Mothers are told over and over again that breastfeeding needs to be offered on demand. What does this mean? Every time babies ask for or seem to want breast milk, you give them access to your breast so they can feed for as long as they need and as many times as they need, without any limits. What demand for breastfeeding can you expect from your baby? The expectations of breastfeeding demand you might have before becoming a mother are…
Although you may have heard that babies breastfeed constantly, when your baby arrives, it may actually surprise you how often they nurse. Usually, we are simply not prepared for this! Babies breastfeed for many months, from 8 to 12 times in any 24 hours, which means that you will spend many hours with your baby glued to your breast. You also have to remember that babies take a long time to complete a feed during their first months. They can…
Breastfeeding works on demand, which means that there is no need for the baby or the mother to wait for a certain amount of time between feeds. The knowledge related to breastfeeding was gradually lost with the introduction of the bottle-feeding culture in our society. What was worse is that practices associated with bottle feeding were simply applied to breastfeeding. Although it later became clear that this was not necessary, bottle-feeding was introduced with a regular schedule, and this mistake…