Meet Janna

Janna, the owner of Booby Food, knows all too well about the triumphs and struggles with breastfeeding, pumping and supply issues. She is on a mission to save your breastmilk and the tears shed over spilled milk.

You’ll never have to worry about wasted breastmilk or stress about how much freezer space you have left when your breastmilk is made into freeze-dried Booby Food. Freeze-dried breastmilk is shelf-stable, travel-friendly with far better nutrient preservation and lasting years longer than traditional freezer storage. Your Booby Food can be made into a bottle or added to your babe’s meals as they grow long past breastfeeding.

Janna is a wife, and mama to sweet baby Sage, 5 and Kassius, 2 a.k.a. ‘wrecker of nipples.’ She has a degree in kinesiology, diploma in holistic nutrition and over 10 years of experience in the health and nutrition industry, from personal training to alternative medicine and her private nutrition practice.

The Origin Story

Sage hit just over 6lbs after his 3 week check up.It was a balmy and cold November 28th, my water had broken 3 days before, but today was the day; I finally got to meet my little guy. 58 hours of labour and Sage was in my arms, surrounded by midwives and my husband (who didn’t quite know what to make of watching me deliver at home in our tiny condo). Still holding my wee little human, the midwives came back after analyzing his test results and gave us the unsettling news. “He’s SGA, we would advise you to take him into the NICU for monitoring”.

Mr. Sage was 4 days late and "small for gestational age". Exactly how small was he? Too small for the car seat.

My husband Sam feeding Sage his bottle of formula.We were advised to start him immediately on formula because we couldn’t transport him to the NICU and he was just at that weight where he could stay at home, but be closely monitored. Formula was never part of the birth plan, but hey – birth plans are always good on paper right. It really didn’t matter though, fed is best.

I was still very eager to exclusively breastfeed and hoped to get the okay to wean Sage off of formula and onto breastmilk only. Luckily, he was a great eater and after a few weeks, we got the go ahead… but that’s when the hard part began.

This took a good week of pumping to build.Breastfeeding did not come easily. My supply was very low and my pumping outcomes were laughable. I suffered terrible postpartum anxiety around feedings and sunk into a vortex of “I’m not good enough, there’s something wrong with me – I’m not producing enough!” I thought the answers were on YouTube, but immediately regretted being there as the first video I saw was on a woman who pumped over 1200mL a day.

I started exclusively breastfeeding after a couple months and was able to bring my supply up.Stubbornly, I refused to let up and stopped using a bottle all together to try and build up my supply. I was always within two hours of home so I didn’t have to use my precious frozen stash and still can’t count how many times I’ve cried over spilled or wasted breastmilk. Determined to keep on it no matter how hard, after 3-4 months my supply really dipped and I went back to nursing every 2-3 hours to build it back up, which it eventually did.

Mr. Sage enjoying his tasty Booby Food smoothies.When it came time for solids, I was so excited to bring a flavourful world of whole foods, herbs and spices. In my nutrition practice, Holistic YYC, I love helping clients fall in love with nutritious and delicious food, so introducing Mr. Sage to homemade baby food, this was my jam! Naturally, I wanted to incorporate my breastmilk into his purees, but I couldn’t bare to thaw a whole bag, just to use a couple ounces… I didn’t want to waste a single drop of that liquid gold. There had to be a way to preserve my stash.

Adding my own freeze-dried breastmilk to Sage’s foods gave me such relief from my postpartum anxiety.After very heavy research, hundreds of emails, messages and broken English phone calls to Europe (where freeze-dried breastmilk has been used for decades) Booby Food grew roots. With the help of the incredible mamas who allowed me the privilege of trial and erring the process with their extra breastmilk, Booby Food officially sprouted.

I wish Booby Food was around when I needed it the most, early in my breastfeeding journey. Adding freeze-dried breastmilk to a bottle of my own pumped breastmilk could have fortified Mr. Sage’s meals and helped with the weight gain he needed early in life.