Hello, everyone. I'm here today with Lucas Francis. And we would like to talk about effective positioning at the breast today and explain why it is so important that your baby is effectively positioned at the breast. It's very important that that your baby is deeply attached to your breast so that the nicklin rests at the comfort zone which is the junction between the heart and the soft palate so that you won't get sore and won't get sore nipples. It's also important to your baby is deeply attached, so that the baby's able to transfer MC rather than being just superficially attached to the nipper. If babies are superficially attached to the nipple, your nipple will rub against their heart palate, which is at the front of the mouse, and will make you very sore.

And baby will have to spend a very long time feeding, but effectively not getting very, very much milk at all. Very little milk. So it will become very frustrating for you and baby, you will get sore and baby will spend a very long time feeding, but not get the medical route that baby needs and perhaps be slow to put on weight, or even use weight. So you want to make sure your baby gets a latch. And in order for baby to get a deep latch, you need to position your baby effectively. So there are a few principles to follow.

To achieve good positioning at the breast. There is one word that you might want to Memorize which can help you follow those principles of good positioning. The words is chin and chin stands for so the initials are the four clothes so have your baby clothes haitch for head free and in line with the body is for I also i stands for the change should be deeply indented into the best. So, when your baby's coming to the breast you want them to come on to the best with their chin leading. Rather than having that chin on their chest. That way there will be only sufficiently attached to the breast and also, they will have difficulty swallowing if their chin is deeply into the chest rather than a little bit extended which will make the airways and also their food pipe why Free for them to swallow more easily.

And then finally, M stands for no strippers. So when you're starting out positioning baby at the breast, you want to start out the nose opposite the nipple, the nipple opposite the nose, so that when baby comes on, so you can brush the nipple a little bit against the nose, that will encourage baby to open their mouth. And then they open wide, tip the head back a little bit. And then they can draw in the nipple. far back to the soft spot of the pallet, rather than coming on centrally. So if you have the nipple opposite the mouse, your baby will just open the mouth a little bit, seeing their lips around the nipple, and just start suckling on the nipple rather than deep on the best.

And if they just suck on the nipple and nippers only the outlet The milk they have to really attach deeply into the best. So not just the nipple. Also the areola. If you go back to where your hand Express, you actually express right at the edge of the areola, you don't squeeze the nipple, and that's the same thing babies need to do when they're latching on. So we'll go back to positioning now because that's what can help to achieve you a deep laps. If your baby's positioned correctly, you're already halfway there to a good latch.

So, we'll look at the principles that we've just talked about. So we take the word chain and start with C. Have your baby clothes. So when you're starting out in the traditional halls, the cradle or cross cradle So we start with the cross cradle because the cross cradle It's easier with a newborn baby or small baby, the cradle hold is easier once your baby's baby has learned how to attach. The crane hold would just be simply This is the traditional cradle hold. But we start out with the cross cradle board, whereby we will just use our opposite arm to the breasts that we're going to offer. And then we have more control to actually bring baby to the.

Okay, so we start with keeping the baby close. So first of all, if you have any towels or blankets, just take that off the baby, remove that off the baby. You don't want any gaps between you and baby, you want to really bring your baby as close and as deeply into your body as possible. So, that's the first step. So you want to bring your baby clothes at the same time when you're guiding them onto the breast. You want the head free.

So you don't want to hold your hand on baby's head and push the baby to the best. And also if you're pushing baby's head into the breast. So imagine if you're pushing baby's head into the breast. If you're pushed by the head, what happens is that your chin will take into your chest and we don't want that as we say. We want the chin extended a little bit so that the chin can come on to the best. First baby can come on the breast cheerleading.

So the baby's neck and shoulders. So you make kind of sexy shape again with your hand and just cut the baby's neck and shoulder and then you clamp baby spot and under your really tightly and the next principle is I still want to keep the baby's head and body in a straight line. So you don't want to have baby's head near the breast, but the body turned because that will be that will be difficult for him to swallow if I offer the breast like that, because his head is twisted and that will make it difficult for baby to swallow. Imagine if you're taking a drink of water, you're drinking like that. You also have your head and body in a straight line. If you're twisted like that, it will make it hard for you to swallow and that's the same for the baby of the breast.

So you want to really turn them towards to tell me to tell me are facing been waiting very long. So in this session now, we got the principles, baby really close. The head is free and can turn and tip back to come to the best chain leading head and body are in the straight line. And the next thing is you want to start no stripper. So we want to start in the way. So under the breast, it's usually best to have one hand under the purse and then start out.

