La Leche League Canada rejects breastfeeding dad's bid to become lactation coach
Published on Sunday August 19, 2012
Josh Tapper
Staff Reporter

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/1243822--la-leche-league-canada-rejects-breastfeeding-dad-s-bid-to-become-lactation-coach


Trevor, a 27-year-old transgendered man, breastfeeds his 16-month-old son using a supplemental nursing system at home in Winnipeg. SUPPLIED PHOTO

Trevor MacDonald, a slim man with short silky, dark brown hair, a radiant smile sandwiched between a wispy moustache and goatee, sits bare-chested in a leafy Toronto garden, his infant son sucking gently on his tiny left breast.

In the photo, shot on a recent visit to the city from his Winnipeg home, Trevor blissfully cradles the boy, contentment visible in his soft features. This is a proud papa breastfeeding his 16-month-old child, just as he has done many times before.

Trevor, a 27-year-old stay-at-home parent, loves fatherhood and, as a transgender man, identifies as a dad. And he loves breastfeeding, owing his confidence and comfort nursing to his La Leche League Canada (LLLC) motherhood support group in Winnipeg.

In early June Trevor wrote a letter to LLLC — an affiliate of the influential international mother-to-mother breastfeeding advocacy group — asking what it would take to become a group leader. He wanted to coach LGBTQ members and those who struggle, like he did, to breastfeed after chest reduction surgery.

LLLC rejected his inquiry seven weeks later, citing an 18-year-old policy.

Breastfeeding Organization Will Consider Allowing Transgender Leaders
By Zack Ford
on Aug 27, 2012 at 11:42 am

http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2012/08/27/749091/breastfeeding-organization-will-consider-allowing-transgender-leaders/?mobile=nc

La Leche League is an international nonprofit dedicated to supporting women who breastfeed, and recently it opened its doors to Trevor MacDonald, a Canadian transgender man who had retained his female reproductive organs and wanted to nurse his child. Despite the challenge of having little breast tissue, he successfully breastfed his son, thanks in part to the support he got from La Leche League.
However, when MacDonald said he wanted to give back and support the organization as a leader, LLL was suddenly not so welcoming, telling him that only women could hold leadership positions. But thanks to those who have advocated on MacDonald's behalf, the organization has said it will revisit the policy:

QuoteOur organization is addressing and carefully considering a unique matter raised when a transgender individual, who has self-identified as a father, approached La Leche League Canada with a request to be considered for accreditation as a La Leche League Leader. A La Leche League Leader is a volunteer with specialized knowledge and training in providing mother-to-mother breastfeeding support.
To our knowledge, this topic has never arisen in the 56-year history of our organization. It is important that La Leche League International and its community thoughtfully consider the issues that are being raised and carefully examine its policies applicable to this matter. We are committed to considering all points of view. To that end, the La Leche League International Board of Directors will carefully review all facts and implications of this unprecedented subject.

The subject may be "unprecedented" — and stories like Trevor MacDonald's may be few — but how society treats transgender parents is an important question to address.