Listen to R4 now re breastfeeding...

[MrsOlf]

Prof Kramer on re breastfeeding and his review of the research

[WoTmania]

missed it. Was it interesting?

[MrsOlf]

Yes. Prof Kramer was saying that he had been misquoted. He fully supports breastfeeding as it is better for baby and mum than formula, he just thinks some of the information quoted to new mums isn't as sure as health authorities make out and that mums shouldn't be made to feel guilty if they chose not to.

Fair enough, me thinks.

[CatIsSleepy]

think the daily mail will aplogise for misquoting him?
headline : 'So is breast NOT best? Expert claims benefits of breastfeeding have been hugely exaggerated'

somehow i doubt it...

[MrsOlf]

Prof Kramer also said that he fully expected lots more research in the future to find other benefits of BFing.

[OrmIrian]

"that mums shouldn't be made to feel guilty if they chose not to."

But who does that? I mean in terms of health professionals. From my own experiences there was plenty of encouragement to bf but no-one threatening to tar and feather the non-bfers. Should the benefits really be played down to make people feel more comfortable? What is the benefit of that?

[fishie]

did he sound cross at being miscast as mr breastisnnotbest?

and quite orm, it is the other way round ime "why are you starving your baby?"

[jimbobsmummy]

"that mums shouldn't be made to feel guilty if they chose not to."

But who does that?''

Pretty much everyone in my experience.

[HoppityBunny]

I don't think anybody is out to make mums feel guilty for not breastfeeding. It's common knowlodge fact that the breast is best and we can't help that.

[BintOfBohemia]

Surely on the whole people give themselves a hard time about their choices; apart from stupid relatives who have a dig whatever you decide, do people really judge others in real life?

[moondog]

Soooo convenient fr people to accuse others of making them feel 'giolty'. What shite.

[ilovemydogandmrobama]

Who are these people that make others feel guilty Really? Who are they?

Because all I ever got while b/fing from HCPs was hassle for not giving them formula

[moondog]

Exactly Ilove.The HCPs were great around me but got plenty of hassle and criticism from other people . Yet you won't find breastfeeders whingeing about 'peole making me feel guilty for not formula feeding'. Madness.

[BintOfBohemia]

Can you believe some random old woman in Tesco told me my 10m old wasn't sleeping because "obviously my milk wasn't enough for him" and if I gave him formula before bed he'd be fine?

I find it hard to believe people walk up to people in the shops, ask if they're bottle feeding and then lecture them about immune systems/ear infections/whatever.

Am also now getting snide digs off my stepmother. Apparently I need to stop feeding DS (now 11m) because it's weird and he's had enough now.

[moondog]

Oh, tell her to fuck off. i would.
In a nanosecond.

[BintOfBohemia]

That's where I go wrong, I'm far too polite. I may not be next time, and there will be a next time. Sigh...

[ilovemydogandmrobama]

Someone really should do a campaign addressing head on the top 10 Myths of breastfeeding.

Off the top of my head:

1. DC will sleep better
2. Benefits from b/fing stop after 6 months

[tiktok]

Whoa!!!

Hang on a bit.

You do get people trying to 'make' breastfeeding mothers 'feel guilty' for not formula feeding - all the time. And breastfeeding mothers do whinge and moan about it - justifiably.

And mothers do wobble under that pressure.

I have spoken to mothers who share with me that

• their partners/MILs/mothers say they are being 'selfish' for breastfeeding, and if they are feeling vulnerable, they may take that on board and 'feel guilty' that somehow they are not giving other people 'a turn'
  
• they experience others trying to make them feel guilty for not using formula/solids 'because he must be bored with your milk now' and they call a breastfeeding counsellor to see if there might be some truth in it
  
• people try to make them feel guilty for continuing to feed their baby over [insert whatever arbitrary age comes up] because 'you'll spoil him/make him homosexual/still be doing that when he's at school and he'll be bullied'
  
  So I believe the guilt-trippers can come from anywhere, and no one group has the monopoly on them!
  
  However, while I think the guilt formula feeders say they feel comes mainly (not solely) from inside and is at least partly disappoinmtent, life will always throw twattish people at mothers, whatever they do.

