Breast Crawl

ivyvines6

I'm expecting and looking into different aspects of a birth plan when I stumbled on the breast crawl, where LO essentially maneuvers their way to your nipple to begin breastfeeding. It looks wonderful, and very natural, but I've mostly seen they take the baby and place them directly on you to feed for 30 minutes to an hour, then take the baby to do measurements etc.

When does partner get to hold the baby for the first time in this equation??? I'm already struggling trying to convince Fiancé to come to the dark side with my crunchy/granola ways, but if he can't hold the baby, he'll NEVER go with this...

crsanchez87

The way the breast crawl works is that they will place the baby on your lower chest/upper stomach area and then he/she will make their way up to your breast to suckle. I would not bank on every infant doing this though. In my experience it just depends on the baby. Some babies are born very sleepy and they dont want to do all that. When we had our LO I knew I wanted skin to skin right away so I pulled off my top and held the baby to my breast. My husband was in the room and he is the one who actually cut the cord for our LO. Then he was just sort of hugging me and the baby while we had our skin to skin time. Right before they took LO, my husband held him for a few minutes. They actually did the measurements in the room so the baby didn't actually go anywhere. Our LO was in the NICU for breathing issues so after  they did the measurements they did take him but I think in an infant who doesnt have to go to NICU, they will hand him back to you. 

Nickioch

Yes! Such a great practice! Also called "skin-to-skin". It's an amazing way to solidify the bond with your baby, regulate their body temp, and transfer the smell of home (the womb) to you. Mine figured out exactly where to go for food and never had an issue with latch. I don't remember at what moment my husband was handed the baby but he definitely got lots of holding and bonding and skin to skin time, too! Baby was always on one of our chests basically the entire hospital stay unless we were [trying to] sleep or they were doing routine tests etc. he also was always invited to go with the nurse or dr when they took the baby to do things, dad would be the one to carry him there, do all the diaper changes, very hands on. it's not really that a crunchy granola idea haha it's good for the health of you and baby!! Best of luck and congrats!!