Breast Feeding and MedicationThe most important thing to remember when you are breast feeding is that practically everything that goes into your body also goes into your milk. Therefore, before you eat, drink or take an over the counter or prescribed medication you should consider how it will affect your little one and if the medication will have any effect on your own lactation. Most prescribed medications are safe to take while breast feeding, however, if you are taking any type of medicine you should discuss this with your doctor to learn if there will be any effects passed on to your baby while breast feeding. There are a few questions you can ask yourself before deciding on taking any medication while breast feeding. They include, do you really need the medicine? Will the medicine affect my baby? Will the drug affect my milk production? You should also ask these questions to your doctor when he prescribes the medication. Remember, even an over the counter cough medicine will go into your breast milk. Do you really need this medicine or do you think you will feel better in a couple of days. Roughing out a few days with the sniffles is better than giving your baby some of the stuff that is in over the counter medicines. If you must take a certain medication that can affect your baby or your milk production, you can always quit breast feeding during the time you need to take medication. Remember, some drugs are not safe at all for breast feeding moms to take. Before you take any medication at all, be sure to discuss this with your health care provider. Read more of our articles on breast feeding Breast Feeding Problems |