Mother saves child’s nutrition through breastfeeding

25-year-old Beverly regrets that she didn’t learn the importance of breastfeeding earlier. She could have breastfed her second child as long as he needed. Now, she is correcting her practice by ensuring that her third child is well taken care of.

Beverly, a mother of three, lives with her family in a shanty in an urban poor community. Her husband, Joel, works as a butcher in the nearby public market and earns minimum wage (P300). They didn’t have many resources as a family, resulting in poor nutrition for both the parents and the children.

The mother admitted that she was too focused on finding ways to survive every day that she forgot the little details that would make her children healthy and fortified.

“I raised my second child without the proper knowledge about infant health care, most especially about proper breastfeeding. I stopped giving him breastmilk when he turned 2 months old. I did observe that he was sickly and thin,” the stay-at-home mother shares.

When the pandemic peaked, food supply was scarce, and going outside, including the trip to the public health clinic, was not allowed. The nutrition status of Beverly’s children could have worsened, but the mother didn’t allow it.

After she learned the proper ways of taking care of infants through World Vision’s Urban Development Project, she already knows how to prepare nutritious meals from accessible recipes. Most importantly, she learned the value of breastfeeding.

“For my third child, I will correct the mistakes that I made before. I will ensure that my child is breastfed until she needs it. I know that this is good for her health and nutrition,” shares Beverly.