Research on breastfeeding beyond two with Joelle Morgan

This week, I’m speaking to Joelle Morgan, an NHS research midwife, about her recent qualitative study on the experiences and challenges of breastfeeding beyond two years in the UK. We start off with Joelle’s own breastfeeding journey and how she came to carry out the research. She shares insights from mothers on social media support, the lack of healthcare guidance on weaning, and the underrepresentation of extended breastfeeding in research. We also touch on the broader implications for public health and the need for greater awareness among healthcare professionals.

You can read Joelle’s study here https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/mcn.70072?msockid=1a148264df536e881f7f8dd5de6b6f2e

My new picture book on how breastfeeding journeys end, The Story of Jessie’s Milkies, is available from Amazon here -  The Story of Jessie's Milkies. In the UK, you can also buy it from The Children’s Bookshop in Muswell Hill, London. Other book shops and libraries can source a copy from Ingram Spark publishing.

You can also get 10% off my books on supporting breastfeeding beyond six months and supporting the transition from breastfeeding at the Jessica Kingsley press website, that's uk.jkp.com using the code MMPE10 at checkout.

Follow me on Instagram  @emmapickettibclc or find out more on my website www.emmapickettbreastfeedingsupport.com 

This podcast is presented by Emma Pickett IBCLC, and produced by Emily Crosby Media.

Transcript

This transcript is AI generated.

[00:00:00] Emma Pickett: I am Emma Pickett, and I'm a lactation consultant from London. When I first started calling myself makes milk. That was my superpower at the time because I was breastfeeding my own two children, and now I'm helping families on their journey. I want your feeding journey to work for you from the very beginning to the very end.

And I'm big on making sure parents get support at the end too. Join me for conversations on how breastfeeding is amazing and also sometimes really, really hard. We'll look honestly and openly at that process of making milk, and of course, breastfeeding and chest feeding are a lot more than just making milk.

Thank you very much for joining me for today's episode. I'm really excited to be talking to Joelle Morgan, who is a budding researcher in the world of breastfeeding. Now, that phrase, budding researcher, I sent to her the notes and said, can I call you a researcher? And she said, oh, I'm just getting started.

I'm not sure. I'm a researcher. And I said, yes, you are. Anyway, budding researcher is the compromise we came up with. She's a midwife by background and an NHS research midwife, and as part of her master's in public health, she recently published a paper. Alongside Sarah Jones and Amy Brown, the title of which is Exploring the Experiences and Challenges of Breastfeeding Beyond Two Years in the United Kingdom.

A qualitative study. So anyone who knows me and has listened to this podcast would totally understand why I would want her as a guest on the podcast, really excited to talk to her about her research. You, you can read the article for free online. That's not true for all academic research in the world, so it's great to be able to offer that.

And I'll put a link to that in the show notes so you can go through and read the whole thing. Thank you so much for joining me today, Joelle. I'm really happy to speak to you. Tell us a little bit about your masters. And about your background before we actually do a deeper dive into your research. 

[00:01:56] Joelle Morgan: Thank you very much for having me on.

It's quite surreal to be on your podcast. I listened to it for a long time. I completed a, a Master's in Public Health and Health promotion. I finished it two years ago actually, but it's taken me a little while to get round to publishing it. I've had two babies in that time and life's just been a bit upside down.

But for most of my masters, I focus my modules on breastfeeding in various, from sort of various angles. Um, so I'm a midwife by background and was always really interested in breastfeeding. And then when I was doing my other modules for my masters, I sort of became more interested in various aspects of breastfeeding.

And then when it came to deciding my dissertation, I was still feeding, say still feeding. I was feeding my one year olds. It's not unusual at all, but I was feeding hair and it just really interested me, interested me, the sort of opinions that I was getting or the decisions that people were suggesting I needed to be making at that time.

So yeah, it just peaked my interest and that's. That's what I delved deeper into, um, for this piece of research. 

[00:03:05] Emma Pickett: Yeah. So you, you were in a hospital as a midwife. What was your background when you were a midwife? 

[00:03:09] Joelle Morgan: I feel like I've done everything as a midwife. I did community. Um, I was in hospital labor ward, post ward elective, um, cesarean team.

Um, and then about six years ago I became a research midwife. And then I've been in various hospitals as a research midwife in London and in South Wales. 

[00:03:27] Emma Pickett: Okay. And daft question, but I'm gonna ask it. A research midwife does research. I know a couple of research midwives through my links at the Human Milk Foundation and, and Heart's Milk Bank.

What is a research midwife? 

[00:03:39] Joelle Morgan: So there couple of different angles sort of way be employed. You could be a research midwife, a university working on a specific study. But if you're working for the NHS, then in England you'd be funded by the Clinical research network. And in Wales it's Health and Care Research Wales that would fund, um, NHS midwives.

And then you are, um, working on usually a portfolio of a couple of different studies up to when I was in London there was about 25 research midwives. So we had loads and loads of studies that a lot of them are multicenter. So it's not just, it can just be your particular hospital, but a lot of them, it's, um, maybe 40 or 50 hospitals across the uk.

Um, identifying women that would be suitable, um, for that particular study and approaching 'em, speaking to them about the study and if they wish to take part, going through the consent process and the data collection, whatever that study is. Okay. Looking at, so it could be anything from like hypertension in pregnancy, diabetes, stillbirth, breastfeeding, all sorts of different, um, whatever's being researched, um, at the time.

[00:04:50] Emma Pickett: And that obviously leads to conclusions around. Good practice and, and effects, um, you know, what's happening for decades to come potentially. Yeah. So quite important, important jobs. Yeah. Okay. So you did this piece of research on breastfeeding beyond two years, and in the research it talks about you having insider status.

So that was a bit of a clue that you, somebody who, who was breastfeeding yourself at the time and, and continuing to breastfeed, breastfeed beyond babyhood. Tell us a little bit now we don't wanna do a massive deep dive into your own breastfeeding experience 'cause that could whiz an hour, could whiz by just doing that.

But yeah. But tell us a little bit about your own children and your own breastfeeding experiences. 

[00:05:26] Joelle Morgan: I found breastfeeding really interesting, um, when I was studying to be a midwife, but it, it'd always been something that was like how you see your ba feed your baby. In my world, my mom was really passionate about breastfeeding and she breastfed all of us.

And then I had my daughter, she's three and a bit now. So I had a really positive breastfeeding experience with her, fed her for two years. Um, and I would've carried on, I think, but I was pregnant again and I think it was around her second birthday. I was about 20 weeks and my milk had just gone and I'd sort of under an argue whether I would tandem feed or, um, I didn't want to stop abruptly and her not be happy with that decision.

