Jade's story - pregnant with HG and breastfeeding

Sometimes, our plans for feeding don’t work out. That’s what happened to my guest this week, Jade Feeney from north west London. Jade had hoped to tandem feed, but ended up weaning her eldest daughter during pregnancy due to hyperemesis gravidarum (HG). She shares a “dream” first breastfeeding experience with her eldest, later identifying cow’s milk protein intolerance when weaning solids, but when she conceived again when her daughter was 18 months and developed severe HG, she required escalating anti-sickness medication, GP and triage support and months off work. She stopped feeding at around 22 weeks pregnant, after intense breastfeeding aversion, using a gradual countdown/tapering approach, and discusses the grief she felt alongside a feeling of relief. After an emergency caesarean, breastfeeding her younger daughter began well. Now 17‑months‑old, her youngest feeds very frequently, including overnight feeds and co-sleeping, and Jade has no plans to wean at present. 

My 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, by going to https://bit.ly/JKPbooks and using the code MMPE10 at checkout.

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

Resources  mentioned

Pregnancy Sickness Support | UK Charity https://pregnancysicknesssupport.org.uk/

PANDAS Foundation UK https://pandasfoundation.org.uk/

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 going to be talking to Jade. That's Jade Feeney, north from Northwest London, and we're gonna be talking about a tandem feeding journey. In pregnancy, but not continuing after pregnancy because Jade sadly struggled with hg. And I'm gonna start Jade by asking you to help me pronounce the proper word for hg.

So I'm gonna have a go. You tell me if I'm right. Hyperemesis gr. 

[00:01:14] Jade: Yeah, that's 

[00:01:14] Emma Pickett: how, say how you say it. 

[00:01:15] Jade: Yeah, that's how I would say 

[00:01:17] Emma Pickett: it. Okay, good. I'm really bad at saying long medical words. So it's just a bit of a flaw when you're in, in this profession. Okay, so obviously you're not, that's not who you know all of who you are.

We'll be talking about your breastfeeding journey generally, but I think it's important to, to mention that upfront and then that'll be in the title of the episode as well, because for some people that was such a traumatic time in their life that actually hearing about it is a trigger. So I think it's important to talk about it.

Tell me about your family. Who, who have we got? 

[00:01:41] Jade: Yes. So we have our, um, eldest daughter, em, who is three and a half. She's actually probably closer to four now. Her birthday's in July. And we have our younger daughter, Jay, who is 17 months, nearly 18 months. 

[00:01:57] Emma Pickett: Okay. And you're still currently breastfeeding Jay?

Yes. Very, very. As much so, very much so. Well, I'll ask you a bit, well, I'll ask you a bit more about that in a minute. 'cause we always love to hear about the realities of toddler breastfeeding. And obviously you did breastfeed him right up until the toddler years, but needed to wean during pregnancy because you were struggling with sickness.

[00:02:15] Jade: Yeah. 

[00:02:15] Emma Pickett: Tell me about a typical day breastfeeding Jay at the moment. What, what does that look like? What's a typical 24 hours? 

[00:02:21] Jade: So, yes, as I said, she's 17 months now and I would say she's probably still breastfeeding as much as she was when she was about nine, 10 months old. It hasn't, it's let up with solids, but it hasn't.

It hasn't changed beyond then she, some days she's at nursery and at some days she's at home with us. At the weekend, nursery days, she'll have a, a she'll like feed all night and then have a feed in the morning, go to nursery, fine, we'll be fine at nursery all day, having lots to eat and drink at nursery, uh, gets picked up.

We'll immediately have a feed at home the minute she sees me. And then, um, these days doesn't tend to want another feed until we do bedtime. And we try. We have been trying and we continue to try to encourage her to let my husband put us to bed because we had great struggles with our first with that. So she will get a feed from me and we'll do like stories and books with her Eldes sister, and then my husband will go and put her to sleep.

Like he'll rock her to sleep, sink her to sleep. Sometimes just lay with her, um, whatever works for them. Then she normally does a stint of about three to four hours, I'd say, and then comes in with me overnight, and then just feeds like, you know, hourly, if not more throughout the night, and is furious if we try and change that.

[00:03:46] Emma Pickett: Okay. Okay. So you're getting that first block. Three or four hours. And so people are listening to that going, well, hang, hang on. How old was she? 17 months? Yes. This is, this is what life can be like. Yes. When you're breastfeeding a 17 month old. So it's great to hear that you've managed to change things a little bit at bedtime, so your husband's supporting you at bedtime and rocking to sleep, and that's working.

So that's in her room. So she's starting in a separate room. And then, 

[00:04:08] Jade: yeah, she co-slept. We co-slept basically from birth because she'd been quite unwell both during the birth and then a few weeks later, which we can kind of maybe talk about later. But, um, so she's basically just co-slept with me since she, we, she was born and either on my chest or like on her side.

Um, like kind of safe following safe sleep guidelines. Then about just before she started nursery at about 11 months, um, and she was like properly crawling and was a bit more mobile, we moved her to a floor bed in her, in her room. And to begin with, I just slept in there with her for a few months, I think it was, and then, and now she's a bit more, um, kind of comfortable and used to it.

I can extract myself or my husband can extract himself. And she sleeps for a good few hours to begin with. 

[00:04:58] Emma Pickett: Okay. Okay. And then so when she wakes, does she shout out? Does she kind of physically get up and come and find you? How does it work? 

[00:05:05] Jade: A combination of, of both. So she either just sits up 'cause we have a monitor for her.

She either just sits up and just like looks about, which is always quite funny. Or if she's like really furious, she'll immediately jump up and run at the run to the baby gate to the door and we'll be like, wailing for mama. Um, immediately. So it could be, it could be either or when it's, um, overnight, it is just a very much a, you know, the, neither of you really do, you just kind of, you hear a noise and you half asleep and you know, kind of latch on and off.

You both go back to sleep again. 

[00:05:42] Emma Pickett: Yep, yep. That's something I'm very familiar with. So you're painting a very typical picture mm-hmm. Of life with a, with a little person, but you're working throughout all this and, and how are you managing to work? I mean, are you going to bed super early? How do you get that night to be enough sleep for you?

