to think "Breastfeed if you can" would be a better message

[ringle]

... than "Breast is best".

I say this having start skimmed yet another thread where the OP was driven to post natal depression because of difficulties breast feeding.

PND is far more damaging to babies than formula.

A friend of mine exclusively expressed for her ds and said that a hospital grade pump made all of the difference. You can rent them from (all?)hospitals and from the nct (or at least you can from our local one)

I just bought one of those medula double pumps and going to get some domperidome and see how that goes. Someone today advised me to pump before baby arrives to get flow going sooner. But I’m pretty sure that sets labour off

Urgh, all this advice that just makes it all even more of a faff.

Laurie, that was my experience too. I was in tears with cracked sore nipples latching and unlatching an agitated baby for ages because I’ve been told by every single midwife and consultant that if it hurts I’m not doing it right. As it turned out, the baby was tongue tied. The “support” at the hospital was piss poor and made me feel inadequate to feed my baby.

Don't bother pumping whilst still pregnant. You're unlikely to get much colostrum with a pump anyway (I think the general advice is to hand express colostrum and use syringes as it's such small amounts)and your milk will still take a few days to come in.

No can’t hand express. There simply isn’t the glands or tissue there to produce anything that can be squeezed out. Nothing at all appears for approx 2-3 weeks sadly.

Ven83 it's incredibly frustrating!!!

I think bottles are more of a faff.
My experience with BF, lift jumper unhook bra, baby snuggle. It didn't hurt at all ever. From the word go with any of them!

Same here headofthehive.

From the very first day.
Up with jumper, attach, easy, no faffing, no thinking ahead, didn't even have to get out of bed in the middle of the night.

But then I have never formula fed.

Lucky ladies!

Good for you.

Good for you ladies. I got to a stage where I cried everytime my baby needed feeding as the pain was incredible - breathtakingly painful, read gallstone painful. There comes a stage that you have to give up before you try to hand the baby back.

Someone asked why the NHS/govt promotes BF. Could it be because it is cheaper? Hospitals would have to supply formula. More people would not be able to afford formula so there would be an increased benefit cost??? I didn't know but it is a good question.

Ultimately as mothers most of us try our best to bring up healthy happy children. Let's support each other to do that. We don't shame parents that chose to bring up their children as meat eaters or vegans so why pick on vulnerable new mothers. Who really cares how someone feeds their baby.

I think there is luck involved. I was lucky in that respect, maybe not in others!

I think it costs the NHS more to support a breasfeeding woman.

She is far more likely to need ongoing support for problems.

A lot of this is very negative. I mix fed both mine so I had the pain and the sterilising - do I get a cookie?

Sterilising bottles and making up formula is as easy as making a hot chocolate - even easier if you use ready made or a perfect prep machine. The pp friends will have struggled on flights due to liquid restrictions and having to open and try formula if you try and take it on the plane (as it shouldn’t be open and used for more than two hours) but you can order formula to pick up after security from Boots these days.

Breast feeding is easy too once the you and your baby get the hang of it, this can take time and can be very isolating and frustrating. There are people to help but it’s not clear if they can help with wanting to mix feed or stop or they can only help you persevere with ebf. Personally I’ve never had anyone be negative about me breastfeeding or bottle feeding in public or otherwise.

It’s ridiculous that parents aren’t given more straightforward help with formula feeding safely when that is clearly linked to more hospital admissions. How’s that helping baby health?

But its up to them if they want to BF.

Whatever the nhs guidelines are on supporting mothers of babies in nicu with formula fed babies, i couldn't comment. All i can say is from my own experience, i was shown how to make a bottle, and a box was ticked. The nurses told me they weren't allowed to tell me anything else. There was nobody to ask except Google, which of course was really helpful to my state of mind.

I just wanted to say for anyone reading this thread who is pregnant for the first time, there are lots of positive stories - it’s just such a sensitive topic I suspect people are reluctant to tell them.

My experience was that baby went straight on and spent the first few days more often on than off. It never occurred to me to worry about whether she was getting enough milk (although she definitely wasn’t getting any at first because after a few days my milk came in very noticeably!) or that she was on the breast the whole time. At no point was there any pain and although she didn’t like being put down and screamed blue bloody murder if I tried for the first six months, I just popped her in a sling, fed on demand (enjoying the excuse to stop and smell the roses) and co-slept. It was lovely, easy and felt totally natural. I was very happy. FWIW I am neither Angelina Jolie nor a fat hippy - just an average sort of a person.

Most of the women I know who wanted to bf and didn’t end up doing so, stopped because of problems that were fixable, but felt overwhelming because of exhaustion post-birth and anxiety about the baby. If it hurts, there’s probably something that needs fixing - tongue tie, latch. You’re not doing anything wrong! It isn’t your fault! Just keep pestering people until you find out what the issue is. If someone gives unhelpful advice, bin them and move on. Keep asking for help. Don’t worry about the baby not getting enough milk, or how much the baby is getting unless someone medical expresses concern. Every time the baby wakes up or squeaks, stick the baby on the breast.

Having said all of this and having seen friends really struggle, the MOST important thing is for you to be happy and ok. If you aren’t, how can you look after another person? If breastfeeding is making you really miserable and you’re really struggling, no one in real life will give two shits about how you feed your baby and you shouldn’t feel guilty about prioritising your happiness/ mental health. It’s your life too.

Sending lots of positive unmumsnetty hugs to all mothers and little babies everywhere

@LittleKiwi could have written that post myself word for word. Nice positive one

Awww @Mustang27 - thanks!