So I was really sort of to and, and froing with what to do. But she just lost interest really. I think when the milk went, I think I was sort of gently nudging her towards stopping if that was where she was. If that's what she was happy with. So I would, I would feed her, but there wasn't really anything there, I don't think.

So then I'd offer her some milk in a bottle and she was chucked with that. And then she stayed at my mother-in-law's for night and she just had milk in a bottle. Um, and then the next night when she came home, I thought, oh, should I just offer her milk in a bottle? See how she takes it? And she. Please just punch, get all this milk that she'd obviously not been having when she was feeding from me.

Um, and that's it. That was the end. I just, yeah. And she didn't ask for it ever again. 

[00:06:52] Emma Pickett: Okay. So when, so when New Baby came along, didn't re, didn't renew any interest, she wasn't asking, 

[00:06:57] Joelle Morgan: um, she was interested. She did ask once and I said, okay, yeah, sure. Think. And then there was that fleeting thought, oh no, what they done you gonna, with like this passion.

She went to latch on and then she was like, oh no. I think she didn't really know what to do anymore, that it was probably about four months, five months, I suppose, that time just. She'd forgotten what to do, but she's always interested in him feeding. 

[00:07:25] Emma Pickett: Okay. I love that. A moment of of her, of her asking. And that split your gut reaction split.

Second gut reaction is, no, I'll let you try. Um, yeah. And that it's not, it's quite common actually for people to say that when the child does ask and you say Yes, they don't go ahead with it. That was just the, that was, they just wanted to know it was an option. Yeah. They just, so you had a little boy, your, your second.

How did breastfeeding go with him? 

[00:07:48] Joelle Morgan: Not after the best start. He, um, I had a shoulder dystocia with him, so he went to NICU for about 36 hours. I obviously wasn't with him and about, I think the first 24, so I couldn't pick him up or hold him. I think 'cause of the monitoring he was having, he had, um, like tiny needles but had to glue them to his scalp so he couldn't be moved at all in the incubator.

But he was 16 days late and I'd been doing my colostrum harvesting. So I had probably about 15 meals of colostrum in the freezer because I was trying to do a little bit every day. Um, so he had just colostrum for the first, um, 24 hours and then I could feed him after, um, after that. But his latch wasn't very good at the start.

He was really lazy and didn't really suck up probably 'cause he'd had a delayed start. But then once he got going, I'm still feeding him now, he's hardly taking any food. Okay. He's nine months now and just spits it out and won't take a bottle. So it's almost like shifted completely the other way that, that that's all he wants.

But that's absolutely fine. 

[00:08:53] Emma Pickett: Yeah. That sounds normal at this point. Yeah. So that sounds like a, yeah. A rough beginning for you. Um, do you feel, looking back, I just wonder how, I mean, you, you can't know 'cause you can't know any different, but I just wonder when you, when you are a midwife. Whether you feel a bit more relaxed when something like shoulder dystocia happens or whether it's still just as awful and traumatic.

Was it, did it help to know what was happening and to understand what was happening? 

[00:09:16] Joelle Morgan: Yeah, I think so. It felt like I was in a prompt, which like a, a skills and drills training scenario. It felt like it wasn't my birth. And I, I think when they shout, like, so they, they announced the emergency when they said shoulder dystocia, I think went, oh God.

Like I knew what was, what was about to happen or what that really meant. Um, but I tried, I had a cesarean with my daughter and then I tried to have a V back at home with my son and we got rushed in right at the last minute because he just wasn't coming out. So I think I had in my mind that that was probably.

The potential to be sort of happening with a delayed second stage at home. 

[00:09:59] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you very much for sharing all that. So when you were actually doing the research, I'm just trying to work out the timing, you were still pregnant, you, you're still feeding your daughter at the time of doing the research?

[00:10:12] Joelle Morgan: Yeah, she was, um, one to one and a half-ish when I was doing the research and. There was no thought of assessment on the horizon at that point. 

[00:10:23] Emma Pickett: Yeah. So talk to, talk to us about the, the process. So anyone who doesn't know about how research works. So qualitative, a qualitative study. Yeah. What does that word mean?

And and what was your process? Tell us about the stages of, of getting, working towards getting it published. 

[00:10:40] Joelle Morgan: Um, so qualitative is all about people's experiences. Um, sort of lived experiences of a certain. Phenomenon in this case. Um, feeding Beyond infancy, like I said, I, I'd looked at various different, uh, so various other angles of breastfeeding for different modules in my masters.

One of them, um, looking at social media support. And then when it came to deciding what I wanted to sort of jump in and delve in and do my own project on, she was turning one and I was going back to work and I was having lots of. Questions of like, oh, you gonna stop feeding her then? Or, what are your plans, as it were?

And it made me think, well, no, I'm not gonna stop feeding her just because I'm going back to work. So I began to look into what research was out there on. Prolonged feeding various different studies, call it different things, feeding beyond infancy, prolonged feeding, extended breastfeeding, um, natural term weaning.

So I've used a couple of different, um, wording in there, but most of the studies I could find were either beyond six months or beyond 12 months. There was very little looking at beyond two years. Or even further. I probably could research older than that now, looking back at how successful it was to find participants.

But it was finding that concept and the idea of what I would study, really looking at the data and the literature that was around it at the time to make sure that it was gonna be, um, filling a gap in what research that we had. And then it was working out how I would find these women that were still feeding beyond 2, 3, 4, 5.

I didn't have enough age limit, but I knew that things changed a lot between one and two years in terms of what, um, what breastfeeding means to that, um, mother and child, that dyad. Um, so I felt it was important to focus on a slightly older child feeding and the experiences that women have, um, with. So obviously it's not the most common practice around, um, often it's not something that you see, um, in public as often.

So I had to find a way of identifying these women and inviting 'em to take part, which I did through Facebook, um, on an extended feeding group. And I had a really positive response. I think I posted it on Friday evening, and by the Saturday morning I had like an inbox full. I wanted to take part and I started interviewing them that night, the Saturday afternoon evening.

I think I got ethical approval through Swaney Uni, um, which I applied for a couple of weeks prior to that with all the information about what I wanted to be doing. I think I got that through on the Friday, posted it Friday night, and then I was interviewing women all weekend and I think I'd finished by the middle of the next week.

So I was looking at, looking at the data as I went along to make sure that there weren't any new areas that were being raised towards the end. So I, I interviewed 12 women and by about eight or nine, it was the same themes coming through. So I interviewed a couple more to make sure there was nothing new that was, um, being.