[00:05:59] Jade: I'm in bed probably by nine o'clock most nights at the moment. Um, and yeah, I'm working full time. I do a compressed fortnight, so I do 10 days and nine, so every other Monday. I have a, as a day off for myself because otherwise I would, I would just fall over. I work quite, um, long intense hours in quite a senior role, so it is very intense and yeah, it's a combination of, yeah, going to bed early, has been trying to do the first wake up so she, um, you know, so at least I get a few hours.

So block in the start of the night. Um, exercise helps, which is annoying at times, isn't it? 'cause the last thing you feel like you want to do is exercise. But I find that helps, especially with mood. Just trying to take it easy at the weekends, not trying to do too much. 

[00:06:48] Emma Pickett: Yeah. You, me, you mentioned your husband doing the first wake up.

Yeah. So, so when sometimes when she comes to the gate, he will go and talk to her and settle back down again. 

[00:06:55] Jade: Yeah. So it's, we're getting there. I'd say like a few months ago it would, it would've just never happened. But now it's probably like 50%, especially if she does like a, a kind of, almost like a fake wake up where she's like maybe like rolled over and caught herself or coughed or something.

Rather than it being like a milk wake up. He can like flip her on. He normally what he does is he flips her onto her front and pats her back and she'll go down quite quickly again. But if it's any time after like 10, 11 o'clock, it's like a genuine, I think hunger wants, wants a milk type thing. So, um, okay.

Yeah. That's my life at the moment. 

[00:07:29] Emma Pickett: Yeah. What do you do for work? 

[00:07:30] Jade: I'm a project director for an engineering consultancy, so I'm, yeah, I'm kind of lead design and infrastructure teams. 

[00:07:39] Emma Pickett: Crikey. Something that requires a brain, so it's very impressive that you're managing to, to work full time with the sleep pattern that you're just describing.

So you described a sort of nursery day on the weekends when you're together, all those occasional days when you're on holiday. What, what's the sort of typical day of feeding? Is she a little 17 month old that will ask to feed constantly? What does it look like? 

[00:07:59] Jade: Yeah, so, uh, we were, uh, you know, kind of all together yesterday and I'd say she probably asked for milk, um, like every hour.

We were together, so, 

[00:08:08] Emma Pickett: okay. 

[00:08:08] Jade: She's, um, she can sign and say milk, so it depends. She and finds it hilarious when she's feeding to sign milk, so that's, that's always funny. Um, yeah, so she, yeah, so she, she is just, my el our eldest was exactly the same, so I know it's, I know it's a phase, so it's, it's, it's so much easier the second time around knowing that there will be an end point, which is highly useful at times, knowing that.

[00:08:34] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that, that insight. I think, yeah, I mean it obviously hourly feeds during the day. If you think, oh my God, that my child is broken, this is, this is a disaster. This is it forever. I've got to stop this. I cannot cope with this. Obviously you're gonna look at it negatively. You're gonna have that sense of overwhelm, but your psychology is what makes the difference, isn't it?

If you come into that with, this isn't forever, this is the phase of what I call the communication buzz, where they love the asking. They love the communication and having that request met and it doesn't last mm, it will, it will fade. You'll come out the other side of it and I'm just so impressed that you're able to, to manage all this happening at the same time.

And I'm guessing like all toddlers, the magic nap at nursery happens with zero milk. Yeah, they lie down completely. They go to sleep completely 

[00:09:19] Jade: and in and in a cot. And she's never, never slept in a cot her entire life in our house. And they put her down in the cot and she rolls over and they pat her bum and she goes to sleep for an hour and a half.

And I'm like, what? It's such cheeky monkeys. 

[00:09:32] Emma Pickett: It's magic, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. I, I often say we need to hire, you have to hire a whole room full of other little toddlers to go to sleep at the same time. 'cause that's part of it. And then wipe them out with loads and loads of exciting, stimulating play. That's part of it.

Yeah. So, yeah, little people are very adaptable, aren't they? Okay. So let's take a few steps back and think about the beginning of your breastfeeding journey. So, m who's now three and a half, four. Um, let's talk about her early breastfeeding experience. Did you have HG with her pregnancy? 

[00:10:01] Jade: No. Which was the, we obviously we'll get to it, which is like the grand shock of number two.

I had what would almost be called as like the dream pregnancy birth was our eldest, um, as a bit creaky at the end, but I think everybody is, had really lovely birth center, birth in the pool, and then. Um, kind of pushed her out land in the end, but spent the whole, um, you know, kind of active labor in the pool.

Um, we got, you know, gave birth to her and there's pictures of her feeding like a half an hour later. So she was okay immediately wanting, kind of asking for the breast, like immediately trying. Latched was, latch was okay to begin with, but I think like once we kind of encouraged her to open her mouth and they're so small at that point, aren't they?

They don't, they kind of know what they're doing, but they do need a bit of support. Um, and yeah, it was tiny bit sore to begin with, but I think that was just like nipples getting used to everything and had no, no issues whatsoever. With her. She, um, yeah, breastfed, like a champ. Day five check. She'd gained weight, not lost weight.

So 

[00:11:07] Emma Pickett: fantastic. 

[00:11:07] Jade: It was just, yeah, it was a dream. It was a dream from start to finish and, yeah. Oh, that's 

[00:11:12] Emma Pickett: lovely to hear. And did you know a lot about breastfeeding going into that pregnancy? What were your, what was your kind of relationship to 

[00:11:16] Jade: breastfeeding? No, so none of my family had, um, breastfed, like, I, like none of, I'm, I'm one of four and none of us had ever been breastfed.

I, I'd had a couple of friends who'd had babies like a year or two before us. So we'd, and some of those had breastfed. So I'd seen, I'd seen it happening and I was aware that it was something that I wanted to do. If we ever had children, we did NCT and there was a whole, the NCT breastfeeding class, but I did a lot of like independent research on.

You know, the early days, what that could look like followed lots of people on Instagram, including yourself and lots of other lactation consultants. So I kind of went into it feeling I was prepared and knew at least the mechanics of it going in. 

[00:12:01] Emma Pickett: Great. And, and doesn't sound like you had trouble. No. But, but, but, um, you mentioned when we were talking about doing this podcast, cow's milk, protein allergy was an issue.

