Feeding in a baby carrier? Here's what your clients really need to know

When breastfeeding in a carrier, what do your clients need to remember?

After Feeding: Reposition your baby and Retighten the carrier!  

This has been CBWS's (Center for Babywearing Studies) safety message of the year since 2014. Despite talking about it for over a decade, we haven’t seen the message sink in yet.

Feeding in a baby carrier is one of those parenting skills that make parents feel like superheroes. All of a sudden, they can walk around the park with their toddler while feeding their newborn without skipping a beat?! Talk about confidence!

They've mastered three skills: breast/chestfeeding, using a carrier, and the combination of both!

But for those who are newer to babywearing, understanding how to accomplish feeding in a carrier often lacks nuance—which is why our mantra of "reposition and retighten" is still so needed.

Figuring out how to loosen the carrier so baby can feed is one thing - knowing why baby shouldn’t stay in that position when not feeding, and how exactly to get baby back into a safe position, is another.

This is where babywearing consultants have an opportunity to make a big impact.

Educating families on the fact that these three skills are unique and separate and helping them understand the nuances within each skill, can not only support their breastfeeding and babywearing journeys…it can save their baby’s life.

If you’ve spent much time around new families, you know that the topic of feeding comes up a lot. How to feed the baby, how well they’re feeding, what they’re eating, and how often are questions that can plague new parents from casual conversations in the grocery store to the pediatrician's office and everywhere in between.

No matter how they feed their baby, the fact is that baby’s feeding routine has an enormous impact on the lives of their caregivers - it can be both a source of bonding and a source of stress.

Especially for families with limited support or with older children in the house, sitting and quietly feeding a newborn may not feel practical or even possible. So what can we do to provide these families with the skills they need to meet their baby’s needs while also getting on with life?

Here are some of the conversations you might have:

• Help your client identify and envision situations in which feeding in the carrier could make their lives easier. Try to intrigue and motivate them.
• Introduce the idea of feeding and babywearing as separate skills…and then feeding while babywearing as an additional skill that must be learned. This helps to set expectations and manage frustration while also improving safety for both the baby and the caregiver.
• Provide guidance on logistics for their situation. However they feed their baby - body, chest, breast or bottle feeding - their anatomy and baby’s size and development, and carrier options can all be factors that affect how they will feed in their carrier.
• Provide them with resources for lactation or feeding support in your community.
• Educate them on best practices for positioning baby to feed in their particular carrier. 

And finally, above all, impress upon them that no matter how they feed their baby - as soon as baby is done actively feeding, they must reposition their baby and retighten their carrier!

Beyond providing practical tips and instructions for your clients, though, when it comes to breastfeeding there’s even more to be done.

Babywearing has been shown to positively impact breastfeeding success for families—and this is unrelated to feeding while using the baby carrier. It’s not just about the practicality of being able to feed on the go, hands-free (at least a little bit). It’s about the connection and understanding of baby that baby carrying provides and how that supports breastfeeding in a variety of ways. ^(1.2.3.)

So, how can we advocate for this practice in our community as a supportive practice for breastfeeding? Where can we partner to get in front of parents at the right time, in the right way, to help them take advantage of this link between breastfeeding and babywearing?

Reaching out to the medical and lactation professionals in your community is step one. Building relationships with the folks new parents are already seeing is the simplest way to begin advocating for this practice - because the more respected professionals parents hear this from, the more likely they are to actually do it.

These professionals need to know what you and I know - that breastfeeding, using a carrier, and feeding in a carrier are 3 separate (and enormously beneficial) skills and that education and support are critical for achieving mastery of those skills.

What tips would you provide new parents for learning to feed their child in their carrier? How do you like to share this information with your clients? How might you work with the families, lactation professionals, and other healthcare workers to make the impact of babywearing on breastfeeding a known reality for the new parents in your community?

Get your informational PDF here

<sup>1. Pisacane,A., Continisio, P., Filosa, C., Tagliamonte, and Continisio, G.I. (2012). Use of baby carriers to increase breastfeeding duration among term infants: the effects of an educational intervention in Italy. Acta Paediatrica, 101 e434-2438.
2. Little tt, Legare CH, Carver L. Mother-Intant Physical contact Predicts Responsive Feeding among U.S. Breastfeeding Mothers. Nutrients. 2018,10(9):1251. do1:10.3390/nUTO091251.
3. Norholt H, Phillips R, McNeilly J, Price C. Babywearing Practices and Effects on Parental and Child Physical and Psychological Health. Acad J Ped Neonatol 2022; 11(5): 555876. DOI: 10.19080/AJPN.2022.11.555876</sup>