Milksharing? What's that?!

I'm a big fan of mothers donating their breast milk to babies in need. I feel all babies deserve to have mothers milk, yet there are circumstances in which a mother is unable to breastfeed or make enough milk for her baby.

Milksharing is simply an informal sharing of milk between mothers who have extra and those who have a need. Milk that's suitable for one baby is most often suitable for other babies as well.

I wish this was more accepted in our society. Many women have plenty of milk and sadly, large amounts of that milk get thrown away or dumped down the drain because women aren't aware that donating is an option.

I've written lots of information on milksharing on my parenting website. Here's a link to the page: http://www.theholisticparent.org/milksharing.html.

I also absolutely love the resource http://www.milkshare.com/. This is a platform for mothers to donate their own milk for free and other mothers to receive desperately needed milk for their babies.

I have a lot of quams with milk banks. I personally wouldn't choose to donate my milk to them for several reasons.

1) There's an extremely high mark up on something that should be free.
2) The milk is pastuerized. I know many people believe this makes it safer, but really what it does is kill all the magical nutritional properties in the milk.
3) Some milk banks sell their milk to pharmaceutical companies so they can study it. Yeah, my milk isn't going towards that!
4) Often the milk at milk banks aren't available to all babies who need it- there must be special circumstances.

Milkshare.com is a non profit organization and doesn't support charging fees for breast milk. It's truly a great resource and helps so many moms and babies during what can be a very difficult period for them.

If you're a mom in need of milk or a mom that has some extra to give away, check out http://www.milkshare.com/.