When did that arise? 

[00:12:12] Jade: She'd always had, um, kind of green mucusy poos to begin with. And my husband's family, all the females in his family really like, strongly, um, like cow's milk intolerant, like in an even, um, like his mother can't even have like sheep or um, goat. So, so that it's like there's a strong family history.

So we always vaguely suspected it, but she didn't have any of the symptoms apart from occasionally having a green poo up until six months. And then when we started weaning her onto food, we ended up, um, in a and e because she hadn't pooed in like a week. She had like intense constipation. Yeah. And ended up like, kind of like in lots of like pain and ended up tearing that kind of thing.

So it was, it was pretty, oh, I'm so sorry. It was all, it was pretty traumatic for her and us. Oh, that sounds 

[00:12:59] Emma Pickett: awful. 

[00:12:59] Jade: We very quickly realized like, you know, this is what it is. And immediately cut, um, cow's milk from her, um, my diet and it like kind of changed overnight, so. 

[00:13:10] Emma Pickett: Okay. 

[00:13:10] Jade: Yeah. 

[00:13:10] Emma Pickett: Okay. So gut in distress essentially.

Yeah. And it sounds as though when you were breastfeeding, she was getting fairly trace amounts, so not enough obviously, to impact on weight gain or, or other, other health. Um, but when she started eating it directly herself, it became a problem. And that's, I think that's, that is a case for, for lots of people that have that non IgE reaction, you may not necessarily have any problems breastfeeding.

That sounds really traumatic, that whole experience of going to hospital, but I'm glad it was identified so quickly. What, what the issue was. I think 

[00:13:37] Jade: just because we knew about the family history and I had, I've got eczema and I still have eczema as an adult, I think we just were conscious that she was, you know, the statistics of her having it were very likely and like just pushed for it.

I know I've heard lots of people on your podcast saying like they weren't necessarily believed or they've had to like really push for it, but I think because we just presented as. We think this is what it, it is and this is what we're going to do. We were, um, yeah, we were very good advocates with each other for, for her.

[00:14:06] Emma Pickett: And then the months go by and you are going to get pregnant again with Jay. How old was um, when you got pregnant again? 

[00:14:13] Jade: She just turned 18 months. So very similar to the age Jay is now. 

[00:14:18] Emma Pickett: And tell me to get stuffed if this is too personal. But you were expecting to get pregnant or was it a 

[00:14:22] Jade: bit of a surprise?

No, we were expecting to get pregnant. Um, fell. Because I was still breastfeeding. Thought it might take a while. It didn't. Uh, yeah, so it was a bit like, oh, right, okay. It's happening this quickly. We always knew we wanted a second, but, so because of the breastfeeding, everything, it might, it might take a bit longer than it did.

One month later, we've conceived again. Here's number two coming. And I very, very, very quickly was very unwell. 

[00:14:49] Emma Pickett: So take you back to that moment. I realize this is gonna be rough to remember these times 'cause it's not an easy time in your life. Were you, when you did get pregnant, were you thinking. Okay. I am not gonna wean.

Um, I'm just gonna see what happens. Yeah. Were you thinking of tandem feeding? You were thinking just keep it open? No, no big decisions around breastfeeding. No 

[00:15:05] Jade: big decisions? No. Uh, I'd even bought that, um, you know, the, the really famous tandem feeding book, 

[00:15:12] Emma Pickett: Hillary Flower Adventures and 

[00:15:13] Jade: Ness. Yes, that one.

Yeah. So I'd bought that and everything I was reading that, I was kind of thinking maybe we'll just see how it goes. Um, you know, I'm not. I was loving breastfeeding, um, like it was, yeah, I had, yeah, I said no strong feelings was kind of just gonna go with the flow and see what she wanted to do. 

[00:15:30] Emma Pickett: And you're working full time at this point?

[00:15:31] Jade: Yes. 

[00:15:32] Emma Pickett: How many weeks pregnant are you when you start to feel rough? 

[00:15:35] Jade: Oh, so I think it must have been about weeks six. So I found out pretty early doors though, 'cause obviously we were tracking, so I found out like kind of four or five weeks and then, yeah, within. A week or six, six weeks. I was, it wasn't awful, awful initially.

'cause I think obviously hormones maybe hadn't lifted quite so high. I remember, 'cause I was working at, um, Stanstead Airport at the time. I was having to drive to Stanstead like twice a week. And the first week or two I did it. I'd be a bit queasy in the morning and then would be like kind of, you know, eat and drink and make sure I was fine for the drive and then at the other end would then vomit.

But like, would be fine driving that very quickly, um, escalated and would by about, I'd say about week eight or week nine, um, I was like vomiting near constantly. If I, if I wasn't vomiting, I had nausea, like not eating, barely drinking. So it, it very quickly went from, oh, just being a bit, you know, morning sickness, kind of maybe a bit more standard to very much not, and completely incapacitated within like two or three weeks.

[00:16:50] Emma Pickett: Golly, I'm so sorry, Jade. It sounds super scary and you are working and breastfeeding. I mean, what was, what was EM'S breastfeeding pattern like at that point? 

[00:16:59] Jade: At that point we were trying to gently, um, not discourage, but we were trying to like reduce daytime feeding because at what I, you know, wasn't feeling great and I was.

You know, kind of one eye on the future thinking at least let's try and, uh, reduce feeds. So she was kind of feeding once or twice during the day, bedtime, and then once or twice overnight. So it's not huge amounts. 

[00:17:23] Emma Pickett: And co-sleeping 

[00:17:23] Jade: and co-sleeping. Yeah. But she was very, she was very verbal from a very young age.

So I. I remember having actual conversations with her at like 18, 19, 20 months where we were talking about this and she was talking back. So it wasn't like she was a baby as such. She didn't understand. She like very much understand what was happening and like talking about it. 

[00:17:43] Emma Pickett: Yeah. And. You. I mean, this is a dart question, but you're obviously not able to eat and very, very quickly, you're going to get quite seriously unwell if your body's not able to eat or drink.

Yeah. So are you going to the GP first? What's the sort of science sort of protocol for someone who's struggling with hg? 

