San Diego Breastfeeding Center News
This month we had an enormous goal… to raise $10,000. While we didn’t meet our ultimate goal, we are so pleased with how much we raised, as this gives us a launching off point for the beginning of the year!
Breastfeeding is not always easy! Having personally experienced breastfeeding challenges with both of my kids, I know firsthand how critical breastfeeding support is for a mom in those first few weeks after her baby is born. Critical, both physically and emotionally.
Join me in helping local low-income women gain access to critical breastfeeding support on this #GivingTuesday.
We are so excited to announce that the San Diego Breastfeeding Center and Wonderful and Wild are co-hosting a 2017 Big Latch On event! For those who are unfamiliar with the Big Latch On, this is an event that started in New Zealand in 2005 during World Breastfeeding Week. The mission of the Big Latch On is to protect, promote, and support breastfeeding women and each year groups of breastfeeding women come together at locations all around the world to latch on their children at a designated time and day in honor of this mission and to attempt to set a new record! This year, our Big Latch On event will also serve as a major fundraiser for our non-profit organization, the San Diego Breastfeeding Center Foundation.
Written by Anna Choi, BS, IBCLC
On March 1st, we asked our community of mothers, families, and friends to help us #givehope to refugee families in San Diego by supporting our effort to collect diapers and women’s hygiene kits for the International Rescue Committee in San Diego. Our initial goal was to collect 500 diapers and 50 hygiene kits in 50 days. Within the first ten days, we had surpassed our diaper goal and were overwhelmed with gratitude as more diapers and hygiene kits continued to be delivered to our office throughout the following weeks. We are thrilled to announce that our final totals were as follows:
Anna Choi, BS, IBCLC
Here at the San Diego Breastfeeding Center, we love women; we love moms; we love our community. And perhaps most of all, we love helping the women and mothers in our community. When we heard about the recent travel ban put forth by President Trump’s Executive Order, we knew it was time to reach out to our friends at the International Rescue Committee of San Diego to see what we could do to help. In our discussions with IRC San Diego staff, we learned about the devastating effects the Executive Order was having [and would continue to have] on the ability of the IRC to provide support and basic necessities for refugee families who have resettled in San Diego. As we read about the decision of the U.S. Appeals Court to uphold the suspension of the Trump travel ban, we celebrated with our friends at the IRC.
Well, our 30 days are up for our Kickstarter project and, unfortunately, our Nursing in Public Task Force website project didn't receive the funding that we had hoped for. We reached about 10% of the funding we needed and I am so incredibly appreciative of the support we received from our generous donors!
While I am sad that the Nursing in Public Task Force website project will have to be put on hold for now, I am not too discouraged to let it go completely. Over the next few months, I will be updating the resources on our local Nursing In Public Task Force webpage, speaking at the Annual California Breastfeeding Summit about our project, and hopefully finding other funding sources to pay for this valuable online resource. So, if you happen to have any ideas for other funding sources (or an amazing benefactor who'd like to pay for the website!), please email me so we can explore these options :-)
If you would like to stay current on this project, please sign up for our newsletter, as we will be updating our website with new information and resources for nursing in public.
Thanks, again! This has been an enlightening learning experience for me and I hope to have a huge announcement in the next few months that we have secured funding for this valuable and needed website!
Warmly,
Robin
We are so excited to announce that we have launched our first Kickstarter campaign today! It is called the Nursing in Public Task Force Website.
As you know, the ladies at the San Diego Breastfeeding Center are fierce advocates for protecting a woman's right to breastfeed in public. This is exactly why we created the San Diego Nursing in Public Task Force in 2013. Too many local moms had been discriminated against and shamed for breastfeeding their babies outside of their homes and we just couldn’t stand by silently anymore!
Written by Anna Choi, IBCLC
When I accepted my current position as an IBCLC at the San Diego Breastfeeding Center, I knew what it meant…. time to dust off ye old breast pump and make it my new breast friend again. Clearly, I have one of the best work environments to pump breast milk in: I hang out with cute babies all day long {helps keep my prolactin levels and mama hormones happy}, my coworkers and boss are all fellow IBCLCs {help for any pumping concern is only a step away – literally}, and should I forget a pump part at home, odds are we have an extra in the office. But ladies, I didn’t always work in the land of boobies and after giving birth to my first daughter, I returned to my job as a retail manager and navigated the ups and downs of being a breastfeeding and working mother just like many of you have, or will soon, and I learned quite a bit about pumping and how to make this whole working breastfeeding mom thing work for me.
Written by Robin Kaplan, M.Ed, IBCLC
My background is in social justice and urban education. For the years before I started the San Diego Breastfeeding Center, I worked in inner-city elementary schools and for non-profits, including AmeriCorps, to help bring well-deserved resources and education to underserved communities who needed it the most. Because of this, one of the biggest challenges I have faced since I started SDBFC was trying to figure out how I could make my expertise and support accessible to ALL breastfeeding mothers... not just the ones who could afford my services. I have seen over and over again local moms posting on Facebook about how desperate they are for breastfeeding help, yet cannot afford to see a qualified IBCLC and this absolutely breaks my heart!
Not being able to help these mothers goes against everything I have been taught and everything I stand for.
How much breast milk does my baby need per feeding?
What is common nursing behavior for a newborn?
How will I know that my baby is getting enough?
As a new mom, these are common questions that you may ask your pediatrician, midwife, postpartum nurse, family, and friends and GUESS WHAT..... they may all have a different answer!
