to think that cunting Cow and Gate with their 'clever' marketing about babies 'needing iron' and funding 'research' have fucked up the last 10 years of improving and supporting breastfeeding?

[AtYourCervix]

1. 3 of the authors of that 'research' are funded by formula milk or baby food companies.

1. physiological third stage anyone?

No, no I did not mean all women feel guilty or should feel guilty or don't feel guilty...it however is a fact that some do!

Oh I give up.

Wasn't the thread originally about follow on milk et being rich in iron and those adverts?

My point with getting the iron from the follow on milk is that it is probably much cheaper to give the child cows milk (if over 12 months) and some vitamin drops than pay loads of money for follow on milk...but perhaps that wasn't the original criticism and I am on the wrong thread...

Er no, Alpine Pony. That's actually quite offensive to breastfeeding mothers and I think you should retract it.

As I have said many many times, my issue is not with the published opinion (not research) - I might even agree - but with the irresponsible way it is being reported. Leading to comments like yours.

Babies cry for many reasons, one is hunger. Mine was waking every 1.5 hours in the night - everybody said she must be hungry. I let her try bits of food when she could pick it up and at 25 weeks I started weaning in earnest. She's now nearly 7 months, having 3 meals a day including protein. Guess what, she still wails like a banshee and still wakes every 1.5 hours in the night.

That was in response to AlpinePony accusing breastfeeding mothers of underfeeding their babies.

I should also have said that nobody, but nobody could say that my DD was underfed. Over the past 7 months she has grown from being a delicate wee thing to a chubby bouncing baby. Underfed? Pah! I don't think I've seen a baby in this country that looks underfed.

Alpine - constantly feeding a baby and building up supply is not starving a baby- it is called persevering and building milk supply. What you say is not true - women who bf and persevere with bf are feeding their babies naturally as the tiny stomach of a baby is designed to take a little milk, stop, then take a little more. It is not designed to take a full bottle of milk...

Please Bertie do not think I am referring to people like you when I talk about the 'no milk' issue - of course I am not talking about people who genuinely have no milk supply. But i have witnessed ladies who, because baby wants to feed a lot ( as is normal for a newborn who is bf) they think they don't have enough milk and look at bottle fed babies who feed differently (every few hours as opposed to the normal cluster feeds that happens with bf) and because this is tiring or hard, they stop and say 'I had no milk'
Surely that takes away from women like yourself
Who had genuine problems and women who bf and persevered with establishing milk supply? It is an untrue statement to make in many cases

I think the majority of guilt over the inability to bf comes from the reactions of other mothers.

When I gave up trying to bf I did so without so much as an ounce of guilt. My baby was hungry, he needed feeding, and I couldn't do it myself and wasn't going to beat myself up or starve him in the process. So I gave him formula and never looked back.

It wasn't until I joined mn that I came up against this concept that women felt guilt over not being able to bf, and the comments from smug, self-righteous women who constantly trotted out the line that not being able to, or in fact choosing not to bf was in some way not doing the best for your baby. Where I was told by a so-called (well respected on here) professional that I must have been mistaken over my claims that I did not produce milk as this is so rare as to be practically unheard of. Where i have seen threads from people expressing their sadness that they saw a mother in a supermarket either with a newborn and a bottle or buying a tin of formula. And the list goes on.

Frankly most of the guilt that non breastfeeding women feel has been inflicted on them by the reactions of some of those women who were fortunate enough to be able to breastfeed.

Obviously the majority of breastfeeding women are not like that, but there is a far too vocal minority that do the image of breastfeeding mothers far more harm than good.

wannabe, my experience was the same as yours. My dd was 5 when i joined MN and as far as I was concerned I had done a perfectly adequate job of raising her. I never ceased to be amazed at how some parents get so worked up and judgey about these things.

I had a ff baby in a creche and became a WOHM. My best friend is a bf SAHM. We have never even DISCUSSED this. Maybe she judges me in secret but I have never felt this to be the case.

www.babyfriendly.org.uk/pdfs/unicef_uk_response_to_BMJ_article_140111.pdf

i found this on the net yesterday - states that 3 of the researchers were linked to formula have twisted an old study to give a different slant. I guess these formula companies will say anything to make money out of new mums.

