Guest Post: Sourcing Breastmilk for an Adopted Baby

Remember early this year when I posted about a milk sharing story about adoptive dads who sourced breastmilk for their baby?  This time, I am sharing a story closer to home.  Today's guest post is from Jason Baker of PETA Asia Pacific.  A friend of Jason posted in one of my egroups about how he was looking for breastmilk for his adopted son.  Super small world, I patched him up with a kababayan from Davao City and Pangging became a regular milk donor.   Jason shared this story with me almost a year ago and I wasn't able to share it until now.

http://instagram.com/p/k0x3uRKXSF/?modal=true

Why did I decide to share?  Since it is breastfeeding month, I've been seeing a lot of stories about breastfeeding in various news outfits. However, I was greatly saddened when a popular site shared a story about a mom saying that breastfeeding advocates condemn formula feeding moms.  She goes on to say that counselors live in posh villages, that formula milk is good enough for her child, that it is impossible for a working mom to commute and bring all her breastfeeding paraphernalia.

Milk Sharing on Kape at Balita

Early this morning, I dropped by Kape at Balita to talk about Human Milk for Human Babies - The Philippines.  HM4HB - The Philippines is part of an international group from 52 countries with the purpose of fostering community between local families who have chosen to share breastmilk.

The community provides a space - where donors and recipients can come together to benefit from each other.  No breastfeeding advice is given and HM4HB - The Philippines does not match up donors with recipients nor do they mediate conflicts.  More importantly, breastmilk offered in the page is always offered for free - never for sale or for barter.  You can read more FAQs here.

A Milk Sharing Story

Update 22 February 2014:  I have edited this post upon the request of J, who initially shared his story with me.  They initially asked me to delete this post.  However, I feel that it is such an important story to share.  To compromise, we agreed on changing the names as they want to preserve their anonymity.

Remember my post entitled "Concerns of a Milk Donor Mom" where I shared the hierarchy of babies that I donate to:

I do have a hierarchy of babies I give milk to - first would be the sick or premature babies then multiples and milk banks, then for emergencies, e.g. mom got sick, etc. If your baby is healthy and you just cannot pump enough milk, ASKING FOR MILK is not sustainable - you need to bring up your own supply

N

I received an email from Victor, a reader from the US who emailed me about this hierarchy.  He is a new parent and is in a male same-sex relationship.  Since both of them are men, it was impossible for one of them to relactate, unlike an adoption involving a heterosexual couple.  Victor shared how they were able to provide breastmilk to their baby girl through milk donations for several moms.  He wanted to know how families such as theirs ranked in my hierarchy of milk donations.  The baby was healthy but there was no "mom" who can lactate and produce milk.