Breast milk is the best thing for your baby...

[Starwhisperer]

Please hear me out on this one.

I know that advertising regulations are in line with the WHO advice that breast milk is the best thing for a baby until at least 6 months of age.

My issue is with the specifics in what we see and read as soon to be and new mothers.

I combi fed my first child for 18m as my supply never seemed to be where I needed it to be. The first 2 months were a hellish cycle of pumping and formula milk. I firmly believe the failure to feed as I'd wanted led to my PND. I met other mothers struggling at the time who felt the same way and there has been research done which has confirmed this.

Everytime I formula fed my baby there in front of me was the message "breast milk is the best thing for your baby". Am I being unreasonable to think that this would do more harm than good. I know it made me feel rotten. I'd have thought that by the time a mother is preparing and giving formula feeds it's generally too late to be converted to the idea of BFing. The message is either going to women entirely happy with their decision to FF or women like me who see it as a kick in the teeth because they tried their hardest and didn't get the hang of it.

I feel that instead more effort should be put in before birth to get the facts out there, all i had was ony little leaflet with no opportunity promoted to ask aboit tjings in more detail. Perhaps a blanket ban on formula advertising. They use babies as close to 6m as possible for the pictures which does far more in the way of promoting FF than a little message promoting BF on a box.

Perhaps I'm getting my knickers in a twist over nothing bit I feel the formula manufacturers are doing way more harm than good here.

I completely believe that the breast is best message can contribute to PND. On two separate occasions I’ve witnessed the distress of two friends, one who couldn’t BF and one who chose not to, by midwives pushing the message. These were strong resilient women, I’d hate to think about the effect on a more vulnerable mother.

If I had children I wouldn’t be able to breastfeed and I would hate it.

As a previous poster said, it's really no more pointless/ emotive than the labels telling you not to drink more than X units or not to smoke etc

So you think that formula milk is comparable to alcohol and cigarettes?

Bubble - I was giving my point of view from a more sensitive place than women who really don't care about it. I guess you don't think it is harmful but I wonder if you think it manages to do any real.good?

The reality is a label shouldn't damage you to the point you say it being there caused PND.

The OP is telling you that it contributed. You can't just shout her down and tell her you know better.

It comes up time and time again that the message breast is best makes women who wanted to breast feed and couldn't feel bad about themselves. It's important to listen to these women, not minimise what they are saying.

If I'd EBFd DD2 she'd have starved to death. No HCP believed me that she fell asleep on the breast after 5 minutes, no amount of foot stroking would keep her awake, then she'd wake up 10 minutes later for another feed. I think she had an extremely weak suck, and was exhausted. At 4 months the HV suggested mixed feeding she gave up the breast apart from at bedtime, and then only until 8 months. I've never been able to express.

Those follow on milk adverts on TV still make me angry, they made me cry at the time.

Laurie you've misunderstood. What I'm saying is the really interesting thing to discuss here is why women are in a situation where when they don't breastfeed they can become traumatised- to the point where it contributes to a mental illness- by a food label. That's what we should be exploring.

I'm not saying OP shouldn't have felt like that.

Chester - it would be unethical as it would involve taking hundreds of babies and rigidly controlling the first 15 years of their life with no regard to them.
You would need breastfed, formula fed and a control group. You'd need to ensure all nutrition, education and exercises are identical. You'd also need to ensure that the environment in which they were raised were identical in terms of religion, rules and experiences in everything from reading to number of siblings and education level of parents.
All studies done so far, suggest that it is environmental differences rather than breast or formula that impact children so in order to comprehensively study, you would need to remove all other differences.

Bottle feed both of mine the thought of breast feeding turned my stomach over and anyone who had a go at me got a mouth full i saw my mothers nipples when i was young and they were huge from bf and they made me feel sick

Words are powerful bubble and actually part of the problem with the 'breast is best' slogan is that it is an amazing piece of marketing, targeted at very vulnerable people.

Until we start taking new mother's mental health seriously and looking at the implications of setting them up to fail, then we aren't going to get far with this. Perhaps we're on the same page, I'm not quite sure from what you posted.

But don't underestimate language. A label can be incredibly emotive.

Breast milk is definitely the best food for a baby. But being fed with formula is clearly better than going hungry and no mother should feel guilty for using it. But for most mothers, br feeding should be the first choice.

And the message needs to be out there that it is a skill, it can be difficult to learn and needs practice, milk needs time to come in after birth, baby will not starve during the wait, feeding is likely to involve pain at first, more milk is produced by more feeding, the whole thing needs support from family and sometimes from a professional to get the latch right.

I think one of the problems is a lack of breastfeeding mums in public view. In Scandinavia every time you encounter a coffee shop/doctor’s waiting room/park bench you can guarantee seeing feeding mothers.

