PHOTO: MAEGAN DOUGHERTY PHOTOGRAPHY
Breastfeeding is pretty cool when you think about it. But if you want to talk about seriously cool look no further than Kate Neal.
Neal's birth photographer Maegan Dougherty was able to capture Neal basically being Superwoman by breastfeeding her 2-year-old daughter while in labor.
Seriously.
"I love this moment," Dougherty captions the image on Instagram. "Big sister was so happy to see her mom and to nurse. And then contractions got longer and more intense."
"Grandma brought big sister to the hospital to spend time with her mum while she was laboring," Dougherty later told the Daily Mail. "The mom knew her daughter would want to nurse, and she also knew that that may help the labor process. Her daughter asked to nurse as soon as she got there, and she said yes."
There have been studies that show the nipple stimulation of breastfeeding can induce labor and help it along by releasing oxytocin into the bloodstream.
"This mom showed so much strength," Dougherty told Popsugar. "Labor is hard. Really hard. The deep connections that this mom had with her husband, their mothers, and her sisters were beautiful. They knew how to support her and they did so with so much love."
Neal gave birth to her second daughter two hours after the breastfeeding photo was taken.
The newborn girl weighed seven pounds, 10 ounces, and her mother could not be more thrilled.
And don't worry, the newest edition to the family, got her own breastfeeding photo.
instant happy in your
mailbox every day.