Raised as a, as a positive or a benefit or anything about their experience, and then I decided 12 was sufficient because I wasn't being funded and I had limited time to do this. I would've loved to carry on, could have probably carried on for months. And then it was a case of looking at all of that, um, data.

I had to transcribe each of the interviews and then sort of pick out, um, common themes, common phrases that women were using to generate some, um, six themes about what it meant or women's experiences around feeding their, their 2-year-old or older. I submitted it for my dissertation. And then, um, my supervisor, Sarah Jones, she suggested having it published and she was really supportive in doing that process.

Um, I've been on maternity leave and just sitting down at her laptops not being the easiest thing for me for the last year. So she really supported in that process of approaching a journal with the, with the research, and then adjusting it to meet their criteria of word count in each each area. Here we're cool 

[00:14:55] Emma Pickett: published.

So getting in a journal, there's this thing about being a peer reviewed journal article. Does that mean it got sent off to other people to read and comments? Came back? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And I'm guessing doubt there would be many comments if it's a no qualitative study. It's not like someone can say, oh, I don't like the way you collected that data.

It's a bit, yeah. It's more just absorbing and listening, I guess, and taking on board what you're saying. Yeah. You talked about finding people on Facebook. I sometimes see people online or people sometimes contact me and say, I would love to be part of research. You know, feeding beyond infancy is really important to me.

I'd love to meet, to research and be able to talk about my experiences. That's obviously gonna be pretty rare when so few people are researching this area. Have you got any advice for anybody who wants to be part of research? Is there any chance that there's a way to make that more likely 

[00:15:42] Joelle Morgan: for a project like this?

It's probably quite unlikely unless you just happen to come across a small advert, advertising it to be part of a bigger study. Um, especially if it's in the nhs, there's, they'll often be posters or the research team, um, looking at various different. Conditions or experiences, but to be part of something small like this, it's just.

Probably being in the right place at the right time, seeing the right 

[00:16:08] Emma Pickett: information. It's fluke, isn't it, to be honest. I mean as, as as we'll talk about in a minute. So few people look at breastfeeding beyond infancy. It's just not something that gets a lot of attention. So, I mean, it's lovely that someone's enthusiastic and wanting to talk about their experiences, but what I actually said to that person was.

To be honest, a lot of research don't necessarily want the most enthusiastic people. They want a representative range of everyone who's breastfeeding, and some of them will be hating it, and some of them will be having a, you know, pretty middling time. So, um, maybe if you wanna share experiences, there are better ways of doing that.

Like, uh, writing a blog or, you know, doing something else. Yeah. That communicates to the public. Okay. Let's talk about some of the other research studies that exist. Now, I'm gonna put you on the spot a little bit here, and you are welcome to get your paper and read from it. I'm not expecting you to memorize all these studies.

There are some bigger studies that have been done about breastfeeding beyond infancy, but not many. Before we talk about the studies, let's talk about why is it quite rare to find research on breastfeeding older children. Now, I think you and I both have a sense of this, but let's just work it through together.

Why do we often not find research on breastfeeding older children? 

[00:17:17] Joelle Morgan: So many women in the UK stop feeding in those early days and weeks. Um, and we know that women often stop before they feel ready. So a lot of the research that is on breastfeeding is looking at those early, early parts of feeding and supporting women to continue through those early, early days and weeks.

That I think once, once you sort of. Succeeded in feeding beyond six months a year. It's almost viewed as well, you've achieved your milestone. Maybe you've got to two years, which is what the World Health Organization recommend two years or beyond that it's almost not viewed as. Important because you tick, they've got there.

[00:17:55] Emma Pickett: It's not significant, is it? So, so the people that pay for research, the big funders, you know, the academic organizations, they're more likely to be commissioned by people that care about early breastfeeding because those are where the big public health outcomes are gonna be more noticeable. You know, if a population's only breastfeeding for a month versus six months, that's, we're talking about greater volume of people.

Therefore more impact on health systems, more impact on NHS costs. So you can see financially why it makes sense to emphasize the early breastfeeding research. Yeah, and it does, you know, it's not because everyone's evil and they hate extended breastfeeding or older children breastfeeding. It's just 'cause there's a greater need.

'cause there's a greater volume of people. But as you, as you gently hint, there's, there's also a little bit probably of prejudice here and an assumption. That because someone's got beyond the first few months, they're fine. They're okay. They don't, we don't need to look at them. Not interesting. And sometimes more than not interesting, a bit icky and not something I'm gonna pay attention to as a researcher.

And I guess a lot of researchers are blokes and people that won't be even thinking about lactating. Um, and then also something else you touched on is there aren't necessarily a lot of people breastfeeding older children, so it's can be harder to find them. You don't 

[00:19:07] Joelle Morgan: even know numbers. Yeah. I think beyond one year.

It's not even recorded as the numbers in the uk so 

[00:19:12] Emma Pickett: no, no, we have no idea's. Not 

[00:19:14] Joelle Morgan: taken the time to figure out how many, let alone what those women are feeling about it. All those children are yeah. Feeling about it. 

[00:19:20] Emma Pickett: I dunno what the situation is. With, with Wales in Scotland, they do record some figures. Um, over 12 months.

We've got some toddler breastfeeding results in the Scottish infant feeding survey, but we certainly have no clue in England. And I'm guessing it's the same for Wales. Um, you know, I think 

[00:19:35] Joelle Morgan: up to 12 months. I, I think memory. Okay. 

[00:19:37] Emma Pickett: Okay. So the, so the National Infant Feeding Survey used to have a kind of eight to 10 month phase, but didn't really go beyond that.

Um, but it'd be interesting to know if there's anything changing when the new National Infant Feeding survey kicks in again, which is any, any day now, because they've been collecting their data. They should be publishing pretty soon on that, hopefully. So if you want to do a quantitative study, and I might have put too many in there, a quantitative study where you're looking at, you know, does breastfeeding beyond three years reduce the risk of asthma, for example?

It's really hard to find enough people. To have enough of a control group, to have enough of a study group to actually, to look, to look at that and to be able to get that data. Yeah. So it's just, it's just the fewer people, the harder it is to, to pull research together. Um, and as you say, you found this lovely group on Facebook who are super useful, but, um, that's not necessarily gonna get you a representative proportion population.

That's 

[00:20:31] Joelle Morgan: key to, to make it more visible and shout about the benefits or, you know. Affect that these results probably are a bit skewed towards those women that are super pro, um, feeding for as long as they them and their child wanna. 

