How dads can support breastfeeding, and why it counts

World Breastfeeding Week runs from 1st to 7th August, and this year's global theme is 'Prioritise Breastfeeding - Create Sustainable Support Systems'. On the surface it reads like a conversation for mothers. Scratch beneath it and it's really about the people around a breastfeeding mother, and whether the support around her actually holds.

For a lot of the men we work with, becoming a father comes with a strange kind of sidelining. You're at the birth. You're up at 3am. You're doing the nappies, the settling, the endless laps of the living room. But when it comes to feeding, there's a sense that this bit isn't yours to help with. That feeling is common, and it's worth naming, because it isn't true.

Research into breastfeeding keeps landing on the same finding. The strongest predictor of whether a mother keeps breastfeeding as long as she wanted to is the practical and emotional support of her partner. Not the feeding itself - you can't do that part - but everything around it. Bringing her food and water during a feed. Taking the baby afterwards so she can rest. Handling the household so feeding doesn't become one more thing she's carrying alone. And how you respond when it gets hard - when feeding hurts, when supply feels uncertain, when she's shattered and doubting herself at 4am.

This is where attachment theory earns its keep. Early attachment isn't only about the bond between baby and mother. It's about the whole network of relationships a baby is born into. A mother who feels backed up rather than isolated is in a far better position to be tuned in and responsive to her baby.

Supporting your partner well is, indirectly, one of the most useful things you can do for your baby's early development.

Then there's the part nobody talks about. We know a lot now about postnatal depression in mothers, and rightly so. It's common, serious, and deserves the attention it gets. What gets far less airtime is paternal postnatal depression, which affects an estimated 1 in 10 new fathers, often peaking in the months after birth rather than straight away. Feeding struggles, broken sleep, money pressure and the sense of being a spectator in your own family's early days all feed into it.

Maybe the first months of fatherhood have been harder than you expected. Flatter, more anxious, more irritable, more cut off than you thought you'd feel. That's not a personal failing. It's a recognised experience, and it tends to get worse the longer it stays unspoken. Men are still far less likely than women to reach out during this period, partly because there's no obvious script for what a struggling new father is supposed to say, or who he's supposed to say it to.

So what does a 'sustainable support system' actually look like at home? Simpler than it sounds. An honest conversation before the baby arrives about what support during feeding will involve, rather than assuming it'll sort itself out. Checking in with your partner about how feeding is going, not just how the baby is doing - the two get lumped together, and her experience deserves its own question. Keeping an eye on your own state too. Are you sleeping at all? Are you talking to anyone? Are you white-knuckling through each day with no space to take stock? And knowing that bringing in outside help - a health visitor, a lactation consultant, a counsellor - is a family taking its wellbeing seriously, not a sign something has gone wrong.

World Breastfeeding Week is a useful prompt, but the point runs well beyond feeding. The early months of a child's life ask a lot of both parents, usually at the exact moment both have the least left to give. Men often carry it quietly - showing up, doing the jobs, keeping things running - while privately feeling stretched thin, uncertain or unexpectedly low. That deserves to be taken seriously, for your own sake and because a father who's steady and supported is part of the system a new baby actually needs.

Some of this might be landing close to home. The adjustment to fatherhood, low mood since your baby arrived, or feeling like you're stood on the outside of something you desperately want to be part of. It's worth talking to someone. That conversation doesn't have to wait until things feel unmanageable.