Sorry if my orginal post was not clear; thanks for the opportunity to clarify. My objective was not to say who can and cannot become lactation consultants, but to illustrate that this is an experience driven profession. I wanted to convey two ideas- That it takes time to gain hours in breastfeeding counseling (so the "fast track" to being an IBCLC is not that fast to begin with) and that there are young people, (pre family pre-degree of any kind) who want to become lactation consultants as their primary career who have large experience handicaps to overcome. This pushes the age of some of the (IMO) most dedicated and excited people looking to be involved in the lactation profession up even further. The path to lactation is through two major ways, being a breastfeeding mother and participating in a peer support group and/or being a medical professional. Until rather recently, one did not have the opportunity to go to an undergraduate program to become a lactation consultant. (Healthy Children now offers a bachelors in Maternal Health-Lactation and I am sure there are others I do not know about. Since currently many hospitals are reluctant to hire non RN IBCLC's (as silly as we know that is), I have no idea if a bachelors in Lactation is a "hire-able" degree at this time, although it may be adventageous in the future). In order to earn the gold standard in lactation, the IBCLC, one must have experience in counseling breastfeeding mothers. Gaining experience takes time regardless of background, this automatically pushes the age of working lactation consultants up. There are a number of people coming out of college (and even high school) for at least the last 10 years who have never breastfed a baby or have any kind of medical background who want to become lactation consultants. There are very few opportunities for these individuals. Even women who have babies find it difficult if they are not members of a large peer support group (Like LLL or less well known, Nursing Mother's Council). I have my BSN, RN now, but I did not have it at 20 (the time I knew I wanted to be a Lactation Consultant). Doors did not begin to open for me until I was a nursing student and they did not open wide until I had graduated. My interest in breastfeeding pre-dates my entrance to nursing school. Orginally I was a theatre and education major. I studied every text book and breastfeeding book available. I wrote research papers on breastfeeding for every college class. I talked about breastfeeding with anyone who would listen. I learned from nursing mothers and I helped nursing mothers. If I found something I did not know how to do or a problem I could not solve, I called my very patient and encouraging lactation consultant MIL, for more suggestions or help in mechanics. As a result, I knew more about lactation than any of my instructors in nursing school. Nursing school taught me very little about lactation, but boy was it my ticket into the "inner circle." It seemed, and still seems, to be a rather round about way to become a lactation professional. Who would want to be a lactation consultant if they have never breastfed a baby or worked with nursing mothers in a medical capacity? I guess the same people who graduate High School knowing that they want to be midwives. The same people who have never had a baby and want to be doulas. People who feel called to help women, babies and families during pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum. They know intuitively that breastfeeding is important and women across all cultures need help in achieving their breastfeeding goals. I did not comment on the unwelcoming atmosphere in the lactation field for newbies. I would like to address that very briefly. At the International Conference on the Theory and Practice of Human Lactation Research and Breastfeeding Managment this year in Orlando, the question was asked why more young people were not coming into lactation. I cannot remember exactly who replied, but one panel member put it very well- "We eat our young." Warmly, Charity *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html