[00:20:48] Emma Pickett: Yeah. And, and also in terms of ethnicity and class and education level, you know, with the biggest, obviously a qualitative study that's not focusing on, that's not your emphasis.

But if we do want a bigger study to find out who is more likely to breastfeed beyond a certain amount of time, you know, you need bigger numbers to be able to represent all the social groups so it gets difficult. Having been negative about why there isn't much research of beyond babyhood, let's talk about what does exist.

So you obviously, as part of your thesis, did a little bit of a literature review, not to the same extent that somebody might do when they're doing a PhD, but you did have a look at some of the studies. Yeah. What, what are some of your faves, or if someone was saying to you what research is out there, what, what, which ones would you mention?

[00:21:28] Joelle Morgan: Um, depends what you're looking at really. There's a couple of studies looking at the composition of milk. Um, the physical changes in the milk beyond one or two years. So there's Mandel, there's Perin, there's shanka, Shanka, and you looked at milk up to two years, I believe. Then if you're thinking about the lived experiences, there's very little beyond two years.

Um, so when I did the literature review, there was. Um, I think about six studies looking at women's experiences of breastfeeding beyond infancy. Dowling and Brown. Amy Brown, again, Burton Jackson and Hall Thompson. Those are just sort of names of various are good. We, we need the names. 

[00:22:13] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Um, 

[00:22:14] Joelle Morgan: and they're all listed in the.

I think none of them looked at specifically beyond, um, two years. There was one actually that looked at tandem Feeding Rodriguez. Um, Rodriguez Vasquez looked at tandem feeding, which included children beyond two years. 

[00:22:32] Emma Pickett: Yeah, so, so some of the names that you've mentioned are kind of real people in my mind.

So, Natalie Schenker, who did the study with the Parenting Science Gang. Who's the co-founder of the Human Milk Foundation and Heart's Milk Bank. That was a just a really nice study where lots of people brought their milk samples and because obviously her interest is in donor milk. You know, she looked at the composition of milk and said, you know, there's no reason why we can't accept donor milk up to two years.

Fact, if anything, fat levels are increasing. Um, you know, we don't, it's not like the milk is becoming less valuable. It's, it's, you know, all good stuff, which is what we saw from some of the older studies like paren. Some of the studies that you mentioned are a while ago now, which really shows how there's a lot going on.

So, so Sally Dowling did a nice study where she also looked at the sort of qualitative experience and, and one of the things I liked about her study is that, um, she was, you know, she wasn't presenting it as a Rosie Stu experience. People were having a really tough time and some of the people in that study were really talking about the impact on their relationships and possibly not even having another child because it was so overwhelming to be in this kind of intense Yeah.

Breastfeeding relationship. So I, I particularly like that one just because I think it does paint the whole spectrum of how tough it can be to be in that, in that, you know, longer term breastfeeding relationship. Tell me a bit more about the Rodriguez one. I'm not expecting to remember all these studies.

I'm not familiar with that one. What's, what's that one about? 

[00:23:51] Joelle Morgan: That was quite recent, so I didn't, it wasn't yet published when I conducted my literature review. Um, but I've identified it, um, Ms. Sarah since. Putting it together to be published. So it was published in 2023 and it was looking at tandem feeding.

Um, so it was exploring tandem feeding, breastfeeding motivations. Um, so looking at what motivates women to tandem feed, um, to continue to feed their older child when they have a, a younger child. 

[00:24:18] Emma Pickett: Okay, well, gosh, that'd be interesting 'cause I always, my experience of talking to families is quite often they're just carrying on.

They're not even deciding to tandem feed. They're just deciding to not stop because yeah, I mean, it's too hard to stop, so you might as well carry on rather than there being some kind of lofty, you know, let's discuss it and look at the pros and cons. It's just day to day what, what's working in this moment.

So I'm gonna be curious to see how that research is worded and, and what their findings were. Okay, so as you say, not much looking at beyond two, so a lot of the ones that talk about continuing to breastfeed, they look at like nine months plus or 12 months plus, but not much. Yeah. The Thompson study is the one that talked about natural term breastfeeding as being a term lots of parents liked, and it talked about how parents aren't massive fans of.

Extended breastfeeding as a concept because it implies that what they're doing is not normal and, and, and not something that is the ordinary. Um, so that, so one of the reasons that I quite often use the term natural term breastfeeding is because of that study. You mentioned that you use a couple of different terms in your research, did you find that, that the mums you spoke to liked describing it a particular way, or was it just breastfeeding?

[00:25:30] Joelle Morgan: For some of them it was just breastfeeding because why is it different that your child's a different age? Um, some of them natural term, um, breastfeeding. Yeah. Various terms. And I, during each interview I used the term that. The mom initially used. 

[00:25:46] Emma Pickett: Okay. 

[00:25:47] Joelle Morgan: She's gonna describe it her way and I'll, I'll go with that description.

I'm not, who am I to describe it differently? Her experience. 

[00:25:53] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I, natural term, it's a bit cheesy in some people's eyes. It just kind of, the word natural is a word we have to be so careful about whenever we're talking about, you know, parenting and, and giving birth and, and breastfeeding. But yeah, sometimes, um, we haven't got, yeah, the word breastfeeding is the word that works.

Why do you think it's important that we research this group? Why do we, why should there be a focus on researching breastfeeding older children? 

[00:26:18] Joelle Morgan: Well, it's happening, isn't it? So it's, it's an experience that women are undergoing or going through. Um, a lot of them say there's so little support, um, on stopping beyond a certain age or continuing support for maybe friends.

It is a behavior that continues. Women don't just stop at a certain age. Um, even though they're only in small numbers potentially, or small proportions, that's gonna still be a large amount of women, um, across the world that are feeding 2, 3, 4, 5 year olds or even older than that obviously. So it, it is important that we, we sort of highlight the benefits the.

Challenges that women face. Um, not only so that they sort of feel validated in, oh, there are other women going through what I'm going through. Um, but it was raised by quite a few, um, of the women actually, that they felt they lacked support from healthcare professionals, even though it's recommended by the World Health Organization to continue beyond what to two or beyond.

That a lot of them, when they saw their gp, um, it was just either assumed that they'd stopped feeding and they were being prescribed a medication that wasn't suitable, um, to feed with and they had to raise it as of is that suitable with feeding and, and the lack of support they felt in those situations.

Even, um, health visited people, say even their health visitor didn't support them in continuing beyond two. Um, but even in my practice made me sort of reflect on the fact that women are still feeding beyond two. Um, but as a midwife, I would never ask in a booking appointment, in that first appointment at until wait 10, 12 weeks.

