Giving nothing but breast milk is recommended for about the first 6 months (26 weeks) of your baby's life.
When you choose to breastfeed, you make an investment in your baby's future. Breastfeeding also protects you and your baby's health.
Some of the benefits of breastfeeding include the following.
Breastfeeding can help to reduce your baby's risk of:
- infections, with fewer visits to hospital as a result
- diarrhoea and vomiting, with fewer visits to hospital as a result
- sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS)
- obesity
- cardiovascular disease in adulthood
Breastfeeding and making breast milk also has health benefits for you. The more you breastfeed, the greater the benefits.
Breastfeeding lowers your risk of:
- breast cancer
- ovarian cancer
- osteoporosis (weak bones)
- cardiovascular disease
- obesity
How to get support
Contact your community midwife if you need support with breastfeeding within the first 10 to 14 days after birth.
If your care has been transferred to your health visitor, you can contact Derbyshire Community Health Service's Single Point of Access for support telephone: 01246 515100.
Or contact Derbyshire Family Health Service's Chat Health by text: 07507 327769.
Find out more about how to breastfeed and get support.
How long to breastfeed for
Giving nothing but breast milk is recommended for about the first 6 months (26 weeks) of your baby's life.
Find out more about breastfeeding at Derbyshire Family Health Service.
How often your baby needs to feed
All mums and babies are different, but as a very rough guide, your baby should feed between 8 to 12 times every 24 hours during the first few weeks.
Find out more about breastfeeding at Derbyshire Family Health Service.
Do the size of my breasts affect breastfeeding?
The size of your breasts do not make a difference to breastfeeding your baby. The size difference is the amount of fat each breast contains and not the capacity of the breast to make milk.
Breastfeeding after a caesarean
You can breastfeed after a caesarean. Ask a midwife about pain relief so you can feed your baby more comfortably.
Drinking alcohol while breastfeeding
Alcohol can pass into your breastmilk and then into your baby when you feed them.
An occasional drink is unlikely to harm your baby but it is advised that you wait at least 2 hours after having an alcoholic drink before feeding.
Find out more about alcohol and breastfeeding on the NHS website.
Breastfeeding support
We also support a variety of initiatives across Derbyshire to help you get the advice and support that you need.
The Breastfeeding Peer Support Service offers support and advice to mothers to help establish a breastfeeding routine. This involves visits to mothers during pregnancy and after birth until breastfeeding is established.
Our children's service and health visitors have achieved UNICEF Level 3 Baby Friendly Accreditation. This involves implementing Baby Friendly standards, and requires being externally assessed by UNICEF which involves interviewing mothers about the care they have received and reviewing policies, guidance and internal audits.
Breastfeeding problems
Sometimes you may experience discomfort or pain when breastfeeding. This may discourage you from continuing, however there is lots of advice to help address some common issues you may experience.
Find out more about breastfeeding problems from the NHS.
Contraception and breastfeeding
You can get pregnant while you're breastfeeding, even if your menstrual cycle hasn't returned to normal.
You can get pregnant 3 weeks after the birth of a baby, including if you're breastfeeding and your periods haven't started again.
You need to use contraception every time you have sex after giving birth unless you want to get pregnant again.
Find out more about contraception while breastfeeding.
Continuing to breastfeeding if you get pregnant
Breastfeeding while you're pregnant with another baby is generally considered safe but this is something that's important to talk about with your GP or health visitor.
Pregnancy can have an effect on the taste of your breast milk, and breastfeeding while pregnant may increase your odds of morning sickness, breast tenderness, and tiredness.
Breastfeeding more than one child
If you experience a multiple birth - for example twins, triplets or more, you can still breastfeed all of your babies. Multiple birth babies can be breastfed. As they're more likely to have a low birthweight breast milk is especially important for them.
Finding out you're a pregnant or trying for a new baby does not mean you have to stop breastfeeding. Mothers can breastfeed whilst they are pregnant, and some go on to breastfeed their new baby alongside their older child too. This is known as 'tandem feeding'. It is possible to tandem feed 2 or even 3 children if that is what would work best for your family.
Breastfeeding Welcome Here Awards
Did you know that we run the Breastfeeding Welcome Here Awards? It's a chance for Derbyshire organisations to show that they welcome and support breastfeeding in their venues.
Nearly 400 places are already signed up.
Breastfeeding helplines
National Breastfeeding Helpline telephone: 0300 100 0212.
Association of Breastfeeding Mothers telephone: 0300 330 5453.
La Leche League telephone: 0345 120 2918.
National Childbirth Trust (NCT) telephone: 0300 330 0700.