to ask does Breastfeeding need promoting?

[mummamizz]

It's a bit of a follow on from the thread about the controversial "apple dumplings" Anyone who wants to watch it it's here

If your answer is yes Why? How would you personally do it? What message would you want to get across? Do you think advertising would make a difference?

"I actually agree with pingu. I think the majority of mothers do find feeding with formula easier. That's why I fed my 2nd and 3rd this way from birth."

Have you ever experienced normal breastfeeding? Or breastfeeding past the first few weeks?

Those of us who have will almost always say that bf is easier.

"Fair play to those who did find breastfeeding easy and convenient but I think many people don't."

There's lots of things that aren't easy or convenient about being a parent. I find cooking decent food for my older children tiresome, but it still has to be done doesn't it? I suppose it comes down to how important you feel it is for your kids to have fresh food. That applies to breastfeeding too........

I agree soverylucky, but the point this comes back to is we don't need promotion we need support systems in place.

The best way to promote/normalise breastfeeding is to have more women breastfeeding. More women will breastfeed for longer if:

• latch/positioning issues are ironed out asap
• tongue ties are diagnosed and snipped quickly
• mastitis and thrush are diagnosed and treated quickly
• women know what to expect and what is normal newborn behaviour
• HCPs are better educated so they have something beyond top up with formula/persevere through the pain to offer to mother's who are struggling

Fewer women would find breastfeeding such a negative experience if there are the resources available to help them instead or undermining them.

spudulika no I only breastfed for 3 weeks. And found it extremely difficult and painful. I didn't think it was worthwhile to go through that again for some small potential health benefits . In answer to feeding older children, I don't feel the need to spend hours cooking a spaghetti bolognaise eg from scratch. I buy mincemeat and a jar of cooking sauce. They are all perfectly healthy.
Still if you feel the need to do things that you find tiresome, go right ahead.

Spudulika, that's more than a little harsh and exactly the kind of attitude that pisses women off. The idea that you just need to knuckle down and somehow get through those first few weeks: it's hard but only the weak give up kind of thing. Not what new mothers need IMO.

i BF DD for around 3 months but am formula feeding DS when he comes. the idea of BF DS has come to me the further on i get but i suffered mild PND with DD and partly blame BF for this. i felt smothered by her constant need to be at me after the first 3 weeks plus the lack of places to BF whilst out and ppls cats bum judgey faces. luckily my MW understands this and hasnt pushed me into it as my last one did. i had plenty of help with BF whilst PG and after birth and in those 3 months i was doing it but when i effectively gave up i was still supported and made to feel if it was right for me then it was right for DD. in my town shops bars restraunts etc that encourage BF on the premises have a poster in the window so that BF mothers know that there are places they are 'welcome' so to speak.

"spudulika no I only breastfed for 3 weeks. And found it extremely difficult and painful. I didn't think it was worthwhile to go through that again for some small potential health benefits ~"

So if you've never experienced normal breastfeeding how do you know it's more difficult than formula feeding?

"In answer to feeding older children, I don't feel the need to spend hours cooking a spaghetti bolognaise eg from scratch. I buy mincemeat and a jar of cooking sauce. They are all perfectly healthy.
Still if you feel the need to do things that you find tiresome, go right ahead."

Well - it's a quality of life issue isn't it? I don't always cook from scratch, but food is one of life's great pleasures and I'd like my children to sit down on a regular basis to something that tastes really lovely at home.

I think babies have the right to an optimal quality of life - and milk is their sole food. Don't see why they should be the only sector of society it's deemed OK to feed entirely on a freeze-dried, processed, reconstituted product. We wouldn't do this lightly to any other group, no matter how much of a faff it was to feed them (and there's probably plenty of adults out their looking after senile/very ill relatives who are difficult to feed who might find the idea of a fully liquid, processed diet highly convenient.....)

RE: 'small potential health benefits' - If you're not convinced by the evidence that breastfeeding can actually have very significant health benefits for some children, including reducing their risk of dying from SIDS, then it's understandible you wouldn't bother with it if it became difficult. What sort of research did you do that gave you the confidence to make such a potentially important and irrevocable decision for your children?

Soverylucky - if 'it's more convenient for me' is seen as a perfectly reasonable and acceptable justification for ff, then 'I don't like the idea of my baby being fed solely on food which isn't fresh' is a perfectly reasonable justification for not wanting to do it for my children and wishing fewer other people did it for theirs too.

I would agree with what someone earlier said about the promotion maybe not being so crucial as the support. I ff my DD1 after a couple of weeks of trying bfeeding and not feeling I had enough milk - screaming baby, crying mother and severe baby blues not shifting (felt PND was creeping in). I had trouble getting the support I needed when I needed it, either from NHS or NCT helpline. When you have a screaming baby you need help right NOW not an appointment in a week's time, or to leave a message.

Using formula was definitely the best thing for me at that time as I think that mental health is very precious and you need to do what you have to do to maintain it and not slip off the edge of that precipice! I did feel a failure for a while and embarrassed about formula feeding a small baby in public but this was only because of worrying what everyone else would think - made worse by the 'promotion' and having to explain to multiple health professionals how I was feeding my baby and why.