Are you still breastfeeding? I would've just assumed you are likely not to be feeding by that point 'cause it's a new pregnancy and a new sort of starting afresh. Whereas it's really made me more aware that there will be women continuing to feed. I was still feeding when I, um, fell pregnant again. And even just someone saying, oh, you're still feeding.

Do you need any support with that? Whether that's support to carry on and look at the transition, um, to tandem feeding or support and thinking about how you might want to stop if you want to stop. So even just raising the awareness amongst healthcare professionals to support these women. Um, or just have an awareness just that it's happening.

[00:28:44] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. That's really important what you're saying about the booking an appointment. I think the mother who's thinking, oh, am I gonna be told off if I'm told I'm still breastfeeding? Yeah. Am I gonna come up against p. When you're already, you know, feeling a bit nervous about the early stages of pregnancy, it's that extra pressure is not fun.

So if you had a midwife that said, oh, by the way, are you breastfeeding? Just matter of fact, and you could say, yes, what a, what a gift that would be. That would be an amazing thing. That should be a standard question on the list. 

[00:29:10] Joelle Morgan: Yeah. 

[00:29:13] Emma Pickett: I want to tell you about my brand new book called The Story of Jesse's Milky.

It's a picture book for two to six year olds, and I wanted to write a book that was about weaning, but also not about weaning, because breastfeeding journeys end in all sorts of different ways. So Jesse's story is presented as having three possible endings. In one ending, his mom is pregnant and Jesse's going to share his milk with a new baby.

In the second, his mum was getting really tired and it's time for some mother led weaning. And in the third, we see a self weaning journey as Jesse's attachment to breastfeeding gradually fades. There are beautiful illustrations by the very talented Jojo Ford, and the feedback from parents so far has been so lovely and touching and I'm really excited to share the book with you.

If you're interested in my other books for Older Children, I have the Breast book, which is a guide for nine to 14 year olds. And it's a puberty book that puts the emphasis on breasts, which I think is very much needed. And I also have two books about supporting breastfeeding beyond six months and supporting the transition from breastfeeding for a 10% discount on the last two.

Go to Jessica Kingsley Press. That's uk.jkp.com and use the code MMPE 10 Makes milk picket Emma 10. So when someone asks you what are the, what are the good things about breastfeeding beyond two years, obviously you spoke to these women and you looked at it, you know, you looked at the research and did a bit of a deep dive.

What are, what are some of the positive things that, that you say? What's your kind of summary at the bus stop? If someone's asking you about, oh, what do you think? What's, why do people do it? What's the reason to do it? 

[00:30:53] Joelle Morgan: A lot of them just becomes normal for how they parent their child. It's so integral in how they parent their toddler or older child helping to soothe their child, regulate their child, helping them get them to sleep.

Um, a lot of them just said, it works. It just works. So why would I stop something that helps everything? Um, like if he's hurt. I think one of the, the quotes was like, if he's hurt, boob, if she's upset, boob is just the go-to. Um, and it just works for a lot of people in a lot of situations. Many of them talked about the physical benefit.

So looking at like the milk composition, like we were discussing earlier, there isn't much research on the milk composition beyond two years, but how can it just turn to water? 

[00:31:40] Emma Pickett: It makes no biological sense, does it? The idea that, oh no, we've only got, you know, Schenker and the parenting science gang, so therefore at three it must be water again.

[00:31:48] Joelle Morgan: Yeah, just water in terms 

[00:31:49] Emma Pickett: of the synthesis of how milk is made. You know, those antibodies aren't gonna go anywhere. Those proteins, that Vitamin A aren't going anywhere still. Yeah. 

[00:31:57] Joelle Morgan: Um, so a lot of them said about that, whether it was because their child was a picky eater, so they knew that at least they were getting a lot of, um, nutrition from their milk.

Some of their children had medical conditions and they knew it would be supporting them. And one of the, the children of, of a mother in the study had cystic fibrosis and she was saying he was, I think he was four or five and he'd never been hospitalized, um, for his cystic fibrosis. And she said, I'm, I'm almost certain it's because I'm feeding him.

He is still getting all that antibodies and that goodness from, from me, a lot of them talked about the benefits for them. So the reduction in breast cancer, ovarian cancer. And a lot of them talked about the stigma that they felt from society, but that they felt they were doing their best to make it visible and to promote it and support other women that might, even if it's just agl, a glance, oh, I've seen there's an older child breastfeeding, just to sort of put that thought in their head that it's, it still happens.

It's not abnormal that might support women in the future when it comes to feeding their own child to be aware that you don't need to stop at a certain age. But a lot of them talked about how they found it hard to find a community, but when they did find that support and an online community, they found that really invaluable to, to know that there's hundreds of thousands of other women across the world feeding their older child and that they weren't, um, they weren't alone in that.

[00:33:23] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. It's a whole, yeah, it's everything, isn't it? I mean, it literally is everything. For some people, as you say, it's so integral into their parenting experience. It's just such a tool. I sometimes talk about it as being like kinda the Swiss Army knife for parenting. It, it does everything. Everything.

And, and why would you take that away? Just because a certain number of months or, or you know, years have gone by. It doesn't make sense. If it's working for you. Why would you deprive your child of this thing that. Potentially fights viruses and bacteria and eats cancer cells and um, you know, fights against disease.

And it's just such an odd thing to imagine removing that. And unless you really wanted to. Unless you really needed to. 

[00:34:01] Joelle Morgan: Yeah. Or they feel they child. And one of them, some of the comments I've had are, um, it's just for comfort now. And she, where did it really run? It's just stuck in my head. She's like, surely that's the most valid need for a child.

Why would you not want to provide them with comfort? Like, so what if it's only for comfort that there may not be any nutritional, um, benefits, which we know is highly unlikely to be, um, that there are. What's the big deal if it's just for comfort? A child with comfort is surely the most important thing you can do.

[00:34:35] Emma Pickett: Yeah, I love that. I saw that quote in your research and did a little Instagram post on it actually, because you know, as a society now we learn, we've learned so much more about adult mental health. Self-care and it's all about, you know, what do you do for your self-care? And, you know, let's go and do some yoga and meditation and, and you know, I do gaming and I do adult coloring books and we're like, yeah, gr healthy, well done, brilliant.

You know, reduced stress levels, heart rate, overall mental health and physical health being interlinked. But for two year olds, for some reason, comfort mental health care is not important. Yeah. And we're like, you know, so even if it, as you say, even if it was just for comfort. Fantastic. Why would that be a bad thing?

