What is a Baby Café?

Baby Cafés are free, drop-in, informal breastfeeding support groups offering ongoing professional lactation care and intervention. Most are open for 2 hours at least once a week. Some communities have more than one, meeting different days of the week.

GENDER EQUALITY: In this website, the terms “she”, “mother”, “mom” or other forms of speech referring to the female gender also includes those individuals identifying as other genders and non-binary. The term “breastfeeding” also includes chestfeeding, bodyfeeding, the use of supplemental nursing devices, and any pumping of breastmilk for human consumption.

BCUSA Updates

Baby Cafés and the Covid-19 virus

Baby Cafés are offering IN-PERSON and VIRTUAL BABY CAFÉ MEETINGS depending on their local COVID-19 restrictions.

Individual Baby Cafés will follow the local Communicable Disease guidelines of their sponsoring organizations regarding group gatherings, therefore as regulations allow, some Baby Cafés are meeting in person.
 
Please check individual listings on the top and bottom of this page (Find a Baby Café button), or with local Community and Facebook listings to connect to a VIRTUAL Baby Café. 
 
NOTE:  If a participant (including infants and children), staff member, or volunteer has any symptoms of illness, has been in contact with anyone COVID +, or has traveled in the past 10 days, please do not attend any Baby Café in person that may be open.
 
CDC Guidelines for Isolation

BE WELL and STAY SAFE

**COVID-19 Vaccine Education and Outreach Materials from Mass Department of Public Health: 
Vaccines and Pregnancy, Breastfeeding, Children and Youth

Baby Café Breastfeeding Counselor Graduates

Farah Antoine-Mayberry

I'm Farah Antoine-Mayberry! I graduated from Howard University with a degree in occupational therapy. I have always loved children and any education related to birth. As an OT, I've had the pleasure of working with babies and families in the NICU among various settings.

My husband and I have 5 children and when our youngest was 9 months old, I was asked by a representative of the Coalition of Oklahoma Breastfeeding Advocates (COBA) to become a Baby Cafe Breastfeeding Counselor (BCBC) for a local Baby Cafe in Oklahoma City. I had the support of my colleague/co-facilitator who is now a dear friend as I continued to gain skills as a certified lactation counselor and eventually as a doula, midwife's assistant, and IBCLC.
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 My favorite part of becoming a BCBC besides meeting new families was creating a safe space for parents to connect with each other while navigating postpartum in a country that doesn't normalize birth, breastfeeding, as well as proper financial, physical, and emotional postpartum support.
 
Personally, I chose to breastfeed my children to take advantage of it being free! (We started off with twins so "free" was an excellent price). We were blessed to have fairly uneventful breastfeeding experiences, however as a BCBC, I realized that birthing families deserve and need so much more prenatal and postpartum lactation support than they currently get.
 
I wanted to become an Internationally Board Certified Lactation Counselor (IBCLC) to expand my scope of practice and reach more of my birthing community. Becoming an IBCLC has been a welcomed achievement and I am excited to contribute to the continued development of more lactation professionals through future community endeavors.

In the News

MelroseWakefield Healthcare Baby Café Empowers Milk Recipient to Become Milk Donor

MelroseWakefield Healthcare Baby Café grand opening. Lisa tells her story of receiving milk at MelroseWakefield Hospital, then going on to donate milk twice, with the support of the Baby Café. READ MORE

FROM BREASTFEEDING MEDICINE JOURNAL: Examining the Baby Café Model and Mothers' Breastfeeding Duration, Meeting of Goals, and Exclusivity 

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Accessible community lactation support impacts a woman's breastfeeding success by offering timely intervention and solutions, thereby allowing mothers to achieve breastfeeding goals and improve overall breastfeeding rates... READ MORE

5 Reasons to Give or Get Support at Baby Café USA

​Not every breastfeeding mother wants or needs an in-person visit along with the pressure of showing up at the appointed time... READ MORE