This Mom is One of the Reasons I’m Still Breastfeeding Today

This post is part of YummyMummyClub.ca‘s support of the Dove® Celebrate Mom Contest. I received compensation as a thank you for my participation. This post reflects my personal opinion about the information provided by the sponsors. You can nominate inspiring moms here: www.CelebrateMom.ca.

I remember being up in the middle of the night with my brand new baby, worried that she wasn’t nursing enough. Worried about how grouchy she was. Worried that I wasn’t good enough or producing enough or mom enough. I did what I always did in a moment of crisis – I turned to Twitter.

In the wee hours of the night, I posted a Tweet that was basically a cry for help. I was frustrated, I was feeling down on myself and I didn’t know who to turn to or where to go for help. It was on that medium, on a platform that can sometimes seem so unlikely for forming relationships and bonds, that my call for help was answered by an amazing mom. Fleur Bickford of http://www.nurturedchild.ca.

Fleur is a private lactation consultant in Ottawa, Ontario and is a Registered Nurse with a Bachelor of Science in Life Sciences from Queen’s University. She is also the mother of two breastfed children and that journey led her to also becoming a La Leche League Leader and then to becoming an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant.

However, it’s not her certifications that make her worthy of a nomination. It’s her spirit, her dedication to other mothers and her willingness to support and love.

Fleur reached out to me in that dark hour and offered her support. She told me to get on the phone with her and when I hesitated, “It was so late… I felt bad asking for help… I felt embarrassed for not feeling good enough”, she told me not to worry, that she didn’t mind and that she would love to help. That night, she eased my worries and she made me feel like I was doing the greatest job as a mom and she put me at ease immediately.

It is rare to find someone who is incredibly selfless and who is willing to put others above herself, especially someone who has two children of their own, but Fleur is that type of person. She extended out an invitation for me to come to her house so that she could assess my latch and she Tweeted back and forth with me always. Incredibly supportive and there for all of the right reasons.

Fleur has made a difference in how I parent my own child and she has been beyond helpful to me, even though we’ve never met outside of the social media space. Her actions are a testament to her character and the fact that she just offers and extends herself without asking for things in return, makes me strive to do the same in my own community.

Fleur also has a thriving Facebook community at . Here, she answers questions all of the time and provides support for other women who are either just entering into the parenting world or who have been there for years but who need support. Her parenting style and her philosophies on motherhood are exactly the inspiration that I need in raising my own daughter and I know many other women who would feel the same way.

They say that it takes a village to raise a child and it’s true. Without having Fleur in my “village”, I may not still be breastfeeding today and my parenting choices may be somewhat more limited. Fleur has expanded my own thinking and she does this for women all of the time. This is why I’m nominating Fleur in the Dove Celebrate Mom Contest.

Visit www.CelebrateMom.ca by September 4th to nominate a mom who’s an inspiring role model to women and girls in the Dove® Celebrate Mom Contest. Four inspiring women will win $2,500 for herself and $2,500 to be donated to the of her choice.

And check out more stories on YummyMummyClub.ca about amazing role model moms: www.yummymummyclub.ca/family/mummy/celebrate-a-mom-in-your-life