Image by Alice Chaos via Flickr

Many studies show that breastfeeding a baby is far superior to feeding with formula, providing such benefits as guarding against HIV and diabetes, avoiding colic and other digestive problems, maintaining a healthy weight, and of course allowing the mother and child to bond more closely through their nursing time. Despite these significant advantages, many women give up their attempts to breastfeed within weeks or months.

Thanks to technology, though, breastfeeding is becoming more accessible and practical for mothers. Some inventions that have helped encourage and ease breastfeeding include:

Fashionable Maternity Clothes

No more do pregnant women and new mothers have to wear baggy clothing and feel frumpy until they regain their pre-baby figure. New fashionable maternity clothing lines are designed for easy access to the breasts during nursing while still being discreetly covered up, and include such delights as evening gowns, pajamas and outerwear in addition to the usual pants and shirts.

Hands-free Breast Pump Bras

Breast pumping is a necessary part of feeding a baby naturally on breastmilk, but it’s also notorious for being much less enjoyable than actually nursing the baby. First-time mothers and women who have difficulty maintaining enough milk may pump to encourage lactation, and women who have extra milk may pump it to save for later when their little one is hungry and they have less milk available.

Breast pumping used to be a one-hand or even two-hand activity that made it inconvenient, especially for mothers who had gone back to work, but now technology has presented a solution: the hands-free breast pump bra. These devices are bras with attachments at the nipples that will literally hang small bottles from the bra. A mother simply attaches the bottles, turns the bra on, and it does all of the pumping for her while leaving her hands free.

Breast pump bras support the milk bottles and breasts so well that mothers can get up and walk around doing household chores or even drive while pumping milk. Now that’s technology making life more convenient — and also making babies healthier.