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“It’s hard to figure out what’s going wrong if you don’t know what’s going right.”
— Leah Jolly
We just finished an hour with Cathy Watson Genna, and our brains are still buzzing. That’s how it always goes with Cathy — she has this gift for showing you how everything connects. The web of infant assessment can feel impossibly tangled from the inside, but she helps you see the threads, trace them, and understand why each one pulls on the others.
One of the things Cathy does so well is remind you how much you’ve actually learned — and how much there still is to learn. Both of us are coming up on recertification this year (yes, already — we found an old episode in our archive of us talking about our first recertification and the time warp is real), and we’re both still chasing CERPs and CEUs with zero signs of stopping.
This aftershow is us, Annie and Leah, processing what sparked for us and what we’re taking back into the treatment room.
Listen now to discover:
- Learning through touch (3:21)
- Finding healthy baselines (7:40)
- The importance of staying flexible in assessments (13:16)
- Tools for oral function (15:15)
“ These are all things that I feel like I’ve intuitively sensed about babies, but now I have vocabulary for it, I have a deeper understanding for it.”
— Annie Frisbie
Links and Resources
- Subscribe to the Deeper Dive Membership: https://learn.paperlesslactation.com/subscription/deeper-dive-membership
- Have an idea for a podcast episode or a Deeper Dive? Let us know! https://learn.paperlesslactation.com/form/collaborate
- Catherine Watson Genna’s book: Supporting Sucking Skills in Breastfeeding Infants, 3rd ed. — the foundational text for much of what Cathy teaches
- “Inside the Interstitium, the Human Body’s Hidden Pathways” — New York Times, May 11, 2026 (gift article — no paywall)
- Langevin & Yandow (2002): Acupuncture points and the connective tissue network — original fascia-meridian mapping study
Infant Assessment Tools Annie Uses
- AOMT (Academy of Orofacial Myofunctional Therapy) — Martinelli Oral Assessment Tool
- Srinivasan, Dobrich, Mitnick & Feldman (2006): Frenotomy Decision Rule — Breastfeeding Medicine
- TABBY (Tongue-tie And Breastfed BabY): Ingram et al., International Breastfeeding Journal, 2019
Craniosacral Therapy Training
- Beames CST Foundations Course — Meaghan Beames, RMT (virtual, 4 weeks, eligible for CERPs)
IBCLC Recertification
Highlights:
3:21 – Learning through touch
7:40 – Finding healthy baselines
10:16 – Being present in every visit
13:16 – The importance of staying flexible in assessments
15:15 – Tools for oral function
17:26 – Always be willing to learn
About Us
Leah Jolly is a private practice IBCLC with Bay Area Breastfeeding in Houston, Texas. Annie Frisbie is a private practice IBCLC serving Queens and Brooklyn in New York City, and the creator of Paperless Lactation.
The Lactation Business Coaching podcast is produced by us and edited by Jillian Grover, who also writes our show notes. Our theme song is by Silas Wade.
