in thinking breastfeeding needn't mean martyring yourself?

[kentishgirl]

Hi - sorry to start yet another bf thread, and I realise this might be contentious, but so many of the bf threads on here make me look like . I realise I'm probably a bit out of date with current thinking on all this, but bf sounds like so much hard work these days...and a little bit of me thinks some bf mums kind of enjoy being a martyr and it's competitive about how hard and such a sacrifice etc etc. This is not about mums who find it physically difficult or impossible to bf.

I bf in the 80s for 11 months. Babe had the odd bottle of formula if I wasn't around.

What puzzles me a bit is this stuff, that I read about on here a lot. Is this the reality now of bfing for everyone/most mums, or is this a minority who just talk about it a lot?

Cluster feeding - having a baby whacked on to you nearly non stop for weeks. Er...this wasn't 'a thing' when I bf. Sometimes babies were hungrier than other times. But no one sat there constantly bfing. Feeding on demand was a thing - but flexibly and not to the exclusion of being able to live a normal life. It just meant it wasn't feeding strictly to the clock. You expected to feed roughly every 2/3 hours within a couple of weeks once feeding was established.

If a baby cried, then it wasn't assumed to be hunger. You'd think 'well I only fed him half an hour ago', check nappy, play, distract, give water, is baby tired etc. It was accepted that there are times that babies just plain old cry. It's an easy solution to pop them on the breast, but it wasn't seen as their really needing a feed.

Longer and bigger bfs - it sounds like babies are on and off the breast all the time for a few mouthfuls these days. We used to do a good feed, if baby started nodding off or losing interest, you'd tap their cheek/stimulate them to get them feeding again. So you'd have a more 'normal' spacing between feeds, they didn't on the whole get hungry again a short time later.

Is it just me, or just the threads I read, that make it sound like every time a bf baby squeaks these days it's straight on to the breast, and there are women who literally have no life of their own or time of their own for months on end, because of this? And isn't this awfully off-putting to new mums about starting to breastfeed?

I know more mums start breastfeeding these days, and that's great. But so many drop out and switch to formula instead, whereas I think in the past, a higher proportion of those who started breastfeeding, continued with it. Is the new 'baby led' attitude to bf a bit of a double edged sword because of this? More try, but it's harder, so more have to give up?

I'm bf ds2 (3 weeks old) and think he'd be attached permanently if he could. He gets very cross at times.

Well they don't breastfeed in that way because mums don't want them to do it!

I think very frequent nursing is probably the evolutionary norm though - probably what babies would do if they were carried a lot and had free access to the breast. This is an interesting study: here

Apparently the babies of this hunter-gatherer tribe who were carried constantly, fed every 15 minutes for most of the day.

I do think now that there seems to be so much pressure on mums to join in with like minded groups so to confirm with these groups they must at all costs stick to the mantra.

The trouble is babies don't belong in groups they are individuals so some will love cuddles and slings while others hate them.

Some will love co sleeping and others like the coolness and peace of a cot.

I had my first babies in my twenties( late 80s) and my last ones ( 2000).

The average she for first time mothers was much higher with the later ones and I have to say the approach if some of the mothers with pfb in their 40s was similar up approaching a new career or a complicated plan. They enthusiastically joined groups like AP and grimly stuck to the mantra even if it wasn't suiting them it their baby.

Put it his way in my 20s at baby groups yes we chatted about weaning etc but other things too. The groups I attended in my 30s were far more focused on parenting methods and ideologies and to be honest terminally boring.

Things have changed.

I followed the recommended schedule on the tin of milk, and it suited all my babies. I wasn't rigid about it though, if they wanted feeding earlier then I wouldn't make them wait, or wake them up on the hour to give them a bottle. They did all settle into that routine really quickly without getting upset, and it was relatively easy for me as well. I would do the same if I was having a baby now.
I would never advise anyone else to do it my way though, unless they asked me for my opinion.

I was having a conversation with a lovely mum of 4 on Sunday. Her girls are in their 20s and 30s and one is pregnant. We discussed bf and she expressed her concern about the lack of education and support available near where her daughter lives (about 4 hours drive from us), and that she would have to go and stay to teach her how to bf. I agreed that a high proportion of women I know had problems. She said "oh, I thought it was just me".
It's not new, but people talk more. And people have different expectations because we no longer live in proper communities where we see other women bf.
If bf is so easy why do so many women have to stop?

Isn't it possibly more the case that now new parents are bombarded with advice and in particular gadgets/equipment that apparently they 'can't live without'. This isn't just in relation to feeding - where there are more types of bottle, steriliser, formula etc than you can shake a stick at. (FF so closer to all the kit though from Mini's post clearly you can buy a load of stuff for breastfeeding too). But also hundreds of different types of baby monitors (audio/video/movement), prams/pushchairs/travel systems (parent or forward facing) car seats (forward facing or erf). It's addling!!

