to point out that formula feeding doesn't necessarily require you to be sterilising bottles and scooping out powder in the middle of the night...

[itsakindarabbit]

Keep seeing this on threads which mention ff...how people couldnt be doing with getting up in the night andstsrilising bottles/making up feeds.

I bf and ff but found ff no problem at night - i would take up a carton of ready made formula and a pre sterilised bottle and i could feed without getting out of bed.

And yes, i know ready made formula is expensive and not everyone uses it. But some of us do/did.

Thank you chundrella

Also now labelling myself as a pro-choice fundamentalist

Thanks fliss

i have breast fed all 3 of my kids but only had pnd twice, 1st & 3rd baby (oddly both boys)
anyway i firmly believe that my pnd was triggered/prolonged by months of sleep deprivation. my second child slept really well from 4/5 weeks old. both boys wake/woke every couple of hours. i want to stop breast feeding this baby but every time i try with more than one bottle a day he gets more sickly and windy. resigned myself to the fact i could be breast feeding for some time

Stoic - I take your point.

I don't like the turn 'failure to progress in relation to labour either so probably should use it in relation to bf.

Chunderella - there is a view that BF can sometimes protect women from PND. There is evidence to back this up.

Why, when women are depressed and not breastfeeding is there usually an assumption that feeding choice and method has played no part in her low mood? We know bf mothers have different - physiologically normal - (in terms of the biology of the postnatal period) sleep patterns, patterns and hormonal physiology. Why shouldn't this impact on mood in a positive as well as a negative way?

I think our expectations of what is normal in mothering are now so shaped by bottlefeeding having become the cultural norm that that its no wonder women who breastfeed often struggle with it emotionally.

I personally wouldn't ff unless I had a medical issue that ment I had to but, I cannot bloody understand why in a country where more people ff than bf you cannot get sound good correct advice and support from HCP's about doing so.

Surely its about time to accept that mothers who do chose to ff may need a bit of support or advice about it.

Chunderella I have tried different types of formula and swapped from tommie tippee closer to nature to the anti colic one's and now trying dr browns.
I am desperate to start meds and get more than just 2 hours before being woken up

The breastfeeding rates thing really gets to me. Who gives a FUCK?? As long as mother and baby are happy and well fed why does it matter how they get that way?

Anyway, to answer the OP, we FF and I don't find it too much of a faff. Up until recently we were using the ready made stuff, making up a few bottles of it at a time and warming it, but it's so expensive we've switched to the powder. We switch between making them up from scratch for individual feeds and making up a few at a time. I have a travel steriliser (cost me a tenner) and you can sterilise bottles individually - you just bung it in the microwave for three and a half minutes and it sterilises bottles and keeps them so for three hours. We sterilise the bottle, boil the kettle (with water not previously boiled, not sure why they say that but that's what we do), make it up then slam it in a sink full of cold water. After an hour or so we stick another bottle in the microwave so it's ready for next time. I have a box of powder at my Mum's and one at MIL's so I don't have to cart it round.

I also use the big steriliser and make a job lot up in advance using the same principle but then they go straight in the fridge.

I get up in the night (husband shares night feeds at weekends) take baby downstairs, stick telly on, warm bottle, feed baby then back up to bed. I'm lucky that my little one goes straight back down after feeding and so do I. I prefer to get up and come down because I want to make sure I'm not falling asleep when feeding him because I'm frightened of falling asleep on him and squishing him. I've never BF so I don't know if it's easier but I honestly don't find it a faff at all. Just make sure you remember to put the telly on with enough programmes to last until the end of the feed (teleshopping sucks) :)

Monkey Had written a proper post to you and bloody net went down - grrrrr..

Wanted to say am feeling for you; bloody nightmare situation; also having 2 other DC's to take care of AND meds needed that you can't take yet as BF'ing. Truly, sending you HUGE un-MNy hugs.

Remember FF may take a bit of persevering but there is almost always a solution, just may take a bit of tweaking. And please please PLEASE do NOT let the (however small) fascist BF brigade in ANY way get you down. Childrearing and child-centricity are all in the round, and a wiped Mamma poss ill/getting iller is WAY worse IMHO than BF'ing at any cost. Have found some links below for you which may help with the wind (a lot of it is the angle, the flow speed, the way you hold baby, WHO feeds baby esp. when used just to smell of you/your undoubtedly lush boobies!).

Lastly, DS1 - who DID get colosterum(sp??!) via agonising and slow vile hospital 'pump' (I genuinely felt a cow being milked as I sat at it) was the ONLY one of my 3 who had ANY tummy or immune issues. I KNEW DSs2&3 were going to be FF and was prepped from get-go, and THAT time I was well, no PNI, and well able to ignore nasty and beyond ignorant comments from others. Good luck and hugs x

www.nhs.uk/Conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/Pages/bottle-feeding-advice.aspx#close

www.easybabylife.com/bottle-feeding.html

www.helium.com/items/924237-ways-to-prevent-the-discomfort-of-wind-when-bottle-feeding-your-baby

www.askbaby.com/wind-the-causes.htm

"Who gives a FUCK?? As long as mother and baby are happy and well fed why does it matter how they get that way?"

Those people who care about babies having optimal nutrition.

You can't discuss this subject sensibly if you won't acknowledge that babies who are not breastfed are losing out on the benefits of breastfeeding.

You can't discuss this subject sensibly if you won't acknowledge that babies who are not breastfed are losing out on the benefits of breastfeeding.