I just wish the whole debate wasnt so polarised. I dont understand why people seem to think it advisable to have a fixed weaning date that everyone should adhere to. Surely evry baby is an individual. When I had dd 11 years ago the advise was generally 4 months but my health visitor was luckily highly experienced and confident in the advice she gave.
This was invaluable to us as dd had beeen born 10 weeks premature so the debate was from which date did we calculate weaning - actual birth or due date. We went somewhere down the middle after observing how interested dd seemed to be when we were eating. Health visitor advised try her with a teaspoon of baby rice. We did this and dd almost ate the spoon she was so desperate for more. She was clearly ready for soemthing beyond breastfeeding. Apart from a few purchases of baby rice the evil baby food manufacturers didn`t benefit from huge purchases of anything from us. I kept breast feeding for another 6 months.
If people had been berating me for not continuing with exclusive breast-feeding I would have told them to mind their own bloody business.
Dd is one of the healthiest children in her class at school and one of the tallest ( despite being prem). I do not ascribe this to my feeding choices for her in isolation from all the other things which influence these things not least that she has probably inherited a generally healthy disposition from me. What she has not inherited ( which all the self appointed experts thought she would ) are my allergies.

Well I can't speak for others, but I have done formula feeding, mix feeding and breastfeeding. First time round our problems were insurmountable. This time they were nearly insurmountable but my previous experience and MN were enough to pull us through. But even when I had problems myself, I never felt the need to try to convince myself that breastfeeding was not the optimum feeding method, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. It is, however, very very easy to take to heart everything that is said as if it is a personal judgment on one's own situation. I have done this in the past. If b/f hadn't worked out for me this time, no doubt I would still be beating myself up to this day.

wannabe, were you ever tested for Sheehan's syndrome?

The description of no milk after colostrum matches what women with this condition experience.

I don't really remember now, but I always ASSUMED I would bf. I remember thinking about whether to buy a breast pump, and thought I'd leave til after the birth. I cetainly didn't buy any bottles. DH had to go to Tesco to buy them and formula before collecting us from the hospital. The message that breast is best is everywhere when you are having/had a baby.

Personally I wish peope would shut up with the ff guilt thing and spend more time campaigning for more SUPPORT for bf. My dsis, who bf 3 babies, was the ONLY person who tried to help me. And as I had a CS I spent several days in the hospital. When I was home and the HV came, the subject never came up. Dd was gaining weight and a perfectly content baby. I was knackered and fed up with being poked about by people. Did I feel guilty? Hell, no!

And I do remember the advise 7 years ago was that you could start weaning at 4 months if you wanted. I certainly started some baby rice at about that time as I wanted to try it out before I went back to work. I never heard of BLW until I signed up here. Now that is one thing I DO wish I had known about.

advice

Sorry - i referred to Bertie in my last posting but should have said wannabe

Sorry wannabe!

'Personally I wish peope would shut up with the ff guilt thing and spend more time campaigning for more SUPPORT for bf. My dsis, who bf 3 babies, was the ONLY person who tried to help me.'

Very well said.

I think the message that has been put across by a lot of health professionals is definitely do not wean before 4 months but aim for 6...with acceptance of 4 months.

Does that make sense?

There are two separate lots of evidence - the first looking at early weaning as in before 17 weeks which we have a lot more evidence for. The second was for the don't wean until around 6 months.

It all got a bit confused I think in that weaning before 17 weeks was much riskier than weaning between 17 and 26 ish was?

YABU the fact is that many children do need to be weaned before 6 months.
Rearing children is so much more complicated than breast good/bottle bad

Haven't read all the thread.

Less than 1% of all babies are still exclusively breastfed at 6 months.

So all this is a storm in a giant tea-cup.

Re: Cow and Gate and all the other formula manufacturers - you are YANBU to hate the profiteering fuckers.

Canada has this though - formula is by prescription and the majority of women bf

I genuinely do not understand how some women can think it is not important to bf though - how can all the benefits of bf to baby and the reduced risk of cot death, long term health benefits etc not be important? This is a frying question and not meant to offend!