[00:18:00] Jade: I went to the GP and. I effectively worked my way through the, the ladder of, of sickness drugs that are available to you on the NHS. So I started on Cycline and I think of anything that made me more sick because it's, it can make you like nauseous and dizzy and that just didn't add to the, the fun.

Yeah. I can't remember all of the names that I, of everything I tried, but the one thing that I ended up taking from about, I think about 10 or 11 weeks. Was a, a drug called a Aron, and it's, it's actually a drug that was, is given to chemo patients for like anti sickness, but it's, it's used for, um, hyperemesis as well.

And that combined with later on, um, I think it's, um, promethazine, I think it was, it was like a lifesaver. So I, um, it, it didn't stop the nausea, so I still had intense nausea, but it stopped the vomiting, so I was at least able to. Like taking fluids mainly. And I had a brilliant GP who, um, who you know, was a, this young, um, man who I think like had recently passed his training and he just was so, he was just brilliant.

He, like, he, after the, I saw him like every two weeks, um, for a long time. He like did loads of like independent research and all the different drugs I could take and, you know, the, some of them come with like, you know, kind of like health warnings type thing. So he, he did loads of research into that for me was just really sympathetic and understanding.

And like I, I, like, every time I'd see him, I would just nearly cry just from relief of feeling supported. 

[00:19:39] Emma Pickett: Oh, that's so lovely, Jay. That's so sweet. I mean, it's gonna sound like really nav conversation to have, but have you told him 

[00:19:46] Jade: was, yeah, I left, I left some fee because I think, 'cause he did like a rotation onto another, um, GP surgery.

As part of that, they asked for his, some feedback for him and I, I gave like. Really, you know, like, oh my God, he's like the best thing I've ever met in my life type thing. But Aw, 

[00:20:02] Emma Pickett: that's so 

[00:20:02] Jade: special. 

[00:20:03] Emma Pickett: Yeah. So you were going through drugs, you were, um, so it sounds like he was your main support. You didn't need to, I dunno, is there a specialist team for hd?

I suppose it's just about medications at the end of the day and drips and, 

[00:20:14] Jade: yeah, there is. Um, so. The GP was like my first line prescriber. And then I would, um, I'd see the midwife this standard amount, um, during pregnancy, which I think was like, I say, four weeks or something. And she'd, every time she saw me, she'd just send me to our local, major hospital where like the kind of, you know, the labor ward was and go to triage and get a drip and get assessed and type thing.

So I'd, I'd like maybe like once a month have to go to triage as well Then. Um, get a drip. 

[00:20:45] Emma Pickett: Okay. Get a drip to increase fluid levels, presumably, and, and that the drip, presumably con contains other things as well. Did you stay overnight in hospital? 

[00:20:53] Jade: No. So I was very anti trying to, I was very anti staying over in hospital because of my oldest.

She'd never spent like a night away from me and was very anti anybody else, either at bedtime or overnight. So we were, we were trying to manage it at home and. I remember triage saying to me like, it doesn't really matter about food to some extent at this point, but you must have like liquids. So I just drank liters and liters of like really cold coconut water and now I can't drink coconut water 'cause I drank so much of it when I was pregnant that like I occasionally see it in a shop and I'll be like, it will turn my stomach.

So yeah, that was, I think what got me through not being hospitalized overnight was just this intense focus on drinking coconut water and try, you know, trying my hardest not to be admitted overnight to be away from my oldest. 

[00:21:50] Emma Pickett: Yeah. So, so you mentioned that you had already been having a gut reducing some of her breastfeeding when you started to become unwell or when you got really unwell and you were down to a couple of feeds overnight and a few feeds in the day.

When did you make the decision? I'm not gonna be able to continue breastfeeding. This is just not gonna work. 

[00:22:07] Jade: I got to about, I think about 16 weeks and I started getting the most awful aversions overnight. Like, awful, awful. Like I had, I had no idea what was happening until I kind of, you know, looked it up online and realized this is what's happening.

I would get like, really horrible. I like, I can't even describe it. Like, it was really weird, like. Tingling feeling in my legs when I was feeding her and the really like intense feelings of just like she must get off me immediately like, and like it being very painful as well. I think it was probably my milk starting to dry up as well.

And I remember just screaming at my husband at 3:00 AM one night, just like saying, I can't do this anymore. Like I, it was awful. Like, I was like, I, I wanted to continue, but my body just physically just was saying no. 

[00:22:59] Emma Pickett: Yeah. 

[00:22:59] Jade: And it was, yeah, it was, it was pretty tough. 

[00:23:02] Emma Pickett: So you were getting your version at night?

Not so much in the day. 

[00:23:05] Jade: Not so much in the day, I think, because maybe, you know, you are less tired during the day and the hormones are slightly different, aren't they? Um, but no, not so much during the day. And also you could always distract her with like a snack or a TV or a book or something. So there was, there was less feeding at night, especially when it was, you know, you're co-sleeping and it's freely, you know, open to her.

She just, yeah, it just, it drove, um, a different behavior. But I just, yeah, the aversions were awful and I, I ended up taking magnesium for them 'cause I, I kind of looked that up and saw that magnesium, so I had magnesium lotion on my legs. Had like a magnesium multivitamin and that helps little. But yeah, I just, yeah.

The, the screaming at my husband at 3:00 AM was, I think the trigger of realizing something had to change. 

[00:23:55] Emma Pickett: Yeah. I'm gonna ask you about your weaning journey in a minute. Um. But I'm just, it just occurs to me, of course, that your lovely GP is doing all that research for breastfeeding compatible drugs in sickness in pregnancy.

Yeah. Did, did he ever say anything about the fact you were breastfeeding? 

[00:24:08] Jade: Only in the sense of making sure that what I was taking was safe for both the, you know, the unborn baby and the, the, the breastfeeding toddler. And actually this surprised me looking back, um, no one ever actually encouraged me to stop breast breastfeeding.

It was, and I was very open about it and, you know, I did it. I was feeding her in front of medical professionals at times in hospitals. So, yeah, no one ever said like, oh, maybe you should try stopping. It was, that's interesting actually, looking back 

[00:24:36] Emma Pickett: and no one in your life? No, no family members, no partner.

