Aibu? to be pissed off at this: "The cost and social implications of using an infant milk should be considered when deciding how to feed your baby."

[Selyna]

WTF do Hipp mean by social implications?

Both methods of feeding a baby are acceptable so fuck off with the whole acting like ff is poison! my dd is perfectly fine but i hate this constant making me feel like a failure because i failed to bf although i tried so so hard!

So if your body does not actuall need the extra calories, the cost of BF is negligable

The only way you won't need the calories is if you've stored them all already. To do that you would have had to eat those extra calories and stored them as fat. You'd need about 90,000 calories - about 25 pounds of fat - for 6 months of breastfeeding. Unless you got the 90,000 claories from free food, that will have cost you.

So it comes down to what did you pay for your BF calories vs what does FF cost per calorie. The "better" the calorie is for you, the more it costs. A middle class organic veggie eater will have paid far more for their BF calories than they'd pay for a tin of formula. A crisps, cokes and sweets person will have paid much less for their calories than a tin of formula.

But even a crisps, sweets n coke diet is far from free. So the "BF is Free" statement is total crap.

Stealth cant you see that you are lucky??? I suspect that bottle induced gastroenteritis is likely to be a result of 'life of grime' type kitchens.

do you maybe think the "obsessive bf types" are like that precisely because the area is so anti breastfeeding.
Glad no one is squamish though.
I too live in an area that has one of the lowest bf rates.

'Ban all Formula Marketing'??? whaaat?? is it 1984 or something? think we know our own minds a bit better than that.

Someone made a good point earlier (Molly ?) about the chemicals BF mums may/may not pass on via breastmilk. Are the ingredients really unregulated LadyM? I'd be surprised...

Stealth - I am ebfing right now so no not at all. Its not anti breastfeeding its just people have choices. I dont feel judged at all for bfing everyone is very supportive. Just cause I am doing it though I am not going to lord it over everyone else.

And if a BF'ing mother is ill or has an infection...I wonder, could that be harmful to a baby?

Molly - you do have to ask yourself whether there is something special about the uk that SO MANY women here find bf impossible compared to other countries. And is this a situation you think is tolerable and ought to be defended?

Seriously - the status quo as regards baby feeding is not GOD GIVEN.

FF mothers should be supported in their choice....not made to feel as if they have 2 heads, or be excluded in any way

I'm with shagmund on this one. I bfed for 16 months. It wasn't easy, I had emergency cs under GA, my milk didn't come in immediately so I used milk bank at the hospital. Dd also didn't feed much and breast refused. A lot.
I took one look at the ingredients. Ff is full of rubbish. Plus nutritionists now agree that the calorie count exceeds that of BM, hence the difference in weight of bfed and ffed babies. Have come across loads of mums who can't be bothered or hate bfing, or that their dps stopped them from doing it. I was shocked by what people told me.
HV are targeted by formula industry, their diaries are full of advertising for them.
And I'm appalled that companies make money out of formula feeding babies.

Sausages - babies who are bf gain protection against pathogens in their environment through their mothers milk. Unlike ff babies who are therefore left more vulnerable to infection (hence higher rates of hospital admissions).

I would have taken social implications to mean you can get someone else to feed your child so you can fuck off to the pub without guilt

Oh really!

I know a lot of babies who have been very poorly...in spite of being BF'd

I don't blindly believe statistics.....

Im not defending it I am saying provide all the support that they do but if people choose not to for whatever reason they shouldnt be made to feel their baby is doomed like is made out so frequently on here. I am all for support, I just dont like judgement

Sausages - if a mum has made a decision to ff then she should be fully supported to do it. I agree that it is unkind and futile to undermine her when she has made her choice. I think that you'll struggle to find many people who don't share this view.

Good point about getting someone else to feed your child....

One great thing about FF'ing (for those that do it) is that the feeding experience can be shared. It is very bonding I think!

"brettgirl2 Thu 03-May-12 14:08:19
Stealth cant you see that you are lucky??? I suspect that bottle induced gastroenteritis is likely to be a result of 'life of grime' type kitchens.
"

Yes, I am lucky, and have said so on many past threads.
Are you an epidemiologist, or are you just guessing??

Unlike ff babies who are therefore left more vulnerable to infection (hence higher rates of hospital admissions)

Oh come on, this is just BS. All the studies of supposed BF health benefits in the West are conflated by the economic and educational backgrounds of BF mothers (typically more MC). The most recent research is showing very little difference, and its irrelevant by school entry age - there is absolutely no discernable difference in outcome.

Feed your children how you will - just make sure you feed them - and tell the zealots of any description to fuck off.

"Add message | Report | Message poster sausagesandmarmelade Thu 03-May-12 14:17:57
Oh really!

I know a lot of babies who have been very poorly...in spite of being BF'd

I don't blindly believe statistics.....
"

Do you use statistics at all in decision making? Or do you assume all risks are equal?

This whole BF/FF argument makes me want to scream. Of course ingredients in formula milk are regulated, see here for anyone who wants to read more www.cwt.org.uk/pdfs/infantsmilk_web.pdf.

It may be that BM is (marginally?) better for the baby's immune system than FF, but in some circumstances it is difficult or impossible. For me it was the latter as my children were born through surrogacy so I had no choice but to FF. I have seen friends in my group beat themselves up and put themselves through all sorts of emotional hell because BF was too difficult for them. Why? Why can mums to be supported in making the best decision for them, whatever they choose, instead of feeling guilt tripped or judged.

And personally I don't feel FF brands should need advertising and I don't think the toddler-type milk should be advertised at all as it is not essential to a baby's development at that age.

Whatmeworry, do you believe that these things haven't been taken into account?

Molly - where has anyone implied that a ff baby is 'doomed'? Hyperbole much?

Or is pointing out that ff babies as a group have higher rates of hospital admissions (usually in response to someone posting that there are no health issues worth considering) the same as saying "ff is bad" and "ff babies will all get sick"?

Of course it's bloody not !

Its not about guessing kitchens full of bacteria + incorrectly made up bottles = ill babies.

Mums should be supported in the decisions they have made. Should that support not extend to helping them make their decision based on accurate evidence rather than myth? Or would that in some way be unsupportive?

so if it's not guessing what evidence is it based on?

Sausages - not blindly believing in statistics is a good thing but thinking that anecdotes = data isn't.

Molly - the thing is that people aren't making the chice to use bm or artificial milk in a vacuum and nor are they actually (generally) carefully studying all the available information. There are social pressures too - from previous generations who were advertised at way more aggresively than we are now. You may be less aware of the formula companies advertising as it's a bit more 'subtle' (has to be now) but they have spent ££££££ on it over the years and it has been very sucesful - nearly everyone used to bf and now hardly anyone does.