Breastfeeding Basics

I present to you breastfeeding basics taught by a Subway sandwich. Now, you're gonna love this, but before we get started, I have to tell you this. My experience as a nurse has included the neonatal icu. I was a labor and delivery nurse. I was a postpartum nurse. So I helped hundreds upon hundreds of new moms learn to breastfeed. I breastfed my own babies. However, I am not a lactation consultant. Okay. This is simply mom to mom advice. Something fun that I think you'll really like. So let's get started. The breastfeeding basics with help from a Subway sandwich. First off, when I eat this sub sandwich, am I wrapped up in a blanket like this? Do you see me do this? That would be weird. We don't do that, right? What do we do? We want that blanket off of us. When we are breastfeeding a baby. Get that swaddle. Get that blanket off. In fact, take off their clothes, even right down to their diaper. And if you're a new mom, take your own shirt off. Take your bra off. When we are skin to skin mom and baby, the natural thing for baby to do is, is to suck. So get those extra blankets off. Now. The next thing, when I go to eat my Subway sandwich, do I do this? That would be weird, wouldn't it? Typically, when we eat our belly buttons, face our food, right? We eat like this. We don't eat like this. Weird. But do you know how often as a nurse, I saw moms take their babies and the belly buttons would be pointing up to the ceiling and they would try to get their little heads to turn and try to feed them like this. Remember, our belly buttons face our feeding. So take your baby, turn his or her belly button to the feeding the breast. Okay? Face our food with our belly button. We don't want this. We want this. Next, when I go to pick up my Subway sandwich, do I do this? Do you see me eating a Subway sandwich like this? No. How do I pick it up? I take this big Subway sandwich. I make a C with my hand and I squish it down so it'll fit in my mouth. Not like this, but like this. I squish it down so it'll fit my mouth. Do you know how often, as a postpartum nurse, I would see moms do this? Don't do that. Don't do that. Make a C with your hand. Go like this. Sorry. I'm just going to show you. You're going to grab it and squeeze it. Just like the Subway sandwich. Make A C. Grab it, squeeze it. All right, so baby's blankets off, clothes are off, belly buttons facing the food. Make a C. Squeeze it. Next thing, if I go to eat my Subway sandwich with a mouth like this, it's not going to go in, right? I need a big open mouth and put that sandwich back on my tongue. Same way. We don't want this little baby on the very tip. That hurts after a while. We want that big open mouth. And when they give the big open mouth, that's when that sandwich, AKA the boob, goes all the way back in there. Okay, now here's your next one. What if I'm eating and I do this, you might think I'm kind of rude, right? Like, it's not very polite to eat like this. We tend to eat like this. We meet our food same way. We want to do the same for our babies. So let me show you. So often as a postpartum nurse, I would see these moms and they would be trying to, like, pull their breasts to meet their baby. No, no, no. Bring your baby to the food. Bring. Bring the baby to the breast. Rather than trying to stretch your breast out 16ft to get that baby on. Okay, now finally, if you and I are at Subway and I take two bites, shoo fly, that's a blooper. If I take two bites of the sandwich and then you see this, are you gonna be like, kara must be tired. We should let her nap. You're gonna say, kara, wake up. We are in Subway. Eat a full feeding. The same thing applies for your baby. Every time we feed, we need a full feeding. Now, for someone, maybe a full feeding is a foot long. And for the next person, maybe a full feeding is a six inch. And for the next person, a full feeding might be a 4 inch and a bag of chips. It doesn't matter what a full feeding is, just as long as you get a full feeding in. Same thing applies to your baby. For some babies, that might be a five minute feeding. For other babies, it might be a 35 minute feeding. For the next baby, it might be a 20 minute feeding. And a few ounces of formula, whatever it is is fine. We just want a full feeding. So again, I hope this showed you the basics to run it through. Remember, we're going to take off our blankets. Consider taking out the clothes. We're going to have our belly buttons face our food. Baby's belly button faces her food, his food. We are not going to use scissor fingers. We are going to pick up that sub sandwich and squish it. Same thing applies with breastfeeding. We are going to have big open mouths. We're going to meet our food. Meaning we're going to take our baby and bring her. Rather than try to bring the breast to the food, we bring her to the breast and then we get a full feeding in. Those are the basics of breastfeeding brought to you by a Subway sandwich. I hope it was helpful. You might be wondering now. No, Subway does not know I exist. Subway is not paying me for this. This is just something fun to help you remember the basics of breastfeeding. Always take a breastfeeding class. I really find that helpful. If you're expecting. And definitely take the taking care of baby's newborn class. That'll be great. Remember, no matter how you feed your baby, you are the best mom for that baby. Nobody could do it better.