[00:24:39] Jade: My husband knew. My husband could see how much I was struggling and. Periodically would suggest maybe we needed to change something, even if it was just curtailing feeds or him trying to do some more of the night shift to allow me to do some rest. But yeah, no one, no one ever said, have you thought about stopping?

[00:25:01] Emma Pickett: Okay, well, I'm glad you don't need that on top of everything else. Um, it's not like it wouldn't have occurred to you yourself, so, so you almost had, it sounds like you had that one night where you almost had a kind of epiphany and thought, right, this is not working, this is not working for anybody. Did you have to have time off work?

What was happening? 

[00:25:16] Jade: Work? Yeah, so I, I got signed off work at about eight, nine weeks and I didn't go back until after I had Jay. 

[00:25:22] Emma Pickett: Okay. 

[00:25:23] Jade: I had the whole of the pregnancy off. It was, it was, yeah. It was awful. 

[00:25:28] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. I'm so sorry. Was was em going to nursery at the still? Were you having time to yourself in the day?

[00:25:33] Jade: Yeah, so she, they, she went to nursery three days a week, and then Granny had her on a Thursday and then dad had her on a Friday, so. Okay. Yeah, with the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I was like, completely child free. 

[00:25:45] Emma Pickett: And what were you able to do in those moments? And obviously you had the drugs that were beginning to work Yeah.

In the sense that you weren't actually vomiting. But I mean, for anyone who doesn't know, what's it like to feel nauseous all day long? What, what? What's that like? 

[00:25:58] Jade: Like I, yeah, looking back, I, I didn't, I didn't do anything for about five months, so. I would just lay on the sofa and at times I was too ill to even watch television 'cause it would make me dizzy and that would make me sick and I couldn't read because that would make me dizzy and that would make me sick.

And I love reading, so everybody you know, that's like my one. Everybody knows me as a reader. So I'd listened to a lot of podcasts, so probably, I think I listened to your entire back catalog, Emma, of, um, of podcasts. So I listened to a lot of podcasts. I just, I don't even, looking back now, I'm like, how did I fill so many hours of my day was nothing, but that's what I did.

And yeah, I, by the time I got to about 20 weeks, I'd lost, I'd lost five kilos, like on my starting pregnancy weight, and I just was so thin. Even like at like, you know, five months bump type thing. It was, yeah, it was, I just, I, I couldn't do anything, like, even just like, I couldn't go in a car because I'd get travel sick.

I couldn't go on a bus because I'd get travel sick. I could walk, I could, I was like, well enough to do maybe like a little walk around the block. But, you know, my, my strengths and my resilience was very slowly ebbing away, so I couldn't really do much exercise. I very occasionally went swimming when it was a bit warmer.

But it was just a lot of sitting around the house and, and lying down for, 

[00:27:26] Emma Pickett: yeah. 

[00:27:26] Jade: Lots of months. 

[00:27:27] Emma Pickett: And I'm just imagining it's the end of the nursery day. Em comes charging through the door. Mm-hmm. How are you parenting? How do you manage that? 

[00:27:34] Jade: It was a lot of, my husband, um, was just an absolute savior. He basically parented both of us for the whole nine months.

He did a lot of the heavy lifting with both m and the house. She was very good at knowing that mommy, we'd always be like, mommy's not very well, and don't jump on her tummy. So we'd, we'd do a lot of sitting on the sofa and like, reading together or cuddling or just watching TV together. Um, she was very good actually, considering she was like a, you know, rambunctious 20, 21 months old.

Yeah, we, she's, she's always been quiet. See she, she's always been quite happy, but she's been quite like a dedicated, serious child. She'll happily sit and read or craft for hours, so we'd like sit at the dining table and just do the sticker books and we'd thousands and thousands of the sticker books and you know, sticking them all out and then cutting them up and gluing them, and we just spend our time that way.

Yeah. 

[00:28:27] Emma Pickett: Yeah. I'd love to tell you about my four most recent books. So we've got the story of Jesse's Milky, which is a picture book from two to six year olds. That really tells the story of Little Jesse and how his breastfeeding journey may come to an end in one of three different ways. Maybe there'll be a new baby sister.

Maybe his mom will need to practice parent-led weaning. Maybe he will have a self weaning ending. It's a book that helps your little people understand that there are lots of different ways breastfeeding journeys might end, that we are there to support them through all of them. And also we sometimes have needs too.

Also on endings, we have supporting the transition from breastfeeding, which is a guide to weaning that really talks through how to bring breastfeeding to a close in a way that protects your emotional connection with your child. There are also chapters on different individual situations like weaning an older child when there's still a baby, feeding, weaning in an emergency, weaning in a special needs situation.

Then we have supporting breastfeeding past the first six months and beyond. That's really a companion to sit alongside you as you carry on breastfeeding through babyhood and beyond. What are the common challenges and how can we overcome them? And let's hear some stories about other people who've had a natural term breastfeeding journey.

Then we have the breast book, which is a puberty guide for nine to 14 year olds. It talks about how breasts grow. It answers common questions. It talks about what breastfeeding is. I talk about bras. I really want to leave a little person feeling confident and well-informed as breasts enter their lives.

So if you want to buy any of those books, I am eternally grateful. If you want to buy one of the supporting books, you can go to the Jessica Kingsley press website. That's uk.jkp.com. Use the code mm PE 10. To get 10% off, and if you have read one of those books and you can take a moment to do an online review, I would be incredibly grateful.

It really, really makes a difference and as you can tell from the fact I'm making this advert, I have no publicity budget. Thank you. And then you talked about making the decision to wean completely. Did that need to be quite abrupt because you were struggling so much? How did you go about weaning? 

[00:30:39] Jade: We tried like spacing, feed, so you know, like not doing a feed till like midnight and saying, oh, you know, um, when we go to, when you wake up tonight that we're not gonna have any milk when we milk until midnight type thing.

And that didn't work. 

[00:30:53] Emma Pickett: Didn't work in the sense that she was just super furious. 

[00:30:56] Jade: Yeah, super furious. Scre screaming, screaming, screaming would scream so much. She'd like, make herself sick. So we just couldn't handle that kind of level of distress on top of everything else. Tried Daddy going in with like a bottle of oat milk.

