Expert Breastfeeding Help from Doulas & Certified Lactation Consultants
Are you planning to breastfeed your new baby?
Are you committed to breastfeeding but experiencing challenges?
Birthways, with providers throughout Chicago and the suburbs, can help you enjoy your breastfeeding relationship and meet your breastfeeding goals. Our lactation specialists are available to walk you through any questions you may have. While our services focus on supporting you at home, we also offer a Breastfeeding Clinic at our offices in Lakeview.
We have a unique partnership model that optimizes your care by pairing together the skills of the doula and the lactation consultant.
Options include:
Breastfeeding warmline
All Birthways clients—including postpartum, labor support, and childbirth education participants—have access to our breastfeeding warmline. Staffed during regular business hours, our lactation experts are happy to answer your basic breastfeeding questions and make referrals where needed.
Doula care
A Birthways’ postpartum doula provides reassurance and solid information about breastfeeding, getting you off to a good start in the early days at home. Your doula is there to answer your questions during that important window when mature milk ‘comes in’ and supply and demand get established. Any family with breastfeeding goals benefits from the postpartum doula model.
Support from a lactation consultant
Mothers with known or prior risk factors or a challenging breastfeeding situation may benefit from a full evaluation with a clinical expert known as a Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC). A Birthways Board Certified Lactation Consultant will meet with you in your home at a time that is convenient for you.
You can also connect with an IBCLC at our Breastfeeding Clinic if you just need some reassurance and information. Meet our lactation professionals.
Preparation prior to your baby’s arrival
In addition, Birthways offers Breastfeeding 101, a breastfeeding class that we recommend to expecting parents. Evidence shows that preparing for breastfeeding, together with follow up with a lactation expert, and encouragement from partners and family members greatly minimizes early cessation of breastfeeding.
Birthways also offers private education visits and packages designed to give you continuity of care. If the class won’t fit in your schedule, you prefer the privacy of a class in your own home or online, or you have a known risk to lactation success, call us about meeting with a private Lactation Educator/Consultant. She will not only provide you with the education and consultation you need, but she can also follow up with you once your baby has arrived, visiting you in the hospital and/or at home.
Visit our Breastfeeding Clinic
Once your baby is born, visit our Breastfeeding Clinic. Our clinic is an affordable way to connect with our lactation consultants, obtain evidence-based information and reassurance, get a weight check for your baby, and meet other breastfeeding moms.
Watch to learn more about your choices and call us for a no-obligation intake to explore what might support you most effectively.
We will pair you with expert support in the first days/weeks of breastfeeding. This can virtually eliminate the all too common challenges of establishing lactation and leave you and your baby thriving!
