Three non-profit organisations — La Leche League South Africa (SA), Project Isabella and The Front Runners Foundation — joined forces recently to make Mother’s Day this year extra special for young mothers at Tygerberg Hospital.
Tygerberg Hospital provides specialist medical care to vulnerable sick and pre-term babies. Many mothers remain with their children away from their families for days, weeks or several months. Others travel in daily to provide vital skin-to-skin care and breast milk, explained Gwynneth Jacobs from La Leche League SA.
Support
Project Isabella, named after the founder’s own daughter who was also born pre-term, provided sponsored meals, nappies and sanitary towels to the mothers. The Thula Baby Project provided packs of knitted baby blankets and baby clothes. Journals were also provided to each mother to encourage them to express their feelings of fear, despair and anxiety and to record their baby’s daily progress, said Jacobs.
Breast milk vital
La Leche League SA, a volunteer-run breastfeeding support organisation, meanwhile provided support and motivation for the mothers, encouraging them to continue providing vital and life-saving breast milk to their babies. Breast milk coats the vulnerable gut lining protecting it from infection and toxins. It also provides brain and nerve cells with vital fatty acids which impacts child development, Jacobs explained.
Claire Koekemoer from Project Isabella led a special prayer on the day for the health and recovery of all the sick babies. Koekemoer offers free monthly counselling for the mothers and follows up with them while in hospital and after discharge.
The special event was held on Saturday 9 May.
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