When Jess Woon describes the work of the Breastfeed Durham Lactation Collaborative, the word that anchors everything is one most clinics never use.
Our hope is that through the Collaborative, families feel more than educated. They feel held.
A labor and delivery nurse turned postpartum nurse turned International Board Certified Lactation Consultant, Jess co-founded the Lactation Collaborative in September 2025 alongside Nicola Young — two providers who had spent years watching the same gap appear, again and again, between Durham’s exceptional healthcare institutions and the families those institutions were not reaching.
“Durham is home to incredible healthcare institutions and passionate providers,” Jess explained recently. “And yet too many families still can’t access the infant feeding support they need — whether because of insurance, transportation, or finances. We knew there had to be a more coordinated, more compassionate way.”
Jess’s perspective comes from years on the frontlines of maternal-newborn care: six years as a labor and delivery and postpartum nurse, a year as an inpatient lactation consultant, specialized training through UNC Gillings’ Mary Rose Tully Training Initiative, and now a fellowship with Teaching Babies to Nurse as she builds her outpatient practice. And alongside all of it: motherhood. She nurses her own newborn while doing this work.
Across every season of her career, one realization has crystallized:
Feeding challenges are rarely just about milk. They’re about confidence. They’re about identity. They’re about culture and mental health and the fundamental human need to feel seen and supported.
That recognition is the Collaborative’s design principle. It is why visits run longer than insurance would ever pay for. It is why families can request in-home care if leaving home is hard. It is why we serve in Spanish and English. It is why the team holds a quarterly wellness gathering for themselves — because providers who feel held, hold others well.
In its first nine months, the Collaborative recorded 62 visits, served 39 unique families, and distributed 24 free breast pumps. One hundred percent of those families were uninsured or underinsured. Forty-two percent of visits were conducted in Spanish.
Numbers like those add up to something Jess has come to believe deeply:
Infant feeding is deeply personal. It carries our hopes, our expectations, our values, and is often woven into how we come to see ourselves as parents. When feeding feels difficult, the ripple effect extends far beyond just infant nutrition. It touches confidence, identity, and emotional well-being in profound ways. Every family deserves compassionate, holistic care that honors their unique goals and lived experiences — so they can move through this season of becoming parents, or adding a new child, not only nourishing their babies, but also themselves.
— Jess Woon, IBCLC · Co-Founder & Coordinator, Breastfeed Durham Lactation Collaborative
About the Breastfeed Durham Lactation Collaborative
The Lactation Collaborative is a free, culturally responsive lactation clinic serving uninsured and underinsured families across the Triangle. We are designed for any parent who feels access to lactation care is a financial barrier — no insurance, no documentation, no proof of need required. We offer in-home visits and clinic visits, in English and Spanish, with a team of volunteer IBCLCs, CLCs, and Pathway 3 students.
If you need lactation support, please reach out. Sign up through our HIPAA-compliant booking portal on the Breastfeed Durham website. For Spanish-language support, call 919-646-5130.
Gratitude and the road ahead.
The Lactation Collaborative launched in September 2025 thanks to the vision and generosity of a private donor who believed in this work. The MAG Mutual Foundation has sustained our first full year of operations, and we are deeply grateful for their investment in equitable lactation care. As we look toward year two and beyond, we are actively seeking the next funding partners to keep this care free and accessible. If your organization, foundation, or family fund is interested in supporting this work, please reach out to Love Anderson at love@breastfeedingcommunities.org.