<<Also if there are specific emotional or supportive elements that 
should be address and how to approach these.>>

This is just from my own experience of having my full-term infant on 
life support and airlifted to a NICU (I left the hospital where I 
birthed AMA and drove with DH down to meet up with my son).  These are 
things I would have liked to have had someone address for me while I was 
in the NICU:

    * that I wasn't a failure just b/c I was pumping and not able to put
      my baby to the breast right away
    * that there is a time/place for bottles (and at night in the NICU
      is one of them -- I felt SOOO guilty that my baby had bottles at
      night b/c LLL etc. can sometimes be a little too adamant about not
      giving bottles if mother is around... I tried staying 24 hours and
      nearly passed out from exhaustion; my blood pressure shot up and I
      swelled up so much they nearly admitted me to the post-partum ward!)
    * that breastfeeding can work even if the pumping/gavage feeding or
      night-time bottles take weeks (my son was only on the vent for a
      little less than a week so I can't imagine how a mother would feel
      having to go weeks or months before nursing her baby)

I think a question you should ask point-blank is "How committed are you 
to making this work?".  A mother may not have thought about it but if 
you'd asked me I'd have told you that hell would freeze over before my 
baby got formula.  He never did. I left the hospital an emotional mess 
(elated to be taking my son home; confused and (realized months later) 
depressed b/c of the trauma of the difficult birth and nearly having him 
die etc.) and utterly exhausted.  Some kind of follow-up would be nice 
too.  We live in a small town.  Nobody called to see how things were 
going.  We have no home-health nurse visits like bigger communities 
have.  Nursing him at home was difficult, thankfully only for a week or 
so, since (as discussed in another case) Liam was one of those "angry" 
babies who seemed to be rejecting me/my breast at first.

Just rambling.  I am not a professional.  Just a mother grateful to hear 
someone wants to do something like this and hoping that my thoughts as a 
mom might help you figure out what the moms you'll be talking to might 
need.  I'm sure I haven't told you anything you don't already know or 
haven't heard before.

Margo
LLL Leader
Mom to miracle babies Liam & Ceilidh
Professional tandem nursers now!

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