Evolve Lactation Media publishes, teaches, and examines the forces that shape lactation care for families, clinicians, and public health professionals.
We connect breastfeeding to its full context — scientific, cultural, political — because the conditions that determine whether an individual breastfeeds are never purely clinical
Our work is free of commercial influence and grounded in evidence, ethics, and the belief that breastfeeding deserves to be understood, supported, and protected.
Evolve Lactation Media has invited contributors during National Breastfeeding Month (celebrated throughout August in the US) to respond to this theme:
We have spent 100 years optimizing infant feeding while unintentionally eroding the relational conditions that make breastfeeding easier.
Relational Care and the Power of Human Connection was written and contributed by Fleur Bickford
I was standing at the deli counter in my local grocery store, trying to decide what to get for lunch, when the young man behind the counter suddenly said “I know you! You helped my wife and baby to breastfeed!”. He then proceeded to tell me all about how well their baby was doing now and he thanked me for the help I had provided. I’ve had other similar experiences over the years. People I didn’t remember or recognize would come up to me to thank me for helping their family when their baby was struggling with feeding. They were heart warming moments, but the reason I remember them is not just because of the people, but because of what those people taught me. The fact that they recognized and remembered me drove home the lesson of the power we hold as health care providers. What we do matters. It is memorable even years after the fact, especially for those of us who are providing care during particularly vulnerable times of life such as during birth and breast/chestfeeding. It’s sometimes easy to forget as we help to correct latch and positioning for yet another dyad, that what seems ordinary to us can feel extraordinary to the person or family receiving our care. We are meeting people during a time of huge transition in their life who on top of that transition are often dealing with pain and/or fear about their baby not feeding well or not gaining weight. They are looking for help, and the way we provide that help creates lasting memories and feelings. Those memories and feelings can be positive or negative depending on how we conduct ourselves and how we relate to the people in our care. Often what people need most is to feel seen. Especially new parents. With so many of my consults as an IBCLC, when I look back at what my clients seemed to be most thankful for, it often wasn’t my clinical skills, it was my empathy, understanding, communication skills and ability to hold space for their difficult feelings while staying regulated myself. Don’t get me wrong, clinical skills are also very important, but what lingers as a memory long after the consult, is not so much our knowledge, but the way we made our clients feel. This is something technology will never be able to replace. What this means for us as care providers is that we always need to remember the power we hold. It can sometimes feel scary or overwhelming to know that the flip side of being able to create lasting positive memories is also true. If we are careless with our communication, if we don’t consider the power of our words, if we don’t learn to hold space and meet parents where they’re at, we can do lasting harm. Sometimes this can create fear of doing or saying the wrong thing but the good news is that just like clinical skills, we can learn to improve our relational skills as well. This World Breastfeeding Week let’s celebrate not just our clinical knowledge, but also our often dismissed so-called “soft skills” of tending not just to the practical needs of our clients but also their emotional needs. It’s a wonderful thing that by honing our communication and relational skills, we can encourage, teach, and empower the families in our care and leave them with lasting positive memories and feelings about the help they received when they were worried about their baby.
Fleur Bickford, BSc, RN, IBCLC can be found on Instagram and Threads
Happy World Breastfeeding Week!
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Olena Dobczansky - https://www.linkedin.com/in/olena-dobczansky-msn-rnc-mnn-ibclc-c-onqs-lcce-878b8263/
Christine Staricka - https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinestaricka/
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