LLL Today #4 – Becoming an LLL Leader
My name is Iveta and I am the very first Czech Leader who got trained in the Czech language to become a La Leche League (LLL) Leader. What an honor! Today I will share with you my experience with the process.
I met LLL some time in the winter 2021. My first daughter was six months old at that time. When I saw the invitation for the online meeting, I was sure I would attend. I liked the whole setting from the start! Very casual, normal and a family-friendly atmosphere. I felt welcomed from the very first minute and felt like I knew Hanka and Misha (our other two Czech volunteer Leaders) forever. When they mentioned becoming a volunteer LLL Leader at one of the meetings, I was sure I needed to get more info about that! When they explained about the prerequisites, Leader responsibilities and application work, I slowly but surely began to prepare myself for the application. The reason why I liked it was that LLL support is an amazing blend of science, empathy, support and mother energy. Sounds like everything you need as a nursing mother. Am I right?
Since that first discussion, I continued attending the meetings, bought a book (The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding) and was waiting for my daughter to be one year old to finally apply.
The whole training was a very good experience for me. I have to thank both Misha and Hanka, who were my support Leaders throughout the journey. Their dedication, patience and knowledge really helped me to experience the true LLL spirit even more.
And do you know what was probably the best thing about the whole training? That I finished it just two days before I got married, while being four months pregnant with my second baby and just days away from my very first LLL conference in Italy. I was invited as a Future Areas in Europe (FAiE) representative with Hanka and other FAiE Leaders. I will never forget this amazing time. We met so many amazing women and families at the conference, listened to amazing speakers and had time to get to know each other. LLL Italia is an example of an excellent network of mothers supporting each other to nurse their babies. This support helps others complete the never ending and the most amazing, important and sometimes quite hard task of raising children.
I am so grateful that we have one another and the art of breastfeeding.
Editor’s note: For information on becoming an LLL Leader see: https://llli.org/get-involved/prerequisites/.