And all the books and advice and kit make it all seem more complicated than it actually is. Perhaps in the 80s when there were less options, fewer forums , it just felt simpler.

Yes agree with that post LittleBearPad

I think there is more anxiety because more people want to do it and ascribe more emotional importance onto their decision to do it, but although the support is better now than in the 80s, the practical support is all to often still not easily available.

The result of this is both that breastfeeding rates are much higher, on average, more mums initiate and they do it for longer, but also that there is a higher importance ascribed to it which causes more anxiety. You could say the same about car seats - that parents worry about getting the right one, there are threads once a week saying "Should I take out a second mortgage to fund this super duper extra safe car seat?", people angst over taking even a short unplanned trip without a car seat, they are stuck in the house because their car seat won't fit in another car, etc. In the 80s you didn't even always have seatbelts in the back. But I don't think anybody would say this is a bad thing, because the level of safety has increased and far fewer children die in car accidents. The problem with breastfeeding is that it's not something you do once (buying the car seat) and then don't worry about it, it's an ongoing process and if you feel it is important then you don't want to just switch to formula if it's not going well, you need support.

Certainly, the mums I know who weren't as bothered about BFing or not tended on average to switch to formula early, rather than deal with any kind of hassle about keeping BF going. Which is fine, of course. That's their decision and perfectly valid it is too. (And some of course have an easy time when they don't mind either way and that's just luck.) But the mums I know who were quite emotionally invested in the idea of breastfeeding, if and when they came up against problems, on average they tended to seek out support with these problems, and if they were successful with finding support, then usually the problems were solved and they continued with the vast majority of their BF time being problem free, it's just that the problems occurred in the very visible earlier part of breastfeeding.

(Data from infant feeding survey which happens every 5 years since 1975)
67% initiated bf in 1980 (England and Wales)
82% initiated bf in 2010 (England and Wales)

The bigger shift was in Scotland - 50% in 1980, 74% in 2010. (There are no figures for NI)

Earliest data from whole UK is 1990, 62% in 1990 to 81% in 2010.

The dates for how long women breastfeed for don't come in until later but starting in 1995 (all of these whole UK):

66% at birth, 56% at one week, 42% at 6 weeks, 21% at 6 months, 14% at 9 months.

In 2010
81% at birth, 69% at one week, 55% at 6 weeks, 34% at 6 months, 23% at 9 months.

When you adjust these for the starting percentage you can see the drop offs are more similar than they look, especially early on but there is still a difference.
In 1990 of the mothers who breastfed at birth:
85% were still bf at 1 week, 64% at 6 weeks, 32% at 6 months and 21% at 9 months.

In 2010 out of the mothers who started:
85% at one week, 68% at 6 weeks, 42% at 6 months and 28% at 9 months.

This is a brilliant article - published in Best of all places! But really good, about the effects of this increased emotional importance but lack of practical help.
www.bestdaily.co.uk/your-life/blog/a592143/the-depressing-truth-behind-mums-unable-to-breastfeed.html

Overall it's a good thing that women are ascribing more importance to breastfeeding, it only becomes a negative thing because of lack of support. I think part of this is a language thing as well - the whole idea that "breast is best" making it seem like something incredible.

Bertie - what are your thoughts about the absolutely massive increase in both sales and marketing of formula in the past 20 years? I think that most people believe that aggressive formula marketing and increased use of formula by mothers comfortably co-exist with increased health promotion of breastfeeding and desire of mothers to breastfeed.

My knowledge of the physiology of lactation suggests to me that ubiquitous formula use and breastfeeding aren't always happy bed-fellows.....

I have to be honest I'm not find bf a breeze in the slightest.

Ds1 ended up FF (on prescription milk due to a dairy allergy) as I didn't make any milk, at all, because of being anaemic and then finding out I had hypothyroidism. So that whole time was stressful, especially with DS being ill.

I'm trying to feed newborn DS2 but I don't find it relaxing or easy, maybe because again my supply isn't enough for him (anaemic again) and I'm having to top him up or try and express. He's hungry all the time, I can bf for an hour and he's still wanting more, then pulls himself on and off getting frustrated. It's relentless, and not easy with an active two year old!

I wish I could just sit and feed and not think about it.

Oh and yes, the ones who were emotionally invested but couldn't find support or the support didn't help tended to have a really hard time of it and take it very badly.

I think there will be a shift back in attitudes and that will also be a good thing but in the meantime we can't afford to see it as less important, we need the importance ascribed to it in order to get in place good practical support, because it is important from a health point of view. This is not forthcoming right now.

