Today Bobbie, the only female-founded and mom-led infant formula company in the U.S., announced a new feeding study and research report called ‘The Feeding Confessionals’: a year long project capturing the personal video diaries of ten different parents throughout their feeding journeys backed by new third party research on the connection between infant feeding and parents’ mental health. The Feeding Confessionals helps new parents and parents-to-be see raw, real, first-hand feeding journeys from across the US. To help support the mental health of a parent’s fourth trimester, Bobbie teamed up with Mindful Mamas, a maternal wellness app company, to offer 20 first of their kind, guided meditations that hit four main feeding hurdles—Breastfeeding/Chestfeeding, Pumping, Bottle Feeding, and Weaning—specifically tailored to support parents through the emotional rollercoaster of feeding a baby.
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“Normalizing the facets of the feeding journey is critical for mental health. Under-education and misaligned expectations are a perfect environment for creating anxiety, isolation, and depression,” stated Chief Wellness Advisor, Erica Chidi co-founder and CEO of LOOM. “Bobbie is reimagining the future of feeding support for parents with this rich content series and first of its kind meditation tools.”
Bobbie commissioned a survey to evaluate maternal mental health during the feeding journey and learned that the guilt and stress of new motherhood is taking a heavy toll—so much so that mothers can’t even be honest with those who are supposed to be supporting them. To avoid judgment, nearly half (46%) of recent moms have lied about their feeding choices—including the majority of working moms (54%), according to a survey of 1,000 recent U.S. moms by Wakefield Research for Bobbie. When the years that should be filled with joy are overshadowed by guilt, it may be time to change the conversation around infant feeding. Other findings include:
- 90% of recent moms admit that the challenges of caring for their baby had a negative impact on their mental health
- 72% of recent moms said that feeding their baby was much more challenging than they had anticipated
- 70% of moms who had intended to exclusively breastfeed until 6 months were not able to meet that expectation
- 79% admit they have felt guilty about some aspect of their infant feeding journey.
“As a team of moms, we wish that someone would have told us about all the different paths this journey could take. There isn’t a one size fits all mantra. Every feeding journey is different and Bobbie wants to honor each and every story — from expectations in pregnancy to returning to work to the challenges of feeding,” said Bobbie co-founder and CEO Laura Modi. “The Feeding Confessionals’ looks to create another safe space for parents struggling to breastfeed while advocating for less mom guilt. The pressure to get everything right as a new mom is intense—and most believe they fall short when it comes to feeding their baby: 79% of recent moms admit they feel guilty about an infant feeding choice.”
“We set out to create a community at Bobbie and that starts by offering understanding and empathy to every parent that struggles to feed their baby. Every journey has its beauty,” said Modi. “We recognize that the health benefits of breastfeeding (for the mother and baby) cannot be compared to formula but we hope to end feeding stigma in the parenting community because it has a severe impact on moms’ mental health, emotions, and wellbeing,” she added.
The Feeding Confessionals will offer support on topics such as:
- What to do when your milk doesn’t come in on time
- What the heck is a vasospasm
- What happens when your frozen milk contains too much lipase
- Advice for returning to work
- What to do when baby won’t latch for several weeks to keep your BM supply going
- How to introduce formula when needed without feeling guilty- but educated on the decision
In addition to the online hub, Bobbie is offering additional support to parents by partnering with Mindful Mamas, a maternal wellness company offering digital support to moms in need of daily encouragement through their mindfulness and self-care app. The Mindful Mamas’ app can be downloaded on both iOS and Android, and each of the 20 feeding journey guided meditations will be available for free— sponsored by Bobbie through the end of November.
“On a daily basis, the Mindful Mamas team speaks with mothers who are riddled with guilt, second-guessing their decisions, or overwhelmed by information. We must continue to normalize experiences and give our mothers a safe place to rest their busy minds,” said Mindful Mamas CEO and Founder Terra LaRock. “That’s exactly what the app’s new feeding meditations do. They normalize, they educate, they encourage, and they empower. We need to keep the drumbeat of maternal wellness alive, and that includes evolving the conversation around how we feed our babies,” she added.
With the launch of Feeding Confessionals, Bobbie aims to continue the conversation by conducting one of the largest social studies on maternal health of the feeding journey. The study will capture the journeys of 400 new moms over 6 months from pregnancy through the 4th Trimester via video diaries to understand how much expectations varied from reality.
As a purpose-driven company, Bobbie started with community, not commerce. They first launched Milk-Drunk, a content site providing a place for parents at the crossroads of feeding to get straightforward answers, support, and information. They launched The MotherLode, an initiative enabling Bobbie customers to become their investors to start a new kind of relationship between brands and its consumers, democratize fundraising, and allow parents to invest in brands they believe in and use. Bobbie also recently launched their first national awareness campaign to evolve the conversation around how we feed our babies to be more inclusive of all parents and to normalize every kind of feeding journey.
To see the full data report and Feeding Confessionals Whitepaper visit here: www.hibobbie.com/feedingconfesssionalsreport.
About Bobbie
Bobbie is an Organic Infant Formula company that exists to build a parenting culture of confidence, not comparison, where every parent is supported in the feeding choice that is right for them and their baby. Bobbie will be initially selling direct-to-consumer and offering a subscription service to parents across the US. Bobbie is mom-founded and led and supported by a 20 person “Motherboard” of advisors and a Medical Advisors made up of doctors, lactation consultants, doulas, pediatricians, and professionals who contribute their expertise to building a next-generation formula company. Bobbie was founded in 2018, is based in San Francisco, and is venture backed. For more information on Bobbie, visit www.hibobbie.com, and follow Bobbie on Instagram @bobbie.
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