Very occasionally that might work, but it wasn't like consistently working. Um, and then we, and I dunno how I found out about this, but I, I just had read every single corner of the internet at 3:00 AM. But we start, I started doing like, um, tapering off. So I would feed her and then I would, like, initially I would say I would just let her feed for kind of as long as she wanted.

And when I could, since she was starting to let up, I'd be like, oh, we're going to count down from like 20 now, and then count down from 20 then, and then take her off and then offer either some oat milk or a cuddle. And she tended to just want to cuddle and go to sleep. I, um, within like, I think the course of like a month, I just, every few days I'd drop the time that she could have the milk.

So we started off at like full length feeds and then I'd go to like two or three minutes, and then it was like 30 seconds, and then it was 20 seconds and it was 10 seconds and it was five seconds and it was three seconds. And then it was one second, and then the last night it was bedtime. And I said, you know, you can, we we're gonna count down from one, and then after that, mummy milk will be all gone.

Um, and there was a little bit of a protest, but I think because we'd been tapering so like slowly, it was just, uh, she kind of just went, oh, okay. And then had smoked milk and then it was cuddled to sleep, and then that was it. Okay. And I was about, yeah, I was about five and a half months pregnant. About 22 weeks I think.

Okay. 

[00:32:31] Emma Pickett: I'm just imagining that's a month of you experiencing extreme aversion. 

[00:32:36] Jade: Yeah. 

[00:32:37] Emma Pickett: Hardly able to walk around the block lying on a sofa all day. That is an intense month. That is a really, really tough experience to go through and, and I can't imagine it was easy to hide from her how much you were struggling.

Um, and what was it like in the middle of the night when you were having this extreme aversion? Was there anything else that helped you in those moments? 

[00:33:00] Jade: No, nothing. My husband would come and, um, he'd, he'd like take her, so she'd have a feed and he'd take her and like cuddle her back to sleep, which, which kind of helped in the sense of, I knew I wouldn't be responsible for the whole sleep element.

But no, nothing, nothing really helped apart from, as I said, the magnesium helped a little bit with some more of the physical symptoms, but it was just mentally trying to power through of. I knew I couldn't go cold Turkey on her. She's very, and she still is very, very attached to me. She's like very much a mommy's girl.

Like we always joke that she doesn't have like a comfort object because I'm her comfort object and she still is like that, you know, three and a half, nearly four. So I just, I just knew I couldn't, couldn't, couldn't do cold Turkey. And it was, I, I think because we could see progress with the tapering and she was responding to it.

That helped enormously for me that I could see that the end maybe was in sight and like with the tapering, the symptoms started reducing. I think the aversions for me were really bad when it's like that, you know, when they're like teasing or something and they're just like constantly wanting to be on the boob, like all nice.

That was like the worst, the worst for me. But when we started tapering and it started just being mere seconds rather than minutes and hours, my body almost could almost like sense that. It was improving. So some of the symptoms did start lifting a bit, um, with the tapering. 

[00:34:31] Emma Pickett: So you're doing tapering through the night and in the day as well?

[00:34:34] Jade: In the day we just did, or you focus on distraction? We, we just did distraction. So she'd have, she could have a feed in the morning and a feed at night. Um, and we'd taper those ones. But during the day we'd just be like, we'd just say milk's all gone now. 'cause she's poorly. Um, and say like, do you want a snack?

Do you want some? And there was a lot of, there was a lot of TV as a, as a bribe, but we kind of felt like, yeah, you know, with everything else going on, you have to relax some of your, your rules, don't you? And that was, um, if she, if she'd have sit and watch TV for five minutes rather than feeding off me, then that's what, that's what we did.

[00:35:08] Emma Pickett: Yeah, no, fair enough. I don't think anybody, anybody would think that was a bad decision. Um, so that very last day when you, when you sort of like literally one second, I mean, she's not getting a let down. That is a sort of, it's a symbolic and she probably hasn't had a let down for, you know, at the five second point or even the ten second point.

It was very much a sort of symbolism, wasn't it? And when that, when that symbolism ended, how was she emotionally, did she go through a wobbly period? What was, what was happening for her? 

[00:35:33] Jade: She did go through a wobbly period, but. I don't know how much of that was Also because she knew there was another baby coming, she still, she, she immediately then was like, oh, can I hold mommy milk to go to sleep?

And she still holds mommy milk to go to sleep. So there was that, um, that element and yeah, that kind of behavior was a bit up and down, but she was not even two at this point. So. Like how much of it is just normal? Normal, you know, toddler development, another sibling coming. Kind of throw this into the mix.

[00:36:09] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah, a hundred percent. And then pregnancy continues. Nausea never got easier throughout the pregnancy. 

[00:36:16] Jade: It got very slightly easier around 30, 32 weeks in that I could, I would take my med, I would take my medicine. You know, regularly, like I have alarms set and the nausea whilst always present. Either lift is a little, or I got used to living with it.

So kind of towards the end I did feel a bit more human, like I was still, I'd still have to like really regulate myself, like I couldn't do too much, but we could like drive to a park and I could sit on a bench and the, and my husband and my eldest could like play and they could come in like, you know, so I could be there rather than just being at home, which helped.

But yeah, it was, um, so kind of, yeah, minor lifting of symptoms towards the end. And we did a couple of tries kind of with the, the GP and the hospital of coming off the medication a few times just to see if that helped. But it, I'd always immediately start vomiting again. So it was definitely still present, but just maybe not, not as much.

And I think there has, there is some research to say that it can improve a little bit in the third trimester. But, and it did, it de, it definitely did improve in terms of nausea levels, but it, it was very much present, present, all the way through to the end. 

[00:37:33] Emma Pickett: And was there any resources that you found particularly helpful?

Any communities or anything you'd recommend for anybody in this space? 

[00:37:39] Jade: There's a really good pregnancy, uh, CH Sickness charity called Pregnancy, pregnancy Sickness Support. The website is, is just so good, especially the, the kind of the drugs treatments available to you. It goes through and it lists all the different ladders of what you can take and you can, you can call them.

And also I also use PANDAS a few times. I can't remember what, um, that acronym stands for. It's like that there are mental health. 

[00:38:05] Emma Pickett: Yeah, yeah. That's about postnatal support, isn't it, from Yeah. 

