Benefits of Breastfeeding Your Baby
Pregnancy is a true blessing and breastfeeding is a special phase in a mother4s life, remembered with a sense of pride. Breastfeeding is a natural process and breast milk is the best food for your baby. However, breastfeeding like birthing has been portrayed as a painful and difficult phenomenon. So, attending a prenatal class with the family is the first thing a mother can do as a step towards preparation for breastfeeding.
Knowledge about the superiority of this natural and wonder food (breast milk, white blood) and understanding the challenges, myths, and facts regarding this process, can help a mother-to-be to successfully breastfeed. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that the first feeding should take place in the golden hour (the first hour immediately after birth).
The Ideal Diet ForA Nursing Mom
The quality of mothers milk depends on the food she eats. Hence, lactating mothers need to have a well-balanced diet that comprises of galactagogues (foods that enhance milk production) in their daily routine, Green gram (moong dal), sago (Sabudana), brown rice and oats should be included in one of the meals for a nursing mother.
Additionally, a handful of nuts like almonds and cashews should be tucked into ladoos or added to smoothies. The herb shatavari kalp is a milk-boosting food and helps increase milk supply. The other helpful foods are sesame seeds (til), fenugreek (methi), fennel (saunf), cumin seeds (zeera) and carom seeds (ajwain).
Advantages of Breastfeeding
Breastfeeding is not just beneficial for the baby but mothers too benefit when they breastfeed their baby. Furthermore, babies who have breastfed, share a special bond with their mother and can easily be comforted. Here are some other benefits of breastfeeding.
- Problems like constipation and diarrhoea are kept at bay, as mother’s milk is easily digested by the baby.
- Breast milk protects babies from SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome), allergies, ear Infections and illnesses.
- Breastfed babies have higher lOs and are faced with less dental, ear, speech and vision problems.
- Breastfeeding mothers lose weight faster and they get into shape easily.
- Breastfeeding for a year prevents a mother from developing breast cancer (in up to 95 per cent cases).
- Besides, the hormone prolactin released during breastfeeding helps mothers feel more relaxed and peaceful.