I'm not exactly sure why, but looking at all the posters up when I've been to antenatal appointments for this pregnancy does stir something up in me and make me feel really annoyed/resentful. I think it's because they're a bit cheezy and patronizing somehow? And maybe just add to the issue of raising people's expectations that it will all be really easy peasy when that is often not the reality. Also that maybe there are other issues just as important - there were loads of posters up about feeding and none about post natal depression or baby blues. My personal favourite bfeeding poster at our hospital is the one with the two happy laughing mother's bfeeding with one saying how bfeeding uses up so many calories and has helped her get back into shape. Not sure why that irritates me so much - maybe someone else can analyse that for me? (btw I did not have particular issues getting 'back in shape' compared to anyone I knew that bfed!)

also one of my friends wanted to BF her DS and tried and tried for 5 weeks but couldnt do it, in those 5 weeks she felt a failure every FF she had to give him but she soon realised it wasnt her he was rejecting as he used to take 2 hrs to take a 4 oz bottle then almost 2 hrs to wind then it was time to start again.once she took the pressure of herself to be 'the perfect mum' she was able to relax and help her DS with his FF and by the time he was around 4/5 months he finally took properly.

People in comas are tube fed formula - it was SMA when DD3 was in a coma.

" it's hard but only the weak give up kind of thing"

Didn't say that.

People give up for all sorts of reasons. Some people give up because they're not convinced that there's any real value for them or their baby in continuing - especially if it's a struggle. Like fatlazymamma. I think a lot of people fall into this camp. A lot.

"People in comas are tube fed formula"

If you CAN'T eat normal food then you have to have synthetic nutrition. Obviously.

But this doesn't apply to babies. They can have fresh food. If their mothers are willing and able to feed them.

Luna - scbu's hold limited amounts of donated milk and afaik this is given to premature babies, as solely formula increases the risk of necrotising enterocolitis, which is often fatal.

spudulika I didn't do any research. I read the info I was given by the NHS. I didn't know it was neccesary to research before having a baby? Perhaps I'm just one of the majority that doesn't research, just gets one with having one.
And still raises children that are 100% healthy and still manage to be reasonably happy myself. Without dreading every feed, or starting to hate my baby being awake.
And the 'reconstituted freeze dried product' i8s made so to be safe for babies.

"You should be thankful that bf worked out for you so brilliantly"

Well - it did eventually with my first. After 3 weeks of scabby nipples and engorged breasts.

"to the many women who ff after very careful consideration because it is what is best for them and their family"

Do you ever ask yourself what it is about life in the UK that so many more of our mothers here find ff 'best for their family' compared to women in other EC countries? And that there are HUGE variations in the numbers making this decision according to social class and education?

It's really not just down to individual mums doing what's best. Women's expectations about feeding and their experiences of it are more affected by where they're born and how long they stayed at school than what's going on in their immediate family.

If this wasn't the case you'd find similar rates of bf fall out across the social spectrum. And you don't. Educated, mature women are vastly more likely to stick out breastfeeding than young and uneducated women. There's got to be an explanation for that that goes WAAAY beyond the personal.

"Sterilising and making up bottles isn't a 'faff' at all. Sitting on the settee all evening without a bra on, crusty bleeding nipples and a baby that doesn't settle for more than 1/2 hour is."

This is not an accurate representation of breastfeeding.

It may be what you experienced in your short time but that's not the same.

"I didn't know it was neccesary to research before having a baby?"

If someone came along with a sachet of a synthetic nutritional food tomorrow and said you could replace all your children's meals with this one product, wouldn't you like to know about how it was made? What research had been done to show it was completely safe in the long term? Particularly if it contained novel ingredients that hadn't been consumed by large numbers children before and had only been tested on very small groups?

I suspect people do more research into buying a buggy or a cot than choosing their children's sole diet for the first year of life.

"And still raises children that are 100% healthy"

Possibly. I suppose you'd have been more concerned about having to use it if you'd believed NHS information about the higher incidence of illness in ff babies.

Oh, she wasn't SCBU, she was in PICU in Great Ormond Street with meningococcal septicaemia. After we'd tube fed her a couple of times, we chatted with the nurse and she told us that even adults were tubefed the SMA.

With all due respect, other EC countries might have vastly different community styles, lifestyles and maternity arrangements, which would have an impact on feeding styles.

But it is not for anyone to say that they did it best and the other way is basically for lazy, uncaring mothers.

'No. Not if we banned ALL formula advertising. The mums clubs, the free cuddly cows, the ads for follow-on, the free samples, all of it. And then we could stop spending so much on breastfeeding promotion and start spending more on breastfeeding support.

But until this happens and until we start seeing vastly more public breastfeeding, promotion is the one way to keep it in the public eye.'

exactly, EXACTLY!

Faff-wise, I forght for perhaps 3 weeks with my first to establish breastfeeding. After that it was completely faff free. I had his food with me, free, ready to feed at the correct mix and the right temperature. What could be simpler than that?

When it works well bf-ing is fabulous. When it doesn't it's crap. Mothers who want to do it should be offered all the help, support and encouragement they need to succeed.

Formula undoubtedly saves lives and sanity but the choice should be an informed one and the benefits of breastfeeding should not be belittled to justify that choice.

Do I care how you fed your baby? Not a jot.
Do I care about misinformation and misrepresentation of breastfeeding and proper support? Yes

Exactly Soupdragon :)

People ( adults ) who are tube fed have a special adult total nutrition. Not SMA.

When My DC were tube fed they had breastmilk. Neither of them ever had formula, though DD did have donated EBM for a bit as the support on the SCBU she was on was so appalling I couldn't manage to pump enough to feed her myself.

The absolute best thing for ill children is breastmilk.

Formula is at the bottom on the list of a the best thing to feed a i'l child.