Bonding is the emotional tie from parent to infant
(
Kennell, 1998
).
It begins during pregnancy and increases with birth.
This attachment enables parents to make sacrifices for their infant.
Many women maintain that their breastfeeding experience
was a very special time during their
life and they valued this closeness to their infant.
If a woman is unable to breastfeed her infant she
needs to be reassured that she will still be
able to bond with her infant.
A recent small study in Boston evaluated the behavioral effects of
a heel prick procedure (for drawing newborn genetic screening) when mothers
were breastfeeding their infants compared to a control group of infants who
were swaddled in a bassinet. All infants in the experimental group were
latched onto their mother's breast lying skin to skin before the heel prick.
Video monitoring of both groups revealed that the infants breastfed during
the procedure had crying and grimacing reduced by 91% and 84% respectively
compared to the infants who underwent the procedure in their bassinet.
Breastfeeding also prevented the tachycardia associated with the procedure
in the control group.
(
Gray, 2002
).
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