By Guest Blogger, Melissa Cole, IBCLC, RLC, 1. Your goals matter As a parent, you probably have some thoughts to how you envision feeding your baby. Your goals matter, whatever they may be! If you feel that you feel that lactation or feeding is not going how you envisioned, please reach out for support. There are many ways to love and feed a baby. You deserve personalized care. Whether it

Eat
By Carol Gray, LMT, CST, RPYT, ERYT-200 Parents ask me about solid food introduction all the time. Here’s my take on it. Babies Need Iron Babies store iron in their bodies while they gestate. Milk has next to no iron in it. At some point after birth, babies’ iron stores begin to diminish. This is often when they show signs of interest in iron-rich solid food. Hopefully, this occurs around

Things We Do (After Birth) to Prevent Babies From Moving
By Carol Gray, LMT, CST, RPYT, ERYT-200 I can’t leave The Stuck Baby Series without describing baby immobilization and container lifestyle. In this article I outline the most significant ways in which we prevent our babies from moving after they are born. It seems like the perfect preparation for a sedentary life in a recliner in front of a screen. Developmental delays are on the rise. It’s estimated that 15%

How Fetal Constraint Affects Babies: Things We Notice After Birth
By Carol Gray, LMT, CST, RPYT, ERYT-200 This is part six of the six-part Stuck Baby Series. In part one, My Baby Dropped!, I explain why engagement is pathology. In part two, Why Did My Baby Get Stuck?, I describe the maternal factors that cause babies to get stuck. Part three is Fetal Factors: How Babies Get Themselves Stuck. Part four explores Fetal Constraint: How Culture Immobilizes Babies. Last week,

Flat Spots
By Carol Gray, LMT, CST, RPYT, ERYT-200 I see lots of babies who have flat spots on their heads (plagiocephaly) in my Craniosacral Therapy practice. Container-Baby Culture and Flat Heads The most common garden variety is the broad flat spot on the back of the head – an artifact of the Back to Sleep Program, swaddling for sleep and time spent in car seats, baby seats and swings that have

Feeding The New Family
By Guest Blogger, Kimberly Bepler, IBCLC, CPD, CLE, CNPE Who has time to make nutritious food when you have a precious new baby? Real food takes time to prepare. Newborn families have little time to spare. As a postpartum doula I love creating food for hungry and tired parents. Over the years, I’ve developed a few winning approaches to help the families I serve get nourishing food into their bellies.

Interview With Carol Gray
We hope you enjoy this interview with Carol Gray on Born to Be Breastfed. It’s about Craniosacral Therapy and breastfeeding. Carol has dedicated her professional life to supporting expectant and new families by promoting gentle aware birth. She has attended births for over 35 years – at first as a doula and from 2000 to 2012 as a midwife. She has since retired from attending births in order to focus

Baby Yoga and Developmental Movement
By Guest Blogger, Ellynne Skove, LCAT, BC-DMT, NCC, E-RYT Baby Spines Babies are born with their spines in a “c” curve. They have been furled into fetal position, not unlike a fiddlehead fern in the spring. The fiddlehead unfurls with time and growth, turning into a lovely full, upright, and open fern leaf. The human baby, with time, and an innate blueprint of movement patterns that involve pushing, pulling, and