Want to start a breastfeeding support group (no LLL in the area)

[brightonwoman]

I was talking with one of my neighbors yesterday and we were noticing that there's no breastfeeding support group (like LLL) here in out town. The nearest LLL chapter is 90 min away that's pretty cost/time prohibitive for the moms who need the support the most. This is a breastfeeding-friendly area in general (most of Alaska is), but there's not a support group per se--if you need help you really have to seek it out. There are a few people in town who can offer support--I don't know if they are certified lactation consultants or not, but there is at least one person at the WIC office who is pretty educated, there are a couple of nurse-midwives, plus I know of at least a couple moms off the top of my head who would love to be part of such a group and I'm sure we could find more if we advertised a little.

Does anyone have any thoughts about becoming an official LLL group vs just being a breastfeeding support group (not officially connected to LLL)? Are there extra benefits to being part of LLL? What's involved with that? I know there's some expense involved...and like I said I'm fairly certain we have a few trained people in town, as well as experienced mamas who would be happy to share, and imo that's the most important part.

[foreverinbluejeans]

You might talk to the people at WIC and the hospital and see if they are interested in having a support group.

There is cost involved in becoming a LLL Leader and you have to believe in LLL philosophy. It takes months or a year or longer to become a Leader. You can find out more on the LLLI website.

There would be more freedom if you started your own support group.

[brightonwoman]

Yeah, I'm kinda thinking the freedom would be nice. Not that I disagree with LLL philosophy (so far as I know) but just having the option to be able to branch into other things sometimes, or to combine meetings and also talk about other topics of interest (such as babywearing or co-sleeping) if the mamas wanted to. I also like being able to do things without feeling like there has to be any money involved...my old LLL group was never pushy or obnoxious about membership, but they always mentioned it and I always felt a little bit guilty for being active in the group without ever paying dues and being an official member...

I have talked with my WIC office and the lady there actually offered their office as a meeting place--it's quite a comfortable place and even has a little kitchen so it would be a great place to meet. She also gave me some contact info for a couple of other people in town (a CNM who is a LC and someone who used to be an LLL leader here in town back when there was a chapter, apparently a decade or so ago). Anyway, I'm going to make up some fliers I think and put them around at WIC and the midwives offices and whatnot. I figure if I just set up a first meeting, then at that meeting we can talk about some of our options in terms of joining LLL or not, and let the members of the group be part of the decision.

[annekh23]

I've got a few different things I want to say, in response to different parts of the message.

Firstly, LLL does have to push membership in meetings, it's a non profit organisation, run by volunteers, there may be the odd paid person right at the top, I'm not sure, but it's overwhelmingly run by volunteers, but even an organisation run like that has costs. Unless you are very lucky you'll find you have to charge in some way for an independent support group, which could turn out to be more difficult, if you charge per meeting, it could be discouraging, if you charge a voluntary membership, then you might not get many people join and not being part of a larger organisation you can't spread the load of variation between groups.

I think it would be very hard for a group as a whole to decide to join LLL due to the way LLL is organised, a group needs to be facilitated by a leader, if none of you were a leader, even if many of you joined individually, you still wouldn't be a LLL group, wouldn't have access to the support of LLL, wouldn't be able to advertise yourselves as a LLL group etc.

I'd still encourage you to set up some kind of group, just don't consider it as a potential future LLL group.

But I would encourage you personally to investigate LLL leadership, both for your own development and for the benefit of your community. The costs involved are really not huge, you need to be a current member of LLL, which is $40, though a supporting membership may be sufficient, which is $25. I can't remember the exact term they apply to it, but you'd have to apply as someone not linked to a current leader, which just means you have to have more contact with the person allocated to approve you, rather than receiving some training from the leader, I'm not sure of the precise current cost of application, but it was $31 last year. The only other definite cost is purchasing a copy of "The womanly art of breastfeeding", which I think is under $30. You'll then find there are other books and literature that are highly recommended and it's your own choice what you do about that, you may choose to acquire them gradually over the next few years. I'm not sure if the organisation as a whole has any kind of scheme for covering costs if you can't afford it, but many local groups do, so if that was unaffordable, you could try contacting the leader of the nearest group and see what they suggest!

It's great that there are plenty of knowledgeable people in the area and most of the time that will be sufficient. The advantage of LLL is that if you really need it, you can move upwards through the organisation and ultimately tap into some of the most knowledgeable people on breastfeeding in the world. Also, as it's a large organisation, when a relatively rare problem comes up you can make those connections as they maintain lists of leaders with expertise in specific areas.

You'll also find that if you do decide to work on becoming a leader that there are rules about publicising that, based on the concern that if you identify as associated with LLL, then what you say might be taken to be somehow representative of LLL, or that you'd be viewed to be more knowledgeable in someway, so you'd have to be careful if you do set up a group and are viewed as a leader/organiser of that group that you didn't bring it up in that context that you were a leader applicant.

That probably all sounds very legalistic, but given they celebrated their 50th anniversary last year, they must be doing something right!

[sparklefairy]

You might consider looking into API as well.

LLL does have a good "training" program that is relatively inexpensive when compared with LC seminars, etc. If you email any Leader in AK, she should be able to direct you toward someone who can help you learn more and make a decision.

[brightonwoman]

Ive discovered that there actually IS a certified LLL leader here in town--she ran an official chapter here for a while but participation was lagging and her family was growing so she let it go several years ago. However I contacted her and she said she'd love to be involved with a new group, especially if I'll head up the organizing part and she can just help (rather than being in charge). So becoming an official chapter might be easier than I'd thought since she is already here... I only got to talk with her for a couple minutes yesterday but we're going to follow up this coming week--talk about some of her experiences, pros/cons of being official LLL, etc.
I don't have anything against LLL pushing membership--I know the leaders are volunteers--I just know that I never had the budget to join (some of us just have that tight a budget) So I don't know that I could become a leader myself since I wouldn't have the funding to join, and that makes it all kindof weird if I'm the organizer/instigator and yet not officially a leader, kwim?
What kinds of expenses would we be likely to incur? We have a place we can meet at no cost, so unless we wanted to set up a lending library or something I don't think we'd incur costs beyond maybe occasionally printing off fliers, and that doesn't seem big enough (imo) to justify charging the members...

Really i think my BIGGEST priority is to make this a very accessible group--something that people can easily hear about, easily attend, and easily continue attending... Something where we can address topics that are of concern or interest to them. I remember LLL having a rotating schedule of discussion topics, so we'd take some time at the start of the meeting to address any specific questions/problems that attendees were having, but then it was the topic-of-the-day whether you'd heard about it before or not. I think it might be nice to be able to discuss whatever the members wanted to learn about, including maybe taking a day to talk about where/how to get a good nursing bra, or the pros and cons of nursing past 12months, or breastfeeding for working moms, kwim?


sparklefairy, what's API? Can you tell me more about that?

[LizzyQ]

Originally Posted by brightonwoman

What kinds of expenses would we be likely to incur?

Meeting supplies like information pamphlets, photo copies, outreach materials, traveling costs for regional workshops and conferences, keeping books up to date.. stuff like that.

[isras1]

Hey there, we live in the same town! I would be interested in assisting with organizing a group, feel free to send me an email.

[sparklefairy]

Originally Posted by brightonwoman

sparklefairy, what's API? Can you tell me more about that?

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