Just before Christmas, ten women qualified as volunteer breastfeeding peer supporters at NCT Southam & Villages to provide support to local parents. Read more about what they’ll do.
Having acquired a £10,000 National Lottery Awards for All grant last summer, NCT Southam & Villages were able to start the ten-week breastfeeding peer support training course for 10 local women that they’d hoped to.
In December, the 10 volunteers successfully qualified as breastfeeding peer supporters.
Now each week, two of the newly qualified volunteers are taking it in turns to attend the Bumps & Babies group in the Graham Adams Centre every Friday from 10-11.30am. They’ll be on hand to talk to parents who might have questions or need support feeding their baby.
The money will also fund a qualified NCT breastfeeding counsellor who can be booked for free 1:1 support with all types of infant feeding in a private room.
Everyone is welcome to stay and have a cup of tea and a chat before or after their talk to the breastfeeding counsellor.
Caroline King, the branch coordinator, was one of the ten newly qualified volunteer peer supporters. She started attending the Bumps & Babies session three years ago when her son Laurence was born, and found the breastfeeding peer support a great help.
She has volunteered at the group ever since and was delighted to attend for the first time as a breastfeeding peer supporter last week.
Caroline, who breastfed her son for 22 months and now has a one-year-old daughter, Jessica, said: “I don’t think I’d have breastfed for as long as I have without the group’s support.
“It’s really different being a volunteer peer supporter to being a mum, and the training has given me a better understanding. It’s about listening and seeing what support the mums need, as well as being a supportive face and giving parents places to find non-biased information.”
If you’d like to go along to the NCT Southam & Villages Bumps & Babies group, details are advertised on Facebook, or you can email Coordinator.southam@nct.org.uk
If you have any questions about feeding your baby, you can speak to one of our breastfeeding counsellors wherever you are in the country. Call 0300 330 0700, and lines are open 8am to midnight every day.