[00:38:08] Jade: Yeah. 

[00:38:08] Emma Pickett: Okay. 

[00:38:08] Jade: So I, I, I called them a few times 'cause obviously I was still officially postnatal with my eldest. And that was around, um, the stopping breastfeeding, um, journey.

I, I kind of call, they have like a, a breastfeeding specific part of their, their offering. So I called, I spoke to a few people there around just trying to come to terms with, um, having to end the first breastfeeding journey maybe earlier than I wanted to. But both of those websites were excellent. And then just trying to find kind of community online.

'cause obviously I spent a lot of time online, you know, talking like texting people or messaging people. But, um, the, yeah, the main one for me was, yeah, the pre pregnancy sickness support and just going into medical consultations, armed with that knowledge was so immensely useful. 'cause even now. One of the times when I was about 28, 29 weeks pregnant, I had to go to triage in Somerset 'cause we were visiting my husband's family and I was really, really poorly.

I caught this awful like virus and. My heart weight was really high and I had like reduced movements and I like went into triage and one of the midwives was trying to persuade me that I didn't need to take all of these drugs and like why was I taking all these anti sickness drugs? And it was just like a world away from the support I'd been having at home.

[00:39:34] Emma Pickett: I, it is really remiss of me, Jade, not to talk about that emotional impact of ending breastfeeding. And I, I kind of focused on, gosh, what a relief. You're finished, well done. You know, this, this, you're down to the last second. Yay, she's off. But of course, there was that huge sense of loss for you as well, because you were saying goodbye to the journey and not the way you'd imagined and, and saying goodbye to the idea of tandem feeding.

How, how did you kind of. Reconcile that feeling of relief alongside that, that feeling of grief. At the same time. 

[00:40:01] Jade: I think it was harder for me than it was for em. She, um, I think, 'cause she's a pretty tough cookie. She knew I was always gonna be there type thing. But I, yeah, I really struggled emotionally both with that and then obviously with the.

Just being so unwell. It was quite hard and it was just a lot of talking it through with my husband and trying to rationalize it that it was the best decision for the whole family. And of course it's sad, but you know, I had another baby coming that hopefully would be able to have a, a lovely breastfeeding journey with, but it was, yeah, it was really sad.

You know, I had no fixed ideas when we started, like when we would stop and I thought maybe we could get to tandem feeding and. She would have a bit more of a natural term and, but yeah, no, it wasn't like it wasn't that way, unfortunately. 

[00:40:53] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. And then you gave birth to Jay. And how was that early breastfeeding experience?

And I, this is gonna sound off, but I'm always imagining that if someone's had such severe sickness, you must almost be frightened. It's not gonna go away when you give birth, even though everyone tells you it is. Um, the idea of that finally going must be kind of quite an immense sort of thing. You are waiting for.

How quickly do you feel better after you could give birth? 

[00:41:20] Jade: So, um, we ended up having. Uh, a cat one emergency section with her, which I kind of alwa always knew in the back of my head that maybe the birth wasn't going to be the magical dream birth that we had for the first. I think just like your reserves going in are much lower.

Um, but we had, so, so we had, we were induced for reduced movements and she was born very quickly, kind of, you know, crashed and, you know, they pull the, pull the emergency trigger and you're in surgery 10 minutes later. So that, that didn't help. Um, and actually I was on the operating table and they had to inject me with loads of like IV anti sickness because I was like laid down with the spinal tapping going.

I'm like, I'm going to be sick. Like you need to do something like now, otherwise I'm gonna like, you know, choke and vomit. So it even, even then, at that point, you know, while I was being operated on, I was still vomiting. But yeah, so the, the relief from the sickness didn't come necessarily straight away because we had quite a traumatic delivery.

I'd say within maybe about a week or two. I was feeling a bit more physically with it, and even though I'd had the, the section which, which, you know, kind of compared to my first birth and this associated pain and recovery around that. That was still infinitely better than what I was feeling like a month or two before when I was like constantly nauseous.

So there was an improvement and as I got further and further away from the birth, it was, it was like, I'd kind of like come out of my, you know, my shell type thing. I'd like been reborn and being able to like, go for walks. And then exercise again was just, yeah, it was just like, yeah, like another, another life had been opened up to me.

[00:43:08] Emma Pickett: Yeah. And, and what was Jay's breastfeeding journey like at the beginning? 

[00:43:12] Jade: Again, very, um, very straightforward. So it obviously was a section daddy and the nurses hold, held her first. But, um, she was very quickly wrapped up and given to me. And then we were in the, the, you're in like, there's like a little mini side ward.

Is it, is it the recovery bay or something before you get put on the ward? We were there for about an hour and we were, she was just like inside my gown and, um, doing like skin to skin and yeah. Um, again, fed. I don't think she fed straight away the same way that em did, but within an hour had, was start like trying to feed and was feeding.

She was a bit more sleepy though. We were in hospital for five days afterwards and I remember like. I think it was like night two. 'cause like night one we didn't really count 'cause it was just place of surgery, like night two. She wouldn't wake up for feeds. That would be, I, I'd never had to set an alarm with my first.

But with Jay, I was setting alarms for every three hours and I would, I was having to like really like take all of her clothes off and like tickle her feet and blow on her to get her to wake up to feed. And she ended up being a little bit jaundice, but not, but never needed the blue lights. Were a bit, we were watched a bit more, didn't quite put on weight in the same way.

Like it took about three weeks to be discharged from the midwives. 

[00:44:37] Emma Pickett: Okay. 

[00:44:37] Jade: But she was always feeding well. She just was a bit kind of sleepier and slower and once she kind of like woke up and was a bit more, maybe had recovered herself from everything that had gone on, she then fed like a champ and you know.

We had a separate, whole separate issue with her and feeding, uh, centiles and weight and allergies. But that's a story for maybe another day. But breastfeeding always went well. Always feeding well. Yeah. And, and as I said, still feeding today at 17 months. 

[00:45:07] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. And who was looking after em while you were in hospital and giving birth?

[00:45:12] Jade: Uh, my husband's parents, so this was the, the first time she'd ever spent. A night away from me. And it hadn't been my husband, like looking after her. 'cause I'd had like a, before I got pregnant, a few nights away was at work. It had always been my husband, but no, it was her, it was grandparents on my husband's side.