In the UK we seem to make br feeding complicated. We constantly have stories in the press about br feeding mothers told to cover up or leave a restaurant/hotel/shop because someone else objects to them being there. Children grow up without ever seeing a relative or neighbour br feeding. They are largely absent in films and TV too.

What I'm saying is the really interesting thing to discuss here is why women are in a situation where when they don't breastfeed they can become traumatised- to the point where it contributes to a mental illness- by a food label. That's what we should be exploring

Right-ho. So see it from the perspective of a woman with a 2-month old baby who makes the mistake of clicking on this thread. She's just given birth and is knackered so is more prone to emotion/ depression than usual. She is upset about breastfeeding not working out and doesn't like feeding her baby formula particularly because she wants to do the best thing.

She reads someone saying that having a health warning on the side of the tin of formula 'is no more counter-productive than cigarettes and alcohol'. Now think - how would you feel if you were her?

The messaging was very upsetting for me. I always intended to breastfeed and I couldn’t do it. My baby just didn’t feed and was given formula in the hospital as her weight loss was too rapid. We carried on trying but just couldn’t make it work. Each failed feed made me cry and I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t do it.

The messaging on the boxes just reminded me of my ‘failure’ and was very triggering for a long time. Despite the fact we were all a lot happier when we switched, I hated the messaging, the restrictions on buying formula and the constant ‘breast is beast’ messaging I had to sift through whenever I needed information or advice. It still makes me angry now. Once I had stopped I couldn’t revserse that decision so those messages served no purpose other than to make me feel crap. I believe there are a segment of women like me who are just seen as ‘collateral damage’. Before my baby was born the HV said my area had high levels of PND and she believed one of the contributing factors was a sense of failure from my managing to meet expectations of birth and feeding.

It's not really about the label, it's about why breastfeeding is bringing out such emotion that women are becoming ill from it.

The wording on formula tins is because of legislation. WHO guidance, probably.

My disability means I can’t go to the gym. Do we ban adverts that encourage exercise to make people like me feel better?

You're probably right OP, there's no point putting anything on formula packaging about breastfeeding. We have a formula feeding culture and the attempts to push breastfeeding just upset the majority who have either chosen to formula feed or who have moved over to formula feeding. Any available NHS/govt money, of which there's presumably very little, should be spent entirely on breastfeeding support for those women that need it.

it's about why breastfeeding is bringing out such emotion that women are becoming ill from it

You see I don't think it is just about breastfeeding. I think that as a society we like to have a go at women with babies whatever they do. So:

• FF=Bad mother you should be breasfeeding
• BF=Exhibitionist/ Stay indoors
• Mummy tummy - get down that gym and get rid of it
• Go for a coffee - keep that baby quiet we mustn't inconvenience anyone/ take up too much room
• Claim tax credits - why are you a SAHM get out there and support your family
• WOHM - why bother having a baby if you'd rather work

And the list I'm sure could easily become longer.

Until women stand up for each other against all this crap, rather than bickering over perfectly reasonable choices at each other the rates of BF won't go up and women forced to FF will continue to feel shit about it.

This post spoke to me so much! I'm currently at the 2 month mark and feeling my lowest, trying everything I can to make it work. Seeing my lactation consultant next week, started using fenugreek today. Drinking water/pumping round the clock and feeling totally disheartened. I'm mixed feeding too and yep that little message sure kicks you when you're down.

it's about why breastfeeding is bringing out such emotion that women are becoming ill from it.

I don't think that's rocket science.

You're at your most vulnerable and hormonal. You have the enormous responsibility of keeping a newborn baby alive and well. Being a good mother is hugely important to you and you desperately want to do your best in every way.

Feeding comes very early on in the parenting journey and there's not much else going on if your baby is otherwise healthy. Society is clear as a bell about what you 'should' be doing from a feeding pov. You try your best and it really hurts to 'fail'.

Later you realise it's not nearly as important as you thought, but its tough to find that perspective in the early days.

I had twins, they were prem and in nicu for 10 weeks and what with all the stress and trauma of their early arrival and subsequent health problems, my milk never came in properly, despite lots of pumping. So I had to ff. Not everyone can bf for various reasons.

Woah increasingly amen to that!!

Molly - babies do sometimes starve waiting for milk to come in. Or they get severely dehydrated. Or have low blood sugar.

Secondly I find it almost unbelievable that if we accept everything you said (that it's painful, might leave babies hungry for days etc.) that you would recommend it as the best method of infant feeding.

Does the mother not count at all? Is women's pain just inconsequential?

Yes agreed middleaged

Later you realise it's not nearly as important as you thought, but its tough to find that perspective in the early days.

^^This really is the case hollowtree

The best thing for any baby is a happy mother (in the context of feeding anyway!). If you can BF, great. If you can't or don't want to, we live in a world with safe healthy alternatives.

I BF until DD was 16 months. My friend FF from birth. There's no way on god's green earth that anyone could tell which child was which now they are 2!