It's, it's just bananas. It really highlights the kind of prejudice against breastfeeding and the kind of sexualization of the breast and the discomfort we have around breastfeeding that it's okay if there's milk, it's okay if there's, you know, nutrition happening or antibodies happening and lots of mums who are extended breastfeeding, again, not the term I use, but we'll say, oh, but antibodies and, and vitamin A and this percentage of protein, and I'm gonna quote Perrin and talk about.

You know, so much of this and Lysozyme and all these things, but actually none of that matters really because it's okay to say, you know what? We're doing it because I like it. He likes it. Yeah. It helps us get to sleep. It re it regulates them. It reassures them. Isn't that enough? I don't need to quote percentages of vitamin A isn't, isn't just the comfort bit enough?

[00:36:00] Joelle Morgan: And why is it your problem anyway? 

[00:36:02] Emma Pickett: Yeah, that's that's the darn show. Why have you 

[00:36:04] Joelle Morgan: got an opinion anyway? Yeah. 

[00:36:05] Emma Pickett: I mean, one of the things in your study, as I said, you do talk about the challenges and you do talk about. Sort of the health professional prejudices. Mm. Um, which we've got a long way to go on. Did people talk about challenges from sort of other people in their life?

Other family members and, and friends? A 

[00:36:21] Joelle Morgan: lot of them said they didn't feel supported by family or friends. They felt a lot social stigma. Most of them actually used the world. They quoted the World Health Organization recommendation. So they'd become educated themselves on how to, how to respond to those.

Questions or that stigma that they weren't just doing it because they wanted to, that it was actually advised to continue. One woman, it was, it was really interesting. She said her partner didn't know that she was continuing to feed her, um, child. I think she said he, he wasn't comfortable with it. He said, can you stop?

And she said, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure. She would wake up before him and was in the room with the child. So she said she just carried on feeding in the morning and he had no idea. And she carried on for about four or five months after that conversation and he wasn't aware. Gosh. So just the lack of support you from your child's father and Yeah, like you say, it isn't necessarily what society supports and it, the breast is sexualized and all these things, and that's partly why I chose to.

Um, chose to look at it as well because it, it didn't feel entirely normal to me. There was, there is that feeling that sometimes you feel uncomfortable, and I wanted to challenge my own perception of feeding an older child and why I felt that because. There's nothing wrong with me feeling that. It's just how I'd become exposed to it growing up necessarily.

I hadn't really seen any older children feed, and I think I, there was a friend on my course who said she, her children are teenagers now, but she breast, they were five. And I remember thinking, wow. That's really old. Really? But now that's completely normal to me. Yeah. 

[00:38:01] Emma Pickett: And so many people breastfeeding themselves are still struggling with those prejudices and those societal views.

Yeah. And the number of times people say to me, oh yeah, I'm fine now he's 19 months, but oh, I'm not gonna feed him when he is three. I'm not gonna feed him when he is. And it's, but it's like, I promise one day before he's three, he's not gonna be a different person. He's gonna be the same person. And it's, it's only when you get there that you realize that your age limits.

Just come from this weird external messaging Yeah. That we've absorbed all through our lives and, and in the moment when you get there, you are gonna focus on your child. You're gonna focus on what's right for them and what's right for both of you. And, and we just adjust as we go along. And not many people who are breastfeeding five and six year olds thought they were ever gonna be doing that.

It's just what feels right in that moment. Coming back to that, that person you were talking about, who, who breastfeeds kind of in secret. I think we obviously have to be mindful of the fact that. We're talking about potentially people in coercive relationships or abusive relationships. Yeah. And, and sometimes breastfeeding does become a sort of weapon in that conversation, and sometimes people are under pressure in a relationship that that really isn't great.

And there are obviously organizations that, that can support you, whether that's women's aid or refuge, or people that can help you if you are in a relationship where you're under a lot of pressure. I did a couple of episodes talking to Scott Mayer from Fatherhood Solutions, where we talk about men and breastfeeding and men and their opinions around breastfeeding and, and if you are stuck in a space where your husband's got some negative feelings around breastfeeding, um, or your partner has, maybe have a listen to those episodes.

One of the things that I thought was interesting in the conversations you were having was participants talked about struggling to find a kind of balance when it came to their own body autonomy and, and of wanting to continue, but also wanting to have a bit more, I guess, freedom as a word that sometimes people use.

Mm, yeah. Tell us a bit more about some of the conversations people were having about finding that balance. 

[00:39:57] Joelle Morgan: Exactly. That a lot of them were saying they wanted to continue for their child and it did work for everything. 3, 4, 5 years is a long time to be devoting yourself, um, toll on your body. Some of them, it was how their child got to sleep so they weren't able to go out for the evening because that's, that's how they got their child to sleep.

So not not having any time to be able to leave the house surrounding bedtime. So they, they sort of felt like a prisoner in the house between like seven and eight or whatever time their child went to bed. Of them fed overnight still. So they, um, they were becoming sleep deprived, been potentially years of, of feeding overnight and finding that support and sort of acknowledging those feelings that, you know, it's the best for your child, yet you still don't want to be, there is a part of you that doesn't wanna be doing it and it's sort of becoming.

Finding that peace within, within themselves that they will carry on. But knowing that one day it will end. But when you're in the thick of it and you are, you've maybe had sleepless nights for five years, maybe it's your second child, it's been seven, eight years of not having a full night's sleep. So those discussions that one day you, you'll get that nap, um, that full night sleep back and your child won't want to feed forever.

But when you're in it. It can feel like it's forever for some of them. 

[00:41:24] Emma Pickett: Yeah. I mean, I think one of the things that you're sort of reminding me of is that it's okay to continue breastfeeding and still to hate it some other time. Yeah. 'cause actually parenting little people is incredibly draining and takes a huge amount of energy out of you.

And the idea that if you end breastfeeding. Suddenly it's all roses and flower petals and wonderful times is not Yeah. You can't get your child to 

[00:41:44] Joelle Morgan: sleep then maybe. Yeah. I mean sometimes it's, 

[00:41:47] Emma Pickett: it's parenting little people in itself that is really tough and yeah, I have occasionally met people who say, oh yes, I want, I need to stop breastfeeding 'cause I need to have my life back.

I'm like, I'm absolutely here to help you stop breastfeeding. Yeah. But you have a 2-year-old who's going to still. Jump on top of you and yeah, need that reconnection after nursery and we'll still wake up early in the morning and they're still going to need you. So that bit may not necess necessarily go away, 

[00:42:09] Joelle Morgan: and you might use that tool that that helps everything else 

[00:42:12] Emma Pickett: potentially.

