Donor Stories
For Mother’s Day this year, we invited our donors to share their stories as mothers and donors. We hope their stories and tips can make a difference for other donor moms!
"Hello to all moms out there! My name is Ekaterina and I am originally from Russia. My husband is Portuguese and we have an adorable 10 month old American-Russian-Portuguese son! From the moment I was pregnant, I knew that I wanted to breastfeed my baby. I read a lot of articles and took online classes to prepare myself. Fortunately, my son latched on 30 minutes after he was born and my milk came in less than 24 hours later. My biggest obstacle, so far, has been to deal with mastitis - so my advice is to not wait [pumping]. If you have too much milk, pump! I waited almost 2 weeks before I started pumping. If you get mastitis, don't give up! The first month is the hardest, but it gets better and eventually, you won't feel any pain, just relief. I am fortunate enough to produce extra breast milk and donate almost 300 ounces. I feel so great to be able to to help and hope I can donate more in the future. I am happy I had a chance to share my store and I hope helps those who read it! With love, Ekaterina"