Kathy Fray is an award-winning best-selling parenting author, passionate promoter of mothers-to-be accessing empowering maternity education, holistically-minded Midwife, and thought-leader of Integrative Maternity Healthcare information.
Hi everybody, Kathy Fray here from MotherWise coming to you with another webinar or podcast and today's topic is all about what are those essential and nonessential equipment we need for breastfeeding. And there's a lot of misunderstanding about what different things are. I'm going to run over these very quickly. Just a reminder we go into a much deeper dive in the Essential Basics program where people sign up to be part of our membership and they get 24/7 access to our Q&A library which has hundreds and hundreds of questions and of course you get access to webinars, podcasts and downloads and things.
Firstly, hydrogel disc pads. These are absolutely one of my favorite products, especially for first-time mums. When you've got those virginal nipples that are going to get a bit of a thrashing I would recommend that you buy a pack of them, a 10 pack of 5 pairs and get them at about 30 or 32 weeks. People buy them 2-3 days later than they really should have been using them. They are wonderful and help your nipples heal between breastfeeding.
Breast shells. Now that is what we used to use a lot before hydrogel pads came along. Certainly, breast shells can still be beneficial especially for mums who have very sore nipples. You can use them during the day and the hydrogel pads overnight. You can't use breast shells lying down because you'll end up leaking everywhere.
Nipple shields go over the top of your nipples that are purchased by way too many women buying them thinking they will help with sore nipples. They're not made for that. They are usually used for women have very flat or inversive nipples. They are a crutch to use to help babies learn to latch for breastfeeding. And really I would say don't use those without speaking to your lactation consultant first.
Pre-sterilized bottle bags that go inside the bottles. They are good because you can use them to store expressed milk.
U-Shaped pillows you can put around your belly so you can hold onto the baby comfortably during breastfeeding for support. Breastfeeding can total to 10 hours a day, and this will help give you very good back support. After 1-2 months you shouldn't need it anymore.
The last thing I should mention is nursing bras and nursing clothing. I recommend you get fitted by a really experienced lady in the local shop at around 8 months pregnant. She should know about how much allowance to leave for engorgement. You should get 2-3 strong day bras and 3 soft ones for overnight. Often we leak overnight and we don't want to be waking up to needing to change the sheets because we leaked on the sheets.
So that's everything for today and I hope you have a lovely rest of your week. See you later everybody, bye.
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