An Important Note About the Videos

In one of Laura's videos about freezing breastmilk, you can see that she laid the bags of milk flat in the door of her freezer, and once they were frozen, moved them into the main part compartment. The purpose of doing it this way is to freeze the bags of milk in uniform shapes and sizes to make for both easier storage, and safer shipping.

I have heard from several different people that some members of the online milksharing community have publicly accused Laura of storing breastmilk in the freezer door long term. As many are aware, that is not a safe place to store milk for long periods of time. The door of the freezer is exposed to the warm air much more than the inside is, and that exposure cuts down on the freezer life of the milk. I am told that these people claimed that Laura was sending my baby bad milk which would make him sick.

Because this was apparently made public, I feel the need to set the record straight:

Laura has never, ever sent my baby bad milk.

As anyone who pays attention to her video can see, she very specifically stated that the milk was only to be put in the door to freeze flat, then it was moved to the main part of the freezer for safe storage until shipping.

So, if these false statements about Laura were truly made (I have not seen them for myself, so I cannot say for sure), they were spoken out of either ignorance (and lack of ability to pay attention to detail) or malice. Both qualities of which are toxic to the milksharing community.

So just a public service announcement to all of us: When speaking about other people in public, please make sure that you are well-informed of what you are saying. Misinformation can cause a lot of harm.

And to anyone who thinks of making up rumors to hurt another human being, I urge you to think first before you do so. Milksharing is not about competition or petty games. It is a humanitarian effort for the greater good. When you wrongfully hurt a person who is volunteering their time to help the milksharing community, you are hurting babies who need milk.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled blog.

Videos

Milksharing is by no means a new thing. Women have been opening their hearts and their milk stores to babies in need since the beginning of time. But modern milksharing is a bit different than the days of wet nurses (although, there are still wet nurses today!). Most milk donations are pumped, bagged, frozen and sometimes shipped. This is still relatively new in our society.

The purpose of this blog is to make this process easier for all milksharing moms. Our tutorials offer pictures, but we wanted to do you all one better by offering video tutorials, as well.

Right now, all of our videos pertain to the donor side of milksharing. Pretty soon, we will have some videos about what to do with the milk once you have received it. We have great tips on storing, thawing, etc.

Please take some time to check out these short videos to better familiarize yourself with safe milksharing practices!

Mixing Foremilk and Hindmilk





Filling Breastmilk Bag For Freezing



Freezing Breastmilk For Safe & Efficient Storage







Shipping Breastmilk













Shipping with dry ice:

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MilkSharing Blog

Big Things Are Happening!

I am absolutely delighted and amazed to see how far milksharing has come in the last several months. What was once a small, underground community has blossomed into a vast network of mom with extra milk, and babies who need it!

I feel bad that I have not been keeping this blog updated as well as I had hoped. I promise from now on that I will be better about that. :)

I have started by adding a little bit of important information to the Shipping Page and the Freezing instructions. We just want to make sure that the information we provide is 100% clear. Shipping milk can be risky business if not done properly, and we want to arm donors and recipients with the best information possible.

While nothing can ever be guaranteed, Laura and I have a lot of experience with donating, receiving, and shipping milk. Laura has donated to over 30 babies in her several years of donating, and has shipped all over the country. I have been feeding my babies donated breastmilk for two years - most of it shipped. While there are no official rules for shipping breastmilk, we are happy to share what has worked for us and countless other moms in the past.

Later today, I will be adding several helpful videos on how to freeze and ship breastmilk. I'm sure many of you will find it extremely helpful to see Laura in action as she prepares her precious milk to arrive safely in another baby's tummy! :)

There will be much more to come on the Milk Sharing blog over the next several weeks. Everyone, please stay tuned!

We also want to hear from all you wonderful mommies (and daddies!) - What issues of Milk Sharing would you like to see addressed on this blog? Please ask any questions you have in the comments and Laura & I will do our best to help you out!

Keep your eyes peeled - there's lost of great stuff to come!

Bekki