got milk?

In the current (March, p. 197) issue of Oprah's O Magazine is an article on breast milk & milk banking. Entitled, "The Gift", the article is about a woman who has preemie triplets and begins pumping, ultimately donating over 7,000 ounces of breastmilk to a milk bank.  It also talks a lot about why breastmilk is best for babies nutritionally and for all the other reasons beyond nutrition.   This article follows last month's  "Books That Made A Difference" section, (where a celeb tells about what they are reading and why), in which Isla Fisher (Confessions of a Shopaholic) talked about birth and Ina May Gaskin's Guide... 

Why does this matter?  Because Oprah is incredibly influential and is sort of the holy grail in terms of PR...and because she has seemed to avoid birth-related topics much to the consternation of the birth community.  Hopefully this is a trend in the right direction!  

Ina May & O

a friend passed this along to me (and I'm able to post remotely!):

In the February 2009 issue of O, Oprah's magazing (p. 144) Isla
Fisher, an actress, lists the "5 books on my bookshelf right now" and
one of them is "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth"! She says about it,
"Women are happy to tell you their terrifying birth stories, but
nobody tells you the positive ones. So if you're going to have a
baby, you have to read this -- it's a collection of stories of
women's birth experiences, plus loads of practical information. In
today's world of modern medicine, it's so easy to have the experience
of pregnancy and birth taken out of your hands: You're measured and
blood-tested and ultrasounded. Sometimes it feels as if the whole
experience is happening to you. But women have the right to have the
birthing experience we desire -- whether it's a Cesarean or a natural
birth -- and to have the fear of the pain removed. A friend, Naomi
Watts, gave me this book when I was pregnant. It was such a special
time for me, and it was such a relief to read these stories."