[vixen77]

My mil told my daughter (age 11 months, so at least she is old enough to understand lol) 'ooh, you're a big girl - you don't need that any more' last week. What's that all about?! She's been telling me to give her a bottle since she was born. I just smile sweetly and say 'good idea, I'll definitely consider that'. Then completely disregard her 'helpful' advice.
I bf'd my eldest (age 11 - different Dad) til she was 2 and no one (that I remember) ever made such comments.
Some folk are weird esp if they didn't bf themselves. Just feed the baby the way that makes you both happy and everything will be fine. No one else's (apart from your partner's, but they too are bound to want the best for the baby) opinion really matters and you want to look back on this special time and feel that you did the best for your baby and yourself. Whatever that may be.

[ilovemydogandmrobama]

Ah, but it doesn't. Giving them a bottle is not a panacea.

DS was b/f'ed until about 13 months, and always slept badly. After being admitted to hospital and diagnosed with a dairy intolerance, is on hyper allergenic formula (where the atoms in the powder are split by NASA ). Sleep pattern is just the same.

[WoTmania]

I think I'll 'listen again' then later on. My mum showed it to me in the mail saying 'ooooh don't read this it'll make your blood boil'

[hazeyjane]

"Soooo convenient fr people to accuse others of making them feel 'giolty'. What shite."

Well some people did make comments that made me feel bloody awful when b'feeding went wrong for me and I ended up f'feeding, both hcp and friends who just made me feel as though I wasn't trying hard enough. I've also read a few comments on here which are hugely insensitive.

"Yet you won't find breastfeeders whingeing about 'peole making me feel guilty for not formula feeding'. Madness"

That is bollocks! I've heard lots of comments in rl and on here saying just that. Obviously it is wrong to make negative comments about b'feeding, but at least if someone makes a negative comment to you, you know inside that you are doing the best thing for your baby. When i got negative comments I knew that I had not only failed at something i wanted to do for my baby, but that she was also not getting the 'best' (ie breastmilk), but something that is just about adequate.

[oneopinionatedmother]

Jenni Murray disappointed me deeply.

i love her low, sonorous voice and she is an integral part of my life.
but when she said -

'if bottle feeding makes the woman happier after being miserable breastfeeding, surely that makes it better for the child'

which is essentially free advertising for formula companies, i could have screamed.

Let me explain: I have failed in many things in life. Many of these things were worthwhile things.

My degree: a 2:2 - had i tried harder that would have been a more worthwhile 2:1
my career: moving from disaster to disaster.
My social life: TOTAL absence of one!

I feel bad about these failures, not least because the resultant financial malaise does have a negative effect on my family. But this doesn't mean i have to turn around and say 'ah well, a 2:1 is not that great anyway' or indeed 'career success doesn't really make you happy'. Jenni was playing exactly this game, the 'I don't have it so no-one else should' game.

If i heard someone else wasn't enjoying their degree, or job - especially in the first few weeks, I'd tell them to work bloody hard at it, apply themselves so even if they failed...at least they'd know they'd tried. She is doing the exact opposite, being the nations false friend, advising that if you're not happy..instead of persevering and finding a way through it, just ditch it.
That is not the advice you give a good friend.

I see Jenni's position as derived entirely from guilt in what she perceives as her own failure. (she has actually demonstrated this in other related discussions)

Now Jenni is a very successful woman, doing a job I would kill to do - why does she have to feel so bad about not succeeding in just one thing? Why does she blame the pro-breastfeeding lobby, the very people who could have helped her? Why doesn't she get angry with the crap support from the health professionals that (in her words) 'don't give you any help then turn up three days later to give you a state-sponsored slap on the wrist when they're on the bottle'

I have been so incensed by this 'debate' (and indeed by my own experience as a first-time mother trying to establish breastfeeding) that I have been writing a piece entitled 'the case against journalism'..I'll post it when I'm finished for comments before I go live with it as I'd appreciate your thoughts.

[tiktok]

It wasn't Jenni Murray on the programme, OOM. It was Fi Glover. I don't know what Fi Glover's experience of bf is.

[OurLadyOfPerpetualSupper]

No, it was the new one - not Martha Karney - can't remember her name - was married to Adrian Chiles.