Mothers' Milk Bank Austin

Baby Athena was born with Congenital Short Gut Syndrome, a rare intestinal disorder. Initially fed hypoallergenic formulas in the hospital, she had a strong adverse reaction and severe bleeding. Only when Athena was switched to donor human milk feedings did the bleeding stop and she started to gain weight. Athena stayed on donor milk for 4 months. Now she is one year old, and her mom decided to share their story as a recipient family to all donor moms and the milk bank community as thanks for all their support. Athena came barreling into this world like a recking ball to our otherwise calm lives. Our warrior was born 37 weeks gestation after a relatively uncomplicated pregnancy. She spent 12 hours in the NICU due to “difficulty to transition” which is fancy medical talk for she needs a little help breathing. Within 8 hours she was in the normal L&D room with me and attempting to nurse. She was sleepier than my first daughter so I started pumping immediately to get my supply...

Breastfeeding, Breast milk, and COVID-19  Hi mamas! My name is Kara Michael and I’m an occupational therapist and an IBCLC (international board certified lactation consultant). I’m the owner of Best Fed Beginnings , a breastfeeding clinic in Beaumont, TX. We’ve also housed a Mother’s Milk Bank at Austin depot drop off in our office since February 2019. I’m the proud mom to my 5 year old daughter, Natalie and my 3 month old son, Theodore (Teddy).  We, as mothers with babies, are facing unprecedented times with the COVID-19 pandemic. We are all trying to do what we think is best for not only ourselves as individuals and families, but for our community as a whole with social distancing and stores closing. It is easy to feel helpless during these times and question how you can both keep your family safe and contribute to the common good and help others in this time of crisis.  Well mamas, I can promise you that breastfeeding, and continuing to breastf...

An Urgent Notice from the Mothers' Milk Bank at Austin Dear Friend of the Mothers’ Milk Bank at Austin, Like so many other organizations, businesses, and individuals, the Mothers’ Milk Bank at Austin continues monitoring the rapidly escalating US experience of SARS-CoV-2, and the respiratory illness it causes, COVID-19. We are comforted by the US Food and Drug Administration’s statements on the safety of food and food packaging and pleased to note that the CDC continues supporting breastfeeding, even in cases of exposure or diagnosis. Milk banks are an essential service, so we continue working through the pandemic, and understand that the highest priority action at this point is to increase donor screening and pasteurization activities to ensure that our fragile babies continue to access life-saving milk. With the knowledge that the peak of this pandemic is still weeks or months away, it is paramount to procure and process milk as rapidly as possible...

Gratitude Mothers’ Milk Bank at Austin recently completed a record-breaking year, with more milk donors providing more milk for more babies in more hospitals and outpatient homes than ever before. Looking back, I’m overwhelmed by the number of individuals, charitable foundations, and businesses who support our work. We thank all of them and hope they inspire others to help babies in need. Many of you know we moved into a larger, state-of-the-art facility in 2017. Since we won’t need all the space in the short run, we took on an excellent tenant last year, Acton Imprimis, a small, private school. We’re grateful to Kevin Jones of Structura, Inc. for donating his time to supervise the tenant fit-out; Structura is the general contractor that did an outstanding job for us in 2017. We thank also Christy Mosely of Native Sun Landscape Design, who donated her time and vision to create a beautiful landscape of grasses and flowers surrounding the milk bank, attracting butterflies a...

Did you know that the people who greet donors at our depots are volunteers for Mothers' Milk Bank at Austin ? They volunteer during their normal work hours and assist with logging milk that is dropped off, storing the milk properly, packing the milk into boxes or coolers, and shipping it back to us or coordinating pickups with our courier. They do a lot to make the donation process work smoothly for MMBA and also for our wonderful donors. We're thankful for all of our depots and the hard work of our volunteers in supporting our mission of saves babies' lives by providing prescribed donor human milk! Donor Mom Brittany and her baby Remington are happy to share their milk with Mothers' Milk Bank at Austin. Brittany shares how her friend Andrea at our San Antonio Food Bank depot helped make the donation process easy.

Donor Mom Janie recently shared her donation story with the Milk Bank. She learned about our mission from a friend who was donating and felt inspired to donate if it was in her future. Read on for more.

Photo by Aneta Hayne Photography Before we get into a topic that I am very passionate about, let me introduce myself. My name is Naya Weber and I’m mother to two little boys who were both breastfed beyond infancy. It was my own struggles that motivated me to pursue a career in lactation. I’m an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) - my job is to support families experiencing postpartum breastfeeding challenges. In addition to working with families, I am the social media manager for Mothers’ Milk Bank at Austin. I’m grateful to have found my way to MMBA, an organization that does so much good and uses their platform to promote good health from an early age. Normalize breastfeeding - it has been a term all over the internet for the last several years. Moms posting breastfeeding selfies (#brelfies) on social media to a variety of reactions - from praise to the more critical, “why is she posting that ??!” I think the real question we need to ask ourselves ...

Donor Mom Ashley's story: I began pumping with my first (now 8) in order to finish out the school year. I was blessed with an abundance of milk and as the summer approached, I looked for something to do with our deep freeze full of milk. I was grateful to hear about the Mother’s Milk Bank and happily donated our excess right as we learned we were pregnant with baby number 2, who is now almost 7 years old! Because pumping had gone so well for the first, I pumped every morning with baby number 2 as a way to have a little extra on hand and in order to specifically donate to the babies the Milk Bank serves. The second time around brought in over 1000oz and it was so nice to be donating and helping, especially when our finances were lean and I didn’t have a lot of other ways to help people. Johnny (5), MacKenzie (8), Liam (5 months), and Keegan (almost 7) Little did I know that this pumping experience was preparing me in big ways. A short time later, we learned that baby numbe...