To think that "97% of women can breastfeed" is a load of crap

Well I was one of the 3%. My baby was dehydrated and lethargic. The look of relief on his face when he finally got a bottle of formula still makes me feel guilty all these years later.

This is what I struggle with, I hear “my milk didn’t come in” SO often and it simply can’t be true in all the cases I hear it, also, I remember what those early days felt like. When it felt like your baby was getting nothing, I suspect a lot of the women who think their milk didn’t come in actually did it just wasn’t how they were expecting, and that comes down to lack of support (and less community knowledge I guess, I was lucky to be surrounded by BFers who put my mind at rest).

It’s not a narrative it’s the truth. Woman should be told the truth.

That’s interesting, why do you think your community does it less?

Breastfeeding can be incredibly difficult. It isn’t for every woman. This narrative puts many mums to be off even trying.

I worked as a lactation support worker and in my experience a lot of women who wanted to breast feed but think they can’t or that they don’t have enough/any milk to feed their baby . The majority of the time these issues are due to poor latch / struggling with feed on demand. With better support post partum I’m sure many more women would breast feed successfully.

But what does need to stop is the judgement of women whether they breast feed or bottle feed. It’s no one’s business but the parents what they do.

Why? Just because everyone else does?

Of course most women can do it, this is why we have breasts in the first place. Unless your breasts were removed, you can generally physically do it. Of course there are reasons why a woman would choose not to- medication, mental health, just doesn’t want to…

Well I'm a gypsy and I only know one woman from my community who has breast fed. We basically all bottle feed.

There are well known reasons more women need c sections to deliver their babies - age and obesity. There aren’t physiological reasons fewer women in the U.K. can breastfeed so it’s notable so many fewer mums do breastfeed compared with women in other countries. In all countries there will be a small percentage of women who can’t produce milk and babies who struggle to feed. But cultures which normalise feeding - seeing relatives doing all your life etc - have higher rates of breastfeeding. Here you buy a baby doll and it usually comes with a bottle. That’s how formula centric the U.K. is. The default way of feeding a baby is with formula in a bottle, not with human milk from a breast. That’s why women don’t start or stick to it, not because British breasts don’t work the same way as Sri Lankan breasts.

Are you suggesting loads of women physically can’t breastfeed? Why would that be?

This is true. All our continued existence proves is that enough babies got enough breastmilk into them from whatever source to allow enough of us to reach reproductive age. There's actually plenty of theoretical room for varying degrees of lactation failure in there, and we know milk sharing is an ancient custom.

My milk never came in properly and my DS had 90% tongue tie so couldn't latch properly anyway. Spent ages trying to pump and getting very little for my efforts I felt awful about it to. I guess I could technically produce milk but wasn't able to feed my baby.

97% of women do produce milk, that figure was around 25 years ago when I had mine. Of the 3% that don’t they are either due to surgery or extreme preemies typically. Many more women find breastfeeding challenging whether that’s because of lack of support, logistics, need to work etc but if those were solved they technically could feed their babies - my friend was very physically disabled (electric chair, hoist, catheter etc yet breastfed because bottles are far harder!)

if you have chosen not to breastfeed because you didn’t want to or doesn’t fit with your life that is absolutely fine but don’t imply you couldn’t. Even if you have low milk production you can mix feed while building supply. I support right to choose but not the claims so that so many women can’t when it’s actually lifestyle related not biology

Mums with disabilities/medical conditions, babies with disabilities/medical conditions, babies who are born prematurely, mums separated from their babies and mums on medication that means they can't breastfeed.

None of those things (aside from the medication) necessarily prevent breastfeeding. Please stop spouting crap that premature babies can’t be breastfed, they absolutely can with the right support.

If a woman produces milk, they can almost always breastfeed if they want to and are given the right support. I think there absolutely needs to be the message that the overwhelming majority of women can breastfeed if they want to and way more resources pumped into helping them. What would you prefer the message was “you might not be able to so don’t bother trying”?

I had to fight to get support to breastfeed my twins.

A midwife told me I was a bad mother because one of my babies wasn’t feeding well - I was told to switch to formula or I’d be starving the baby.

A lovely Mum at Twins club gave me wonderful advice and I exclusively breastfed both babies for 18 months.

Not everyone can breastfeed, not everyone wants to.

But most women should be able to with the right support. It’s cheaper, it’s easier (once you get the hang of it) and it’s the best food source for the baby.

The UK is dreadful at supporting breastfeeding Mums. As society we should be ashamed.

Breastfeeding is incredibly difficult. I’ve just finished feeding my 3 year old. She self weaned. It has been gruelling and relentless and one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. She also insisted on feeding multiple times a night for most of that time. I did all of this with no help whatsoever from anyone else. She wasn’t interested in a bottle and only wanted me. There is nowhere near enough support for woman to breastfeed successfully and it’s going to take me years to recover from the lack
of sleep and the toll it’s taken on my body. I completely understand why woman don’t even try.

As other people have said, why do you think we have breasts? They have developed to be able to feel the young. Survival of the fittest, the young who aren't fed die. Therefore, I would fully expect the number of women able to breastfeed to be in the 97% region which is proven by the study.

These days there are other routes which some women choose, as is their right.

I suspect better help, guidance & education would be able to increase breast feeding rates. Ultimately if there wasn't another option I suspect 97% of women would find a way to feed their baby. The other babies would die in infancy (or be fed by another mother depending on the issue).

Some women find it painful, difficult etc and want to switch to formulae. That's fine but does it mean they can't feed a baby? No

I couldn't produce milk. Couldn't get more than drops, pumping or feeding.

Baby screaming so much the hospital advised formula lapped from a cup until my milk came in but it never did, despite hours of attempted feeds and nipples so sore they cracked and bled. The midwives said there was nothing wrong with his latch.

I did have low iron and they thought that could compromise my ability to make milk.

In the end we gave a bottle and he went from screaming constantly to a well fed, calm, happy baby who slept through the night from a couple of months old.

I'm not sure how many women there are like me, because I think there is judgement if you cannot breastfeed and a lot of pressure to do so.

I'm not sure this is necessarily true because for most of human history we lived in social groups where both a lot of women would have been lactating and there was a high infant mortality rate, so someone would have been able to feed a child if the mother couldn't.

Yes exactly this

Sad that those doctors said that as NICU babies are the ones who really should be having breastmilk either from their mum or donated.

Which keeps you in the 97% then.

This. If we didn't live in a formula centric society, that vast majority of women would be able to breastfeed. The human race wouldn't have survived otherwise.

Your interpretation of this data seems a bit disingenuous. Approximately 97% of women are able to lactate. Of course women can't breastfeed babies from whom they are separated, of course babies with developmental or physical barriers to breastfeeding can't be fed this way. And so on, as per your opening post. I think you're labouring a point nobody claims to have made.