Babies are not miniature adults.

Sometimes we expect an awful lot of these immature little humans whose brains take 25 years to fully mature. And probably the area we have the least realistic expectation is how we think they should sleep.

To hear some people talk about sleep in infancy, you would think that sleep was a behavioural problem and parents need to take control and correct the habits of their child whose waking is manipulative and intentional!

Reality check: adults cannot control their own sleep, let alone their baby’s!

Your Baby, your goals, your rights 

If you feel you are not receiving the support you need, feel pressured or start to doubt your abilities, it can be hard to advocate for yourself. If you are hearing information about your baby’s growth or development in emotive language or an authoritarian manner, you can feel your goals are no longer relevant.

The safest place for a baby to sleep in the first 6-12 months is in the same room as their mother. Day and night.

Many parents understand the need for a bedside nursery to make nighttime parenting easier when their baby cosleeps at night. However, learning the safest place for daytime sleep is not the room they prepared for the baby can come as a shock! (When exactly will this child be sleeping in their nursery?)

Your baby will be hanging out where you are so you might as well set up your space to work for you.

The safest place for your baby to sleep in the first 6-12 months is in the same room as you - day and night. While expectant parents often invest a lot of time and money into creating a room for their baby, the reality is that is the place where you store baby stuff and not a space your baby occupies very much!

By contrast, babies and mothers spend a lot of time together in the adult bedroom yet this space tends to be cobbled together while you are using it and nothing really feels organised or functional.

So let's look at what you might need for overnight and nap time in your bedroom:

Breast compression is a tool which is useful when you need to improve milk removal by your baby or a breast pump. External pressure can increase the flow of milk. 

Lactating breasts naturally release milk when a baby or pump triggers the let-down reflex. A well-attached baby doesn't need additional help removing milk. However there are circumstances where babies benefit from the technique.

A human infant needs an enormous amount of support to reach the stage of independence, more than any other species on earth. Taking on that commitment, ahead of all other possibilities, is the greatest demand there is. If we just look raising a child to “breeding age” (puberty) we are looking at 12-15 years. Brain maturity is reached around 25 years.

A mother bonds with her infant during the postnatal period. Bonding probably begins in pregnancy but it is during during the immediate skin-to-skin period after birth when it really kicks in. It is a process which develops over the following days and weeks.

Bonding is a two-way process. The baby needs to bond with their mother just as much as she does with them

By the late 1980s, mothers were no longer advised to limit feeds by the clock. The descriptors Foremilk and Hindmilk were intended to describe how the milk glands released milk high in fat during the let-down and breastmilk becomes increasingly richer as a feed progresses. Advice to mothers changed from offering both breasts equally at each feed to allowing babies to “finish the first breast first” so they could get this richer hind-milk.

When it comes to milk production problems, low supply gets all of the attention. Identifying the cause and resolving it, supplementing the breastmilk intake and supporting the mother emotionally.

The mother who appears to have far more breastmilk than her baby needs almost seems to be mocking those who have too little. Talking about their frustration or their baby’s symptoms in groups can attract nasty comments and mothers learn who to share their feelings around. However for some women, too much breastmilk has a significant impact on their daily life and that of their infant.

Hyperlactation or hypergalactia occurs naturally in some women and is self-induced in others. Physical causes can include thyroid or pituitary disorders. Prolactin is a hormone produced by the pituitary gland which has a key role in milk production. High levels of prolactin can be responsible for hyperlactation. Where oversupply is having a significant impact on either mother or baby it is worth having your doctor run some tests to rule out any medical cause. However, in the majority of cases, there is no underlying medical condition.

Has anyone ever told you their milk dried up overnight? Or they lost their supply after six weeks? Twelve weeks? Or somewhere in between?

Someone should have explained to them what was really happening.

Perceived low milk supply is so common, it is actually listed as one of the top reasons mothers stop breastfeeding or begin supplementing with formula. Perceived - not actual - low milk production. There is a difference.

Exclusive breastfeeding is a global guideline for all infants in the first six months of life. It means that babies are given no foods other than human milk in their first half-year. No infant formula, no juices, no teas, no cereals, no “solids”.

Breastmilk contains all the nutrition a baby needs and supplements are not required.

Sounds great! So what's the problem?

Ideally, every baby should be given the opportunity to meet these health guidelines. However, there are many obstacles placed in their way and unfortunately, very few babies in the world are exclusively breastfed for the first six months.

How’s life, Breastfeeding Mama?

Tired? That's because you're Breastfeeding!

(No, it's because you have a newborn baby!)

Struggling to keep up? That's because you're Breastfeeding!

(No, it's because you are now responsible for a whole extra person and you are still adjusting to that.)

Humans are social beings designed to live cooperatively in groups. Unlike the solitary orang-utan who raises one child to adulthood before breeding again - a cycle of around 8 years - humans average around 3-4 years between babies and rely on the support of others in their community to keep them alive. The intense care required by the relatively immature human infant leaves little time for much else so grandmothers, aunts, cousins, sisters and daughters step in. Traditional hunter-gatherer communities understand that keeping the next generation alive supports their own future well-being. When not caring for the very young, these women are caring for the very old. The continuity of care across the ages is part of what makes humans such a unique species.

Throughout human history, people have lived in tight-knit communities and shared the responsibilities of raising children. Mothers have always worked and young infants typically stay within reach of the breasts in arms or a baby carrier while they go about their day. Older babies and toddlers however might be gathered together to be cared for as a group - what we know as a creche - to allow women to focus without constantly supervising groups of children. Often older girls and even grandfathers would be responsible for supervising smaller children. And a lactating member of the community would make her breast available to any babies and toddlers whose own mother was busy elsewhere.

Breastfeeding is natural. But it doesn’t all come naturally.

Where children grow up surrounded by women and frequently see babies of all ages going to the breast, they learn the process without realising. They see the positions used by mothers with newborns and how they change as the baby grows. They here the wisdom of elders guide the new mothers to improve their milk supply or help a baby improve their latch. Small girls will mimic the maternal behaviour, while older girls learn to recognise feeding cues. As they approach their own matrescence they are guided by experienced breastfeeding mothers. And they are nurtured during the first 40 days, where they are not expected to do anything more than recover and learn to breastfeed their baby.

Often we will describe babies as having an unsettled or “fussy” period in their day or during periods of rapid development. But what does that mean?

Some babies are pretty chilled and its easy to spot when they are feeling a bit overwhelmed. But other babies seem to feel this way most of the time! Sometimes we describe them as “high needs babies”.