Okay. Um, and they said the first night or two she was fine, but then once the baby was born, not fine, didn't very distressed type thing. And there was one awful event in the hospital where I was told I could go home and my husband Ben, arrived with our eldest M and when they got there, the doctor came around and said, actually, no, we're not discharging you this evening.

You're gonna have to stay one more night. 'cause of the pain levels. And they had to go home without me and they'd like bought a, bought a balloon and everything and she was really upset then That was, um. Really tricky time. And even now she still occasionally goes, oh, mommy had to stay in hospital and I couldn't stay with her.

So she does, she does remember. 

[00:46:21] Emma Pickett: It's interesting, the thing that stick in her heads, isn't it? And did she ask to breastfeed again? What was her relationship? Did Breastfeeding? 

[00:46:28] Jade: Yes. Yes she did. Yes. She um, 'cause we were still initially co-sleeping together and. We eventually got her into her, her, her own bed, and my husband dealing with the night.

But yeah, especially at night, she'd, she'd ask for mummy milk a few. She, she did it quite regularly and then has hasn't asked since for a good six months, I'd say now. But still wants to like, yeah, hold my boobs at night and now we've started saying to Jay, you know, mommy milk is o going to be over soon?

'cause you are not a baby anymore and only babies have mommy milk. I'm like, I'm like, right. Okay. I've never said that to you, but you obviously heard it somewhere. So she, she's very aware of. Of the whole process, shall I say. Okay. 

[00:47:15] Emma Pickett: And, and obviously you made the decision not to start feeding her again. Yeah.

Do you, do you remember the, sort of getting close to that? What was the kind of, what was your thought process around that? 

[00:47:23] Jade: I do remember thinking, oh, we could just try it again. You know, she's, you know, I've got plenty of milk and she's obviously keen, but then I remember. I remembered thinking just how long it took us to wean her.

And I was like, I don't know if I have it in me to do that journey a second time. 

[00:47:43] Emma Pickett: While also feeding another toddler 

[00:47:45] Jade: as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then also my husband made a very good point of she'd had at that point, like, yeah, like like 22, 23 months of dedicated milk to herself. Like, maybe it was our, um, youngest's turn to have that attention and focus.

[00:48:02] Emma Pickett: Yeah. 

[00:48:02] Jade: Um, and, and, and I, that kind of struck a chord with me as well in the sense of trying to, wanting to keep it, I know not exactly the same, but at least fair for both of them. 

[00:48:13] Emma Pickett: Yeah, no, I, I relate to that. So, so what's your plan with Jay, despite pressure from certain parties? What, what are you thinking you're gonna, whatcha gonna think, what are thinking you'll do with her breastfeeding journey?

[00:48:22] Jade: I honestly have no idea. 'cause obviously we're now in uncharted territory. Effectively. I don't have, you know, pregnancy hormones or milk drying up to drive and end. We're going on holiday in June and July. We're like cycling around Italy and Austria and. I was saying last night, actually, it would be useful if we still had, you know, breastfeeding as a tool during that holiday, 

[00:48:47] Emma Pickett: especially with allergies as right.

As 

[00:48:48] Jade: well 

[00:48:48] Emma Pickett: to worry about accessing other milk. Yeah, 

[00:48:50] Jade: yeah, yeah, exactly. So I thought let's, let's at least if we can keep going till post-holiday and then maybe see from there it would be nice to get to two after all of this, you know, this journey and we'll see how we go. 

[00:49:05] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yeah. Okay, and I'm gonna ask an outrageous question.

I can't imagine that anybody with this history wants a third child. 

[00:49:12] Jade: Yeah. Oh, absolutely not. Absolutely not. We, I think if, if you like promised us like a really good labor and like really good pregnancy, a really good birth, and a really like great, you know. Breastfeeding journey with no allergies, then I think we both would be like, oh yeah, that, that would be lovely.

It would be lovely to have a third child and bring that love into our family, but just absolutely never taking the risk ever again of, of, of going through that kind of, you know, year period that we both did both just from a physical and a mental point of view. I think. Yeah, my husband would have, would have to basically parent two toddlers by himself.

And then have me not being able to do anything and then having a newborn on top of that eventually would just, I think he might have like, I think he would actually probably have some sort of stress in juice breakdown. 

[00:50:00] Emma Pickett: Yeah, understandably. Yeah. Yeah. Although there are people out there who do make that choice because they want to grow their family.

And, and obviously I'm not saying that's, that's the right thing or the wrong thing, but there's obviously a whole range of different choices that people make despite that very, very, very difficult pregnancy. Um, thank you so much for sharing your story today, Jade. I really, really appreciate how open and honest you've been about your experience.

Is there anything, um, we haven't talked about that you think we need to cover? 

[00:50:24] Jade: No, I don't. I don't think so. I just, um. Like what you said at the beginning about the, the, the concept of like, you know, did you know anything about breastfeeding before you started? And I always, I always just feel so immensely proud of myself that we went from, from where we started and you know, not really knowing anyone who breastfed.

And that wasn't part of like our, both of our upbringings type thing. And so we've got where we are today and I've had such immense support from friends and family that I hadn't expected Yeah. To get where we are. 

[00:50:56] Emma Pickett: Yeah, that is really special. I'm, I'm just so in awe of you, Jay, just not at least just hearing about how you weaned gently be despite everything you were going through.

I mean, that is somebody who really, really, really put the needs of their child first, and that's, that is, you know, a very special thing to hear. And obviously not everybody in that situation could have coped with that, but I think you should feel really, really proud that, that that's the, the journey you were able to go on.

Thank you. Thank you very much and good luck with the end of Jay's breastfeeding and I'd love to hear how things go when you do get to the ending. 'cause I'm obsessed with endings. Yeah, I 

[00:51:28] Jade: know. I'll do, I'll, I'll message you in a year, so I'll be like she's still going. 

[00:51:32] Emma Pickett: Excellent. I look forward to hearing it.

Thanks so much for your time today. 

[00:51:35] Jade: Thank you, Emma.

[00:51:41] Emma Pickett: Thank you for joining me today. You can find me on Instagram at Emma Pickett Ibclc 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.