Wait for baby to open really right and then bring him onto the chair. Bring him onto the breast with the chin leading like so. And he's on. Well done, Lucas. You've been so patient So nose, wide open mouth, and you want your brain with baby to the breast rather than the breast into baby smells because you have more control that way. Now you can hear him drinking.

Once he's on you can swap your arm around. Then once he's attached now, so this feels very comfortable for me, there's no rubbing off his nipple against his hard palate up at the front of his mouth. At the top, so my necklace now resting at the junction between the heart and soft palate so you can actually, if you take your tongue and you kind of brush it along your palate, you will fall back into your throat, you will feel where your hard palate meets your soft palate, and that's where the nipples should rest. Also when he is attached, if you're looking for signs of good attachment, the signs of good attachment would be that once he's on his chin is deep in indented into the breast, and it's actually compressing the breast up and down with sucking, then his jaw bone is moving, that's a good sign that he's actually transferring milk.

You can see some of the air you're less still it depends on the size of your IRA older but you would use usually want to see Arriola above the top lip and non below the bottom lip. Also when you're looking that, looking at his lips, so his top lips is kind of in a neutral position, whereas his bottom lip here his bottom lip is kind out and he has a wide open mouth really wide open. The next hold we would like to show you is the so called rough behold, it's called rough behold or American football hold, because effectively you're holding and supporting your baby like a rock people or American football. This position can be very helpful for if you've had a Syrian section so that The pressure is taken off your Assyrian scar because you'll be moving the baby around and the baby will not be resting on your tummy.

This position is also very good for very small babies or premature babies because you can give them a little bit more support in this position. It's also very good for moms who will have very large breasts because the baby, the breast is not going to fall onto the baby. And also you will have better visibility so you can see better what you're doing. This position can also be very helpful if you baby favors one side. So let's say if your baby is very comfortable feeding on this side in the cradle or cross cradle hold. But then when you turn your baby around two feet on the opposite side They, for whichever reason, sometimes it's a positioning from the room that they then struggle a little bit on the opposite side.

So if you've been feeding your baby in the crane, low cost grade on the one side, and then offer the rock behold, they effectively stay in the same position, and you can trick them into thinking they're still on their favorite side. So it's very useful. It's also very useful to change positions around in the early days. So you baby accesses the breasts from all around. And as we said before that when the baby is transferring myth, the chin is compressing the ducts and the chin is effectively draining the breast and and that's how they take in the milk. So wherever the chain is position, dis best stimulated and also best empty.

So in the early days, when you're still stimulating your mix apply, it's good to offer the breasts in different positions. And also, if you feel a little bit fuller in one side so often as the mail comes in, because we've got lots of dots on the in the outer quadrant and the outside, it's helpful to position the chin in that way so that you can effectively empty the breast. It's also very helpful to change positions if you're already a little bit sore, so that your baby's not always compressing the same spot. So getting used to lots of different positions. Breastfeeding positions can be very beneficial for you and for baby. So what usually needed for the rough the whole It's a good support for your elbow because your hand your arm is actually holding baby.

So you want to have some props for you. And it's always like as we said, with the principles of chin, see for close you want your baby. So the support is not to put baby down on the porch and you keep so you can use the breastfeeding pillow, or you can just use any ordinary pillow or cushions to just prop yourself up so that you can sustain the session for a good while. Then again, we go back to this Yes, so patient, we go back to the same principles of keeping baby clothes. Also we go back to head free So we go back to that hold. And it's really helpful to even practice that when baby is asleep or dry.

Practice it beforehand with adult. So, you want to make that C shape, cup baby's neck and shoulders just under the nape of the neck. So the head is free. And if you really support them like that, their heads not gonna fall. Yeah, it's going to be it slightly extended, but it's not gonna drop or fourth. So then again, to elbow and really clamp face bottom and the legs, the legs.

So the legs go behind you. So it's good to have maybe support for your lower back But keep a little bit of room behind your back to put baby snake legs around. Then again in this position as well. Sometimes if you feel like baby's hands on the way they can talk to the breast and you start out in the same way. No snipper wait for Lucas to open really wide so no snipper wide open mouth and then ensure that you kind of work baby to the best rather than the best interest mouth. And then once you really have a good hold, you then put the pillows under you And you can see it in the rough behold.

Then we're just going to show you the rough the whole from the side as well. So from the side it looks like this baby's legs behind you wrapped around, you keep baby in place and then the pillows will support you. So at all times you want to keep the baby's head free and you can hear him swala effectively transferring the myth you can see where his chin is attached compressing the breasts so he will work on the outside of the breast and empty those stuck. Which is very helpful when you have a block doctor in this area or you just feel a bit colder