Yeah. So you need to really sort of look at the whole story and, and it's possible to hate it, you know, 51, so 49% of the time and, and like, and, and tolerate it like it 51% of the time. And being a regular breastfeeding parent, and as I said, the Sally Dowling research touches on how. Really tough and unpleasant it can be some of the time.

[00:42:32] Joelle Morgan: Yeah. A lot of women talked about feeling aversion. Um, especially if they were tandem feeding. They'd feel it just towards their older child, and maybe it was because their older child would only feed at bedtime or only feed overnight. It's that long day of parenting your child and then you're just exhausted and you know that.

As soon as they're asleep, that's when you get a bit of you time and they're not gonna, that, those negative thoughts are just gonna sleep. 

[00:42:58] Emma Pickett: Yeah. 

[00:42:58] Joelle Morgan: Um, you just want it to be over because once they're asleep it's over. It's like connecting those two behaviors and patterns. 

[00:43:05] Emma Pickett: Yeah. That exasperation of, I will not get any time to myself until you're asleep and oh my God, I've been doing this for 40 minutes.

And just that absolute fury and, and I'm not dismissing that that isn't also breastfeeding version, but that is also. Little person contact aversion, and I just, and you know, if you weren't breastfeeding, they still might take an hour to get to sleep and Yeah. Um, so it's all about looking at the whole picture for sure.

And making sure that you're looking at, you know, their nap times and bedtime and sleep pressure and the whole, you know, you need to look at that, that whole story. I mean, people obviously felt very happy to talk to you about the negative experiences as well, which I think is super important. 'cause we don't need a research study that's just all rosy and lovely and isn't it all wonderful and let's all you know, dance together in a crook circle, celebrating breastfeeding beyond two years.

It is, it is hard. It is tough. And then, and that's why we need to talk about it so people know that this group still need research and support. So social media is often something that we feel very negatively about. Everyone talks about how the evils of it and it's destroying society, but, but your research also talked quite positively about social media and, and what it can bring to people's lives.

Tell me a bit more about that. 

[00:44:12] Joelle Morgan: Yeah. Well, I think a lot of these women felt very alone in feeding their older child. Maybe their family weren't aware they were continuing to feed. Maybe they didn't feel confident to tell people, but there is a lot of support on social media. For feeding older the children.

And a lot of them talked about once they found that community, they were able to ask their questions and feel Even a lot of them said they didn't even post anything. It was just knowing that there were other women doing the same thing as them. They could read their experiences, read their stories. You can post anonymously if you've got particular questions.

Um, but just knowing that they weren't alone. And having that access to support 24 7. They could go on Facebook. A lot of 'em talked about going on it when they were feeding their child to sleep. Um, needing to scroll through something, if they're feeding a version, just to, you know, keep their, their mind elsewhere.

Reading other people's experiences, other people's stories. 

[00:45:08] Emma Pickett: So this is Facebook mainly. Obviously you recruited this group from Facebook, so inevitably Facebook is something that would they be connecting to? I guess, obviously there are Instagram accounts that talk about breastfeeding older children, but, and some of the, you know, there are sometimes comments that develop a sense of community on those posts, but Facebook, even though Facebook's going outta fashion in lots of ways, and it, and it's not really what the youth are doing these days, it's, it's definitely sticking, it's really good 

[00:45:33] Joelle Morgan: for community.

Yeah, it 

[00:45:35] Emma Pickett: is definitely sticking with community, isn't it? And 

[00:45:37] Joelle Morgan: more rare communities. Yeah. 

[00:45:39] Emma Pickett: Yeah. And the breastfeeding older children and beyond. Or is it breastfeeding older babies and beyond? Is that the group you used for recruitment? Yeah. Yeah, that's, that's probably the biggest group out there though, though.

There are lots of different ones. 

[00:45:49] Joelle Morgan: Yeah. And there's local ones as well. Yeah, because even finding people locally, some women said they've never, they've never met someone in person who is breastfed to the age of their child is, or three or four, five. So it was invaluable that they could. Virtually communicate with these people that, that were just like them.

[00:46:08] Emma Pickett: Yeah. The lecture league is often a good place to look for people breastfeeding older children. They are, yeah. They have a regular meeting about breastfeeding older children and breastfeeding toddlers, and some of those have moved to being Zoom meetings. But you can, you know, get in touch with a lecture league and see what's local to you or whether you can join a a A A Zoom group as well.

I know some people talked about ending breastfeeding and how it was difficult to, to find support around ending. This is something that I'm really interested in. So tell me a bit more about what people were saying about weaning and ending. 

[00:46:35] Joelle Morgan: A lot of them found information and advice online. Instagram was discussed more for finding information or finding advocates or specialists on feeding older children or weaning an older child.

A lot of them said it was really difficult. They felt that there was all this support for starting feeding, but no one there to help them when it came to stopping. And there's, it's obviously so much more than just stopping one day. It's, it's intertwined with so many aspects of caring for your child. One said it, it felt really profound stopping feeding, and it was like the end of a, an era for how you cared for your child.

But no one was interested. No one cares. But for them, it was a really profound, um, important milestone to have achieved. Um, but there just wasn't any interest from even their, their families. Sometimes they said they felt lack of support, and it was almost viewed as, oh, good, you stopped. Rather than like, how was the process?

Or you're trying to stop. Do you need support? A couple of women actually talked about how they felt their child had a connection to their breast beyond when they'd stopped feeding. So they would like cuddle or rock their child to sleep and they'd have a hand on one side. And then she said she switched hands after five minutes or so to the other side, and it was almost like she imagined feeding on one side still and then swapping to the other side.

Yeah, a lot of them talked about that. Connection with their breast still, even though they weren't feeding, they'd, they'd hold it or they'd, they'd cuddle there because that's where they felt most comfort, I guess. 

[00:48:07] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Oh, I love the little imaginary swapping sides thing that's really special. 

[00:48:11] Joelle Morgan: Yeah. So sweet.

[00:48:13] Emma Pickett: So you were really lucky to have these, these in depth conversations with these women and, and hear their stories. Was there anything about the research that you were really surprised by that you were not expecting? Or did it just kind of confirm what you were already feeling as likely to come up?

[00:48:28] Joelle Morgan: Because I was feeding my 1-year-old. A lot of it was very interesting for sort of what stage I'm gonna be entering. Um, so it was useful for me, but she, um, didn't usually feed to sleep. She had a dummy so she wouldn't feed to sleep. So when they were talking about it, just working and solving all problems and, and.

