Breastfeeding Doesn't Need to Suck

Breastfeeding Doesn’t Need to Suck (2023 Prose Award Finalist) shows mothers how to navigate their breastfeeding journey while also caring for their mental health.

Breastfeeding Doesn’t Need to Suck, contains information that you will not find in other breastfeeding books, such as a thorough discussion of breastfeeding’s impact on sleep, safe (and unsafe) bedsharing, and how where babies sleep impacts their mothers’ mental health. This book describes what effective help looks like and gives specific suggestions for partners, grandmothers, and friends who want to help. Mothers will also learn how to navigate healthcare systems that can often undermine breastfeeding and mental health.

Postpartum is hard, no matter how you feed your baby. Yet formula companies tell mothers that all of their problems will be solved if only they would switch. It’s not true; these issues will still be there even if mothers stop breastfeeding. These are the five “I”s of new motherhood: idleness, isolation, incompetence, identity, and intensity. If mothers are unprepared for these feelings, they can undermine both her breastfeeding and her mental health.

Breastfeeding Doesn’t Need to Suck provides information on common breastfeeding problems, such as nipple pain and low milk supply, while also keeping mothers’ mental health in mind. Breastfeeding, when it’s going well, protects mothers’ mental health. Conversely, breastfeeding problems increase the risk of depression and anxiety. Dr. Kathleen Kendall-Tackett is both a psychologist and an International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant, with more than 30 years’ experience in both lactation and mental health. Breastfeeding Doesn’t Need to Suck is an evidence-based guide full of practical advice with the goal of helping mothers and babies navigate postpartum and come through it happy, healthy, and securely attached.

Preface: Breastfeeding Doesn’t Have to Suck

Section I: The Fundamentals

• Chapter 1: A Primer on Breastfeeding
• Chapter 2: The Five I’s of New Motherhood
• Chapter 3: Breastfeeding: Learned or Instinctual?
• Chapter 4: Breastfeeding and Your Mental Health

Section II: Positioning, Latch, and Nipple Pain

• Chapter 5: Baby on Your Breast: Positioning and Attachment
• Chapter 6: Sore Nipples and Engorgement

Section III:Milk Production: How it Works and How to Spot Difficulties

• Chapter 7: Making Milk: How You Can Know Your Baby is Getting Enough
• Chapter 8: Delayed Lactogenesis II and Insufficient Milk

Section IV: Sleep and Nighttime Feeding

• Chapter 9: Breastfeeding, Sleep, and Mental Health
• Chapter 10: Bedsharing and Infant Sleep Location

Section V: Finding Breastfeeding Support

• Chapter 11: Family and Community Support
• Chapter 12: Hospital, Healthcare Provider, and Lactation Consultant Support
• Chapter 13: What Postpartum Support Could Be

Section VI: Caring for Your Mental Health

• Chapter 14: Postpartum Depression, Anxiety, PTSD, and D-MER
• Chapter 15: Breastfeeding after a Traumatic Birth Experience
• Chapter 16: Breastfeeding after Childhood Abuse, Adversities, and Sexual Assault

Section VII: Moving Beyond the Early Days

• Chapter 17: Employment and the Breastfeeding Mother
• Chapter 18: When You Can’t Feed at the Breast

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Index List

Kathleen Kendall-Tackett, PhD, IBCLC, FAPA, is a health psychologist and international board-certified lactation consultant. She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association in health and trauma psychology.

She has been an accredited La Leche League leader for 26 years and served in many board and leadership positions. She was the founding editor-in-chief of the journal Clinical Lactation and is currently editor-in-chief of Psychological Trauma.

Dr. Kendall-Tackett has authored 490 articles and is the author or editor of 40 books including the bestselling Breastfeeding Made Simple (with Nancy Mohrbacher) and the Clinical Lactation Monograph Series.

Visit her websiteopens in new window and follow her on Facebookopens in new window, Twitteropens in new window, and Linkedinopens in new window.

• 2023 Prose Award Finalist

This is the best book I’ve ever read in my 35 years specializing in maternal mental health. It advises women how to successfully navigate breastfeeding and motherhood, how to weigh all their options, and how to begin the most important journey of their life with confidence.
—Dr. Diane Sanford, Licensed Psychologist, Co-author of Stress Less Live Better: For Pregnancy, Postpartum, and Early Motherhood, and Life Will Never Be the Same: The Real Mom's Postpartum Guide

If you are considering breastfeeding your baby, are actually breastfeeding now, or are providing support for nursing mothers, this book is for you! It goes beyond the basics to provide the research and tested suggestions needed to prevent and work with challenges that might occur. Written in a friendly, positive voice, this is a book which I am excited to highly recommend.
—Marian Tompson, Co-Founder of La Leche League International, Founder of Another Look at Breastfeeding and HIV/AIDS, and author of Passionate Journey: My Unexpected Life

This is the down-to-earth, no-nonsense book we needed about breastfeeding, and Dr. Kathleen Kendall-Tackett is the researcher, practitioner, and mother we needed to write it. Equal parts research, science, and practical advice, if you have questions or concerns about breastfeeding, buy this book!
—Meghan Owenz, PhD, Professor, and author of Spoiled Right: Delaying Screen and giving Children What They Really Need

Kathleen Kendall-Tackett has managed to tackle some of the most common problems facing breastfeeding mothers today and has made them relatable and nonthreatening while providing advice and connecting with the reader not as just an authority but as someone who truly “gets it.” It is a book I will be recommending to all new moms so we can once and for all put to bed the idea that breastfeeding has to suck.
—Tracy Cassels, PhD, Director of Evolutionary Parenting

An indispensable resource for all new mothers. Kathleen Kendall-Tackett is a trusted expert in the field who uses understandable language to integrate science, her clinical experience, and, crucially, the experiences of mothers. This book cuts through the contradictory messages that new mothers often receive about breastfeeding and provides hope and optimism even in the face of breastfeeding challenges.
—Amy Wenzel, PhD, Founder and Director, Main Line Center for Evidence-Based Psychotherapy, Bryn Mawr, PA

Chapter 2 is pure genius and worth the price of the entire book. In Chapter 2, the “five I’s” of new motherhood address contemporary issues that are rarely mentioned in other comparable books: idleness, isolation, incompetence, identity, and intensity. “Mothering is relentless” might be the most insightful phrase in the entire book. The coping strategies in this chapter are brilliantly simple, doable, and practical even if the new mother is alone in her environment.
—Linda J. Smith, MPH, IBCLC, Bright Future Lactation Resource Centre Ltd.