Veering a bit into judgypants territory there Shagmond. The 'evidence' often cited is very shaky and doesn't take into account socio-economic factors. For example obesity rates - children raised in socially deprived areas are more likely to be FF and have poorer diets which contain more processed food and saturated fats. This is far more likely to be the cause than the type of milk they were fed for the first 6 months of life.

Let's not find yet another stick to beat FFers with. Formula is perfectly acceptable for babies, as we all should know.

Of course you can Shagmumd. Its just certain bores zealots are unable to do so.

Words like 'losing out' are just more loaded words to try and make people who can't, or choose not to, breastfeed like failures imo.

There may be advantages but it's not proportionate to the guilt trips placed on mothers and mothers to be. It's not like bottlefed babies are dropping like flies or less healthy.

I don't think phrases like pro-breastfeeding or pro-formulafeeding help people either, nor statistics about breastfeeding rates across countries. Women who want to breastfeed should be given every support and encouragement and those who don't should be well informed about the best ways to ff and offered tips like those on here. Women should be were properly informed about both feeding methods rather than the current bombardment of breastfeeding propoganda with no real support after plus being made to feel like shit if you decide not to/can't give your child 'the gift of breastmilk' (or whatever other wanky phrase someone can come up with'. That way breastfeeding mothers would be able access help when they are struggling without feeling bad and bottlefeeding mothers wouldn't feel the need to make excuses.

The ultimate aim is happy, healthy babies with happy healthy mums. How you feed your child, as long as it's safe and appropriate, should not be a cause of unhappiness in either of you.

Of course you can as Shag what a silly argument. Parents make choices daily that don't provide the optimum for many things and are fully entitled to have an opinion and make contributions in discussions.

You know as well as. I do that the science re bf/ff is shite. I bet there isn't a single one of us on this thread that did the same thing. Some will have ebf for 1,2,3,4,5,6 weeks or months,some will have mixed fed,some will have bf then ff for however long.

I wonder who these mothers are that are giving optimum nutrition.Is it the ones that bf exclusively for 2 years but then do they get discounted if not providing a 100% organic veggie diet rich in 10 portions of fruit and veg a day with zero sugar?

Silly,silly,silly.

There are some benefits but the stats are small,the science is crap and often gets challenged with further studies.Those that want to bf should be given the support to do so,all mothers should have be able to me an informed choice which includes the info that making up formula safely is no more of a faff than the 101 other parenting things we do daily.

Oh please. I took up 2 bottles of cooled water and a divider of powder and tipped one into the other, hardly rocket science. BF was just as much faff, couldn't do it lying down go into the spare room and light on to get latched on. Yes, I know the formula rules, which incidently I have never heard of anyone IRL following, but more than happy with the way we did it.

In Shagmund's world bfing mothers should forego their own health for their babies.

It is not helpful to bound into a thread, asking for ff advice, and start spouting off about how wonderful bfing is and how every mother should do it or she's a failure and isn't giving her baby optimal nutrition.

There are quite enough sticks for us to beat ourselves with, thanks.

Just another point. It takes two to bf.

I love how militant some people are on these threads, I'd like to be a fly on the wall of thier homes and see how far they carry this stance in every day life.

I have only skim read but it does make me feel very very sad when people just totally discount the mental and emotional needs that a baby has from its mother aside from all the physical biology.

If it came to saying =- a baby should be BF but the mum cant do it/cope with it/ and will be under immense emotional pressure to actually care for that baby, Id say FF wins hands down?

myrubberduck

"SHag- I dont think that drawing comparisons with 'tradidional' socieities is very helpful. Your argument is like like saying that women in those countries manage without pain relief in chlidbirth so therefore women in the developed world shouldnt 'need' pain relief either"

"Your argument is like like saying that women in those countries manage without pain relief in chlidbirth so therefore women in the developed world shouldnt 'need' pain relief either"

OK - shall we compare women in the UK with women in Norway?

98% are breastfeeding on leaving hospital.

over 60% of them are still exclusively breastfeeding at 3 months.

80% are still breastfeeding at 6 months.

Canada - 55% of babies still breastfeeding at 6 months.

Australia - 57% of babies still breastfeeding at 6 months.

Sweden 67% still breastfeeding at 6 months.

And all of these countries had low breastfeeding rates 20 years ago. In all of these countries formula is freely available.

In 2005 (the last feeding survey) only 25% of six months old babies were still being breastfed in the UK, and most of these are being mixed fed.

It really is VERY shit here. Unusually shit. The experiences of breastfeeding in the UK are NOT representative or normal breastfeeding even in most Western countries.

"If it came to saying =- a baby should be BF but the mum cant do it/cope with it/ and will be under immense emotional pressure to actually care for that baby, Id say FF wins hands down?"

If a mum can't or won't breastfeed a baby still has to be fed. Formula is the only safe way to feed a baby who's mum won't or can't give her own milk. That kind of goes without saying. A mum has a right to not breastfeed, and not be criticised for not doing so. But on a wider stage that doesn't make it wrong for people to raise concerns about how few babies in the UK are being breastfed. Babies are still losing out, and judging from the experience of other Western countries, this really isn't necessary or inevitable. We can change things so that more women choose to feed their babies on their own milk.

God who gives a shit,there are so many other things that many kids miss out on I worry about waaaay more.

And I am so sick of continuously having what mothers in other countries do held up as some kind of example to us all.