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Nursing Mother, Working Mother
The Essential Guide for Breastfeeding and Staying Close to Your Baby After You Return to Work
By Gale Pryor
Far more valuable than advice from relatives, friends, or experts is the knowledge within you that you are completely capable of caring for and raising your new baby. Bruno Bettelheim, the child psychologist, writes in A Good Enough Parent that "acting on the recommendations of others cannot evoke in us the feelings of confirmation that well up in us only when we have understood on our own, in our own ways, what is involved in a particular situation, and what we can therefore do about it." Successful breastfeeding kindles these "feelings of confirmation'' for the breastfeeding mother knows in her heart that she can nurture her child well.
Breastfeeding, in short, is much more than a feeding method. Beyond providing perfect nutrition at every stage of your baby's growth, breastfeeding is a language, subtle and intimate, between you and your baby, as well as a proud and marvelous expression of your unique abilities as a woman. When you return to work, breastfeeding will ensure that the bond between you and your baby cannot be weakened by your frequent separations.
Read Part Two here.