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Home › Articles › Breastfeeding Basics › A Touchy Subject

A Touchy Subject

By Carma Haley Shoemaker

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Babies thrive on touch. As they grow to imitate the actions and emotions they witness from their parents, they will learn to use touch to express comfort and affection. This innocent gesture becomes a controversy when Mother's breasts are involved.

The relationship between mother and child begins long before they actually meet face-to-face. According to Breastfeed.com Expert Advisor Melissa Clark Vickers, IBCLC, "For the first nine months of a baby's life, he is in complete contact with Mom. He is fed, protected, soothed to sleep and loved, all without having to ask for a single thing. This is his world. He knows nothing of open spaces: be it crib or castle. At birth, he finds himself forced into what must be a bewildering world, where space to move about is the norm. His connection to Mom is gone and his needs are not automatically taken care of. Breastfeeding -- especially the touch connected with breastfeeding -- reestablishes that connection to Mom."

Touching Base
When coming into the world, we are not equipped with the knowledge of "right and wrong." Acceptable acts are not learned until much later. According to Vickers, when something is said to be wrong, it may simply be misunderstood. "Babies are not born with the social mores that define which body parts are 'okay' to touch and which are not," she says. "Touching the breast is the same as touching a nose, arm or belly button. And yet, there is an important difference. That breast is the source of food and comfort -- proof to the bewildered newborn that Mom is still there for him. So in that sense, patting the breast is a little like patting a beloved pet! Some babies naturally 'knead' the breast -- much as newborn kittens will do to mama cat. In addition to a comforting touch, this may very well stimulate the milk flow."

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