San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
I’VE DONATED OVER 2,000 OUNCES OF BREAST MILK
This month I donated my 2,000th ounce of breast milk to the new University of California Health Milk Bank. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, this cutting edge, nonprofit facility set up shop here in our own backyard. Housed in the San Diego Blood Bank, it works to help save the most fragile among us, premature babies in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).
Nearly 10 percent of babies in the U.S. are born preterm each year. These premature babies, the smallest weighing less than 1 pound — about the weight of a block of butter — are at risk of a disease called necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a leading cause of illness and death among preterm infants. The risk of NEC increases for the smallest babies if they are not fed human milk, either their mother’s own milk or donor milk, when they are small and sick. Along with the terror and heartache of caring for an infant in the NICU, often a mother of an early preterm baby cannot produce enough milk, if any at all, that her child so desperately needs.
The milk I donated will feed babies in the NICU and other infants in need. The milk bank makes human milk accessible to families seeking it for a multitude of reasons, including birth by surrogacy, adoption or when a mother does not have sufficient supply for a baby’s nutritional needs.
I know the emotional burden that having too little breast milk can cause. I am grateful to have two young children, both born healthy and full term. After my first baby was born, however, three bouts of mastitis — an infection caused by a clogged milk duct — destroyed my body’s ability to produce enough milk. For 13 long months, I struggled daily to produce milk for my baby. No matter what I did, I never had enough. Intellectually I knew that everything would be fine. My baby was growing and thriving. We are fortunate that we can afford formula and have health care. Nonetheless, however irrational, I lived with a primal fear that I could not feed my son.
Given my breastfeeding struggles, I was astonished when a year later, following the birth of my daughter, my freezer stash of breast milk started to grow. I mentioned this to our pediatrician, and asked for his suggestion as to what I might do with it.
“Donate it,” he said immediately. “NICUS are in great need of breast milk.”
His answer surprised me. I had never heard about donating human milk. In my year of low supply, including consultations with doctors, lactation experts and other breastfeeding mothers, no one mentioned a milk bank. I searched for and found the UC Health Milk Bank. Its staff made the donation simple and pandemicfriendly: following a remote screening and a quick blood test, I was cleared
The milk I donated will feed babies in the NICU and other infants in need. The milk bank makes human milk accessible to families seeking it for a multitude of reasons, including birth by surrogacy, adoption or when a mother does not have sufficient supply.
to donate. The milk bank analyzes the milk, pools it with that of other donors to create ideal nutritional value, and supplies it to NICUS to feed, nourish and help save feeble, premature babies’ lives.
Working full-time as a nonprofit regional director, teaching spin classes and caring for my kids doesn’t leave me with a lot of spare time, but recent advances in cordless breast pumps allow me to pump while multitasking. I pump once each morning, put away 8 ounces of breast milk each day, and donate a couple hundred ounces to the milk bank each month. I’ve only ever produced a low or average amount of breast milk, but have kept at it daily. Ten months later, I’ve now donated over 2,000 ounces.
Thanks to organizations like the UC Milk Bank, advances in accessing human milk have come a long way, but we still have a long way to go. Not all NICUS promote mothers’ own milk, provide pasteurized donor milk for patients, or even inform parents of the risks of going without it. Many pregnancy, postpartum and parenthood issues remain taboo, increasing the challenge of raising awareness about human milk donations.
Whether or not you have milk to donate, you can play a part. If you’re a breastfeeding mother, talk about your journey, not only with other mothers, but with friends and colleagues to help normalize it. Consider supporting your local milk bank with a monetary donation. Spread awareness about donating human milk and the opportunity to procure donated milk. And if you accumulate those extra ounces beyond what your baby needs after three months of age, donate them. You might just save a life.