That was harder for me to understand because that wasn't my experience. Um, but it's definitely the experience I'm having now with my son. He feeds to sleep, um, and doesn't have a dummy. So it's almost like bringing all these discussions back into the forefront of my mind of how I sort imagine the next couple of years to pan out potentially with him.

Um, I guess what shocked me most was when that woman said about her partner not knowing, thinking there's, there's so little. Support from people's friends and family to the extent of someone's your child's father not even supporting it. Yeah. Um, little Britain was raised a lot in, in like bitty and 

[00:49:31] Emma Pickett: Yeah.

So anyone who doesn't know Little Britain, who tell us what Little Britain is for anyone who doesn't know, there might be some younger parents that never saw it or people from other countries. Yeah. Well it 

[00:49:38] Joelle Morgan: was so huge when we were growing up. It was, it was on and then you, it was all you talk about. It was all I talked about in school.

It was, um, an older child, one an adult. 

[00:49:50] Emma Pickett: So David W. Williams was playing, uh, the child in the breastfeeding relationship. So Little Brick was a sketch show, wasn't it? Comedy sketch show. Yeah. Matt Lucas, David Williams. And there was one re recurring sketch. It wasn't a one-off. It was happening quite regularly.

Yeah. And the idea was that it was a kind of upper middle class family. Are you okay with me summarizing this? By the way? Feel free to chip in. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Um, upper, upper middle class family, and. You know, she was, I don't know, in her sixties, he was in his forties and they'd, they'd be having afternoon tea and he'd suddenly say, mommy, can I have some bitty, which is his, their, their word for breastfeeding, or she would offer it and he'd go over breastfeed, you know, all the people having tea would be horrified.

His potential girlfriend or whatever would be horrified. You know, it would, so it was, and then the, the mother was sort of just pretending it was completely normal and the husband the was not reacting and the. The older Nurse Ling who was 40 something and David Williams was so, it was all just kind of, it was throwing the weird on the situation, wasn't it?

Yeah. The idea was that it was just so incredibly weird. They, it wasn't even talked about. One of the jokes was that it wasn't even a discussion, it was just something that was happening around everyone else and they weren't even noticing it. But that word bitty, which was that family's word for breastfeeding.

Became a word that lots of people used in England and Britain to describe older children, breastfeeding. And you don't want to be like that gross family. Yeah. And you don't want to be like him. And you know that, that dysfunctional, horrible mother and, and if you carry on breastfeeding this child beyond 13 months, it's, it's like the David Williams character who's in his mid forties.

Um, so it just became this sort of. Brush that people were, you know, tarring families with, who were continuing to breastfeed beyond. And, and when you live in a society where people may not have seen any breastfeeding, they may not have seen any breastfeeding on television, and the only representation of breastfeeding in primetime television was this 40 something bloke breastfeeding with his 60 something mother.

Um, it it, it was very much coloring people's perceptions. So even though it hasn't been on tele now for probably a good 10 years, there are. YouTube clips around still. And these, and these women were still being impacted by that. They still had people making those references and talking about that program.

[00:52:10] Joelle Morgan: Yeah, they still are now, because I feel like I'm in my mid thirties, it was probably my generation that were like teenagers or early adults when it was shown on the tv and it was, it was everywhere, wasn't it? Little Britain. Everyone knew Little Britain and bitty. 

[00:52:25] Emma Pickett: Yeah. 

[00:52:25] Joelle Morgan: And how do you shape that? How do you shape that?

[00:52:28] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Well, there's nothing else counteracting that. There are no positive representations. Yeah. Of breastfeeding beyond babyhood. There's nothing else. All there are is messages. It's just a bit weird, isn't it? Bit weird, bit kinky. Bit strange. Yeah. That's what happens if you don't parent, you know, in a healthy way.

Yeah. 

[00:52:46] Joelle Morgan: You've gotta stop because you don't wanna be like that. 

[00:52:49] Emma Pickett: Yeah. It's just super sad. Yeah. I mean that, that program's fallen outta favor for lots of different reasons. There was potential misogyny and, and body shaming and all sorts of stuff going on there. And, um. Yeah. But that, that particular representation is something that I hear people talking about a lot.

Yeah. Sad. Okay. What's next for you, Joelle? What are you gonna be doing next? You're obviously on maternity leave right now with your little one. Yeah. What's, what's your plan for the future? 

[00:53:16] Joelle Morgan: Oh, I don't know. I'm back to work next month and that's pretty much all I've got. 

[00:53:21] Emma Pickett: So when you're back to work, you'll get stuck into new research studies as part of your NHS research midwife hat.

Yeah. Um, can we persuade you to do any future research on natural term breastfeeding? 

[00:53:33] Joelle Morgan: Yeah, I probably would.

I can't find the time. It's finding funding to support my time. Yeah. Um, so I'm open to, I don't really know where my career will go. I've been a research med midwife for about six years, but I've been on maternity leave for two of those. So I feel like I'm still in the early stages of deciding whether I continue in the NHS as a research midwife or maybe go down the academic route.

Who knows what this space, 

[00:54:05] Emma Pickett: watch this space. I'll get you 

[00:54:06] Joelle Morgan: going back to work ll I'll send 

[00:54:07] Emma Pickett: you nagging emails every 12 months. Let me just set reminder up in my Gmail to, uh, nag you every 12 months. Thank you so much for talking to me today, Joelle. I'm really, really grateful. Thank you for having me. And uh, yeah, thank you so much for doing this research and as I said, look in the show notes to get the link.

But if you just Google, uh, um, Joelle's name, you, you know, you'll, you'll find it. Joelle Morgan breastfeeding. You're gonna find that research study coming up. Thank you. Really grateful on behalf of all the breastfeeding women of the world and breast lactating parents of the world. Thank you for doing that research.

Yeah, doing it. And, and it's just, and I love the way you wrote it up with all the quotes from the parents in it and, and highlighting the voices of the parents. It was, yeah, because that 

[00:54:43] Joelle Morgan: is the most interesting part, isn't it? Those quotes. 

[00:54:47] Emma Pickett: No, that is, it's a fun read. It's not a heavy bit of research. It's, it's really a nice, easy read as well, so beautifully communicated.

Thank you. 

[00:54:55] Joelle Morgan: Thank you very much, Anna. Thanks for having me.

[00:55:01] Emma Pickett: Thank you for joining me today. You can find me on Instagram at Emma Pickett, IB clc, and on Twitter at Makes milk. It would be lovely if you subscribed, because that helps other people to know I exist. And leaving a review would be great as well. Get in touch if you would like to join me to share your feeding or weaning journey, or if you have any ideas for topics to include in the podcast.

This podcast is produced by the lovely Emily Crosby Media.