Question: I am a nurse and am very aware of the benefits of breast milk. I always imagined I would get breast milk from a milk bank if I adopted. Just recently, I read there aren’t many milk banks around, and they can have a supply issue and be very expensive. I then stumbled upon adoptive parents inducing lactation to feed their adopted baby. How common and easy is this? Is it successful? Does never being pregnant before and having small breasts have an effect?
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Please pardon any errors, this is an automated transcript.
Welcome to Weekend Wisdom by Creating a Family. This is Creating a Family's short, quick, to the point answering your questions weekly podcast.
We also have our regular podcast, Creating a Family. It's an hour long interview with an expert, but this is intended just to get to the heart of what your real questions are. So that's a great way to say you guys should be sending us your questions.
We have a question today from Brittany. Brittany says, "I'm a nurse and I'm very aware of the benefits." successful and does never being pregnant before or having small breasts have an effect.
Great questions, Brittany. The answer is it's not very common because it's not very easy, but it can be done. So normally, when pregnant, the natural production of breast milk,
or lactation, is triggered by the interplay between three hormones, estrogen, progesterone, and the human placental lactagen or prolactin. So,
at delivery after the baby is born. levels of estrogen and progesterone fall, allowing the hormone prolactin to increase and that initiates milk production.
So induced lactation depends on the successful replication of this process. So ideally you would need months in advance to prepare and your healthcare provider would likely prescribe hormone therapy,
such as supplemental. estrogen and progesterone, to mimic the effects of pregnancy. This hormone therapy, as I said, ideally would last a number of months. After about two months before you expect to start breastfeeding,
or when you think the adoption will happen, you will likely stop hormone therapy and begin pumping your breasts. It would be important to use a hospital grade electric breast pump,
which you can rent. But this is not the case. the production and the release of the prolactin. You will likely not be able to supply all the milk your baby needs and thus you will need to supplement with formula or donated breast milk.
You need to do your own research on the safety of donated breast milk. You might want to consider using something called a supplemental feeding aid that delivers the donor breast milk or the formula through a device.
device that you tape and attach to your breast. So when the baby sucks on your breast, they are getting the donated milk or the formula. The supplemental feedings can also be given obviously with a bottle.
Something that people don't realize is that many lactation specialists will have information on this and can support you. So check with a lactation specialist, but ask that question first.
And the answer to your last question was... breastfed in the past or a bottle fed.
How motivated the mother, this is not an easy process. So you've got to be fairly motivated to make this happen. It also somewhat depends on how you define success. As I said,
you're likely not going to be able to provide the milk for all of your baby. The best feeding method is a well -fed baby keeping that in mind. So I hope that answered your question.
Creating a family has an entire section on breastfeeding the adopted child that covers all of this plus all of this. some adult adoptees oppose the idea of adoptive moms breastfeeding.
Some oppose, some do not, but it's worth doing some reading on why some adoptees oppose this practice. Before I let you go, let me tell you about some free courses that we offer here at Creating a Family.
They are given to you through the sponsorship and partnership we have with the Jockey Being Family Foundation. We have a library full of wonderful courses. They are free.