), I always volunteered the information that no one at the local
hospital where I birthed had helped me with breastfeeding--others had--so
they better find LLL. The Doris Haire booklet I got from LLL, The Cultural
Warping of Childbirth, educated me to become furious because the hospital
protocol was purposeful to mismanage the birth/breastfeeding experience.
That is why baby #2 was a planned homebirth.  My husband was adamant that he
did not like how our baby had been treated there post birth either.  Judy
Ritchie

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