Prairie Lakes Maternal Child Health (MCH) strongly recommends all new moms breastfeed their babies.
The benefits of breastfeeding are numerous for both an infant and their mother. However, we also understand that challenges are normal – even if you’ve successfully breastfed your previous newborn. Certified Lactation Counselors (CLC) and International Board-Certified Lactation Consultants (IBCLC) are available to provide education and support to new mothers, fathers, and support people while they are learning how to best breastfeed a newborn.
We sat down with Sara Kannas, CLC, and Sarah Taylor, IBCLC, and asked them frequently asked questions we’ve received from new moms when it comes to breastfeeding – the common challenges, how to store breastmilk, and the benefits of ongoing breastfeeding.
Benefits of Breastfeeding 
Breastfeeding provides many advantages to both babies and mothers; including, colostrum, the first milk, which is rich in nutrients and antibodies that protect against infection and provide actual living cells as food. Breastfeeding encourages the development of immunities, significantly decreasing illnesses, allergies, asthma and other potentially serious health issues.
Video 1: Benefits of Breastfeeding
Breastfeeding 101
Many new mothers are concerned about how often they should feed their babies, or how long each feeding should last. Here, Sara and Sarah offer advice on breastfeeding basics.
Common Challenges
Challenges in breastfeeding are extremely common – no matter how much experience a mother has. Each mother-baby experience is different depending on various factors. However, there are common challenges that our lactation specialists hear regularly: sore nipples, low milk supply, mastitis, or your baby just doesn’t seem interested in feeding.
Video 3: Common Breastfeeding Challenges
BREAST MILK STORAGE
There is a lot of information available from multiple, sometimes conflicting sources, on how best to store milk – in which types of containers, does breastmilk expire, etc.
Resources
Prairie Lakes Maternal Child Health offers a continuum of breastfeeding education from our Childbirth Class Series before a baby is born, to lactation counselors and consultants available to mothers when they are visiting our MCH unit, to breastfeeding support upon discharge. Follow-up calls are made by our lactation educators to breastfeeding moms at home within the first few weeks after delivery. Moms are encouraged to call the OB Education Office at 605-882-7628 or the OB Department at 605-882-7735 with any breastfeeding questions, concerns, or help.