Our WIC teaches the Peer Counselors to ask open ended questions that do not encourage a yes or no answer. Such as "What have you heard about breastfeeding?" or "What feeding method have you thought about for your baby?" 

Many mothers are afraid to breastfeed, they think they will not be successful. So they hedge around, they want to breastfeed but have bottle feeding as a back up. Perhaps hearing from the nurse that she will be shown how to breastfeed immediately after birth, rather than being asked to make a feeding choice, would prove helpful.

I find that the one or two hospitals that tell my WIC premie moms that they must breastfeed for 6 months, the moms just go ahead and do it. Well, many of them anyway. They take it matter of factly and want to try. These are not committed breastfeeding moms to begin with. So perhaps having the staff take the attitude that breastfeeding is the method of choice and let the bottle feeding moms have to request their choice. Rather than, "which do you want?"

It is nice to hear of a hospital that is committed to doing so much for breastfeeding mothers!

Kathy Eng, BSW, IBCLC

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