The brand new Mid Sussex Breast Feeding Peer Support Team will be volunteering at baby and toddler groups across the area from September.
The Mid Sussex NCT (National Child?s Trust) has trained 12 breast feeding peer supporters (10 from Mid Sussex, 1 from Crawley and 1 from Horsham) to provide mother-to-mother support to women trying to breast feed. This is an exciting achievement for the local charity and will benefit families across the county.
Only 35% of UK babies are exclusively being breastfed one week after birth.* The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends that all babies should be breastfed exclusively for the first six months.
With this huge disparity in mind the Mid Sussex NCT decided to train up local volunteers to provide more support to new mothers who want to breastfeed their babies.
The newly trained peer supporters are all mothers who have breastfed at least one baby and are passionate about supporting other mothers who want to breastfeed. Their role is to listen, support, and to offer factual information. The NCT peer supporters are qualified to support mothers with a ?normal? breastfeeding experience.
The team, who have now finished their training of between 20 and 30 hours, are all offering their time voluntarily ? an amazing commitment especially considering they all have families of their own and most work outside the home in a variety of demanding jobs. The newly trained volunteers are an invaluable resource for local new mothers as they have been fully versed in the mechanics of breastfeeding; what happens from the moment of birth onwards to produce milk, how to position and attach the baby effectively, how to teach a mother to hand express and how to store breast milk.
Ally Hewitt-Lock, Breast Feeding Peer Support Project Co-ordinator, Mid Sussex NCT: ?Having met so many women who want to breastfeed but have not been able to I became frustrated that there wasn?t more help and support for them. There are lots of different barriers to breastfeeding that a new mother may encounter and many of them are small things that can be solved easily. This new group of peer supporters are extremely enthusiastic and are keen to help any local mothers who want to breastfeed their babies.?
The Breast Feeding Peer Support Team will be on hand to help at many different locations throughout the week: on Mondays at the NCT Haywards Heath Bumps and Babes Group and at the Baby Cafe in The Sanctuary in Hurstpierpoint, on Thursdays at the Noah?s Ark toddler group and the Little Footsteps baby cafe, both at the new Kings Centre in Burgess Hill (33-35 Victoria Road) and on Fridays we will be at The Baby station at the United Reform Church on Keymer Road in Hassocks and at the NCT Fumbles Music group which is re-launching at the Kings Centre. Mums, whether NCT members or not, are welcome to drop into any of the groups to speak to one of the team for information and support with Breast Feeding.
NCT is here to support parents. We give them accurate, impartial information so that they can decide what?s best for their family, and we introduce them to a network of local parents to gain practical and emotional support.
Written by midsussex ? Filed Under All Post?
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