Mini I'm against formula marketing, I think it's been shown to be aggressively unethical and they've had far too many chances and should be prevented. Freely (in the sense of non restricted. I know it costs money.) and easily available, yes it should be. Information about the composition, safe practice etc yes should be available and obvious, but advertising is unnecessary. As tiktok said on one of these threads ages ago, when was the last time you saw an advertisement for clothing pegs, and yet you know they are available and how you can buy them, right?

I think fomula use and breastfeeding could easily be happy bedfellows until you put capitalism into it. This is much the same for most issues which affect exclusively women, actually

"I think fomula use and breastfeeding could easily be happy bedfellows"

Even though formula use can and does disturb the process of lactation (which works on a demand and supply mechanism - if the formula is meeting the 'demand', then supply may well be affected).

Past 4 months, 'insufficient milk' is the primary reason given for stopping breastfeeding (according to the DOH Infant Feeding Survey).

Given that over half of all mothers are using formula by the end of the first week, when lactation is still being established, surely this must be having - at a national level - a huge impact on the healthy establishment of normal breastfeeding?

Not read the full thread, but as a new mother I am very painfully aware that cluster feeding is all too real! It doesn't go on for weeks, but there have been a couple of instances when yes, the baby has been attached to me for hours and hours and I think actually mothers know intuitively when their child is crying to be fed. Back in the 80's my mum gave us water to fill us up a bit when we were cluster feeding so in that sense, she didn't experience it as much as mums today who are advised not to give water to breastfed babies.
I think the sense of martyrdom comes probably from the pride a lot of mums get from continuing to bf. I had thrush, mastitis, abscesses etc etc and managed to carry on and get to the point where I love bf and I don't think there's any shame in being proud of myself for that. (I also don't think there's any shame in saying 'I've had enough' and switching to formula.) If that's being a martyr then so be it.
Breastfeeding (in most cases) IS hard, should we not support those mothers who are struggling instead of saying 'well it wasn't like that in my day'?

I also do think that there is a lot of fairly heavy "guidance" out there. For example occassionally someone will indicate online that it was mixed feeding that ultimately saved their sanity."Sounds good" I start to think.

But then will come the plethora of posts warning about nipple confusion. The message is "its a big risk, are you really sure thats the right idea?" And of course no first time mother is sure of anything!

I'm gobsmacked at some of the ages mentioned in here.... Bf until 4 even 5!

I now know where that bitty idea for little Britain came from....

So Gemma, is milk for a baby cow better than milk for a baby human?

"I also do think that there is a lot of fairly heavy "guidance" out there. For example occassionally someone will indicate online that it was mixed feeding that ultimately saved their sanity."Sounds good" I start to think"

But I suspect that for every person who feels that mixed feeding saved their sanity or helped them continue breastfeeding there'll be 5 for whom early supplementation caused ongoing problems which eventually resulted in them packing in breastfeeding earlier than they'd wanted to.

5 years ago 50% of breastfed babies were being given formula in our local hospital within 12 hours of birth.

To me this suggests the need for some pretty robust guidelines.

Oh Gemma, there's no need for that kind of narrow minded and repressed attitude to breastfeeding. Feeding till 4 or 5 years old is extremely normal in many parts of the world. In the UK the NHS suggest that you should continue to breastfeed as long as you want to, and the WHO recommend till 2 years old at least.

It is not weird or strange, and the reference to that stupid term popularised by Little Britain is not something that should be referenced in an adult debate about feeding methods.

Gemma - in evolutionary terms whole generations of humans being reared primarily on animal milk is vastly more 'gob smacking' revolutionary and experimental than by continued breastfeeding of young children, which has been a feature of infancy since we crawled out of the swamps.

You're clearly entitled to feed your kid as you like....

I just think feeding that late is making life harder for yourself. I don't tend to see many children starting school still depending on moms milk or with a bottle.

Your life and your choice I suppose

Hmm, I'm going to wager that you don't see any children starting school depending on Mom's milk. Because there aren't any - not one single one in the whole of the world.

However, some children do still like having breastmilk at that age, and it's not completely unheard of for some children of that age to still enjoy having milk from a baby bottle although people rarely talk about it. It's a comfort thing and something that particular child likes. The horrors!

Yes but mini, that's not what I meant. It's possible to supplement while respecting the way bf works and it's possible for a choice to FF to be respected while supporting another mother to EBF. There's no need for it to be all or nothing. In the current culture it is harmful, yes, but it needn't be.

Okay... So what age if the kid likes it as a supplement does if become unwarranted? 5,10,15,30+?