@RidingMyBike Yours is one of the more measured voices on here and I often think that women who have fed their child/ren by both methods are the best placed to weigh in on the subject, as no particular axe to grind (although I'm forced to clarify by this I mean used both methods either exclusively or mixed for an extended period, because as has been established most women breastfeed for a short length of time and then transfer to ff, so those women would usually only have encountered the negative side and have a strong bias against.).
I wasn't much of a 'true believer' before having my baby; more of an "I'll try my best but if it doesn't work out, hey ho" sort of person. My sister had bf both her kids to a year with no formula, and so I wanted to try and knew it was possible (i think lack of a positive example in their own circle is a massive disadvantage to a lot of women). She had struggled hugely with her first with pain and nipple damage due to tonuge tie (although I had no real idea how much until I had my own problems with same, as she had played it down a bit at the time - she's a legendary tough cookie who hates to struggle publicly), so I knew it wouldn't necessarily be a walk in the park either. Had no idea it would hurt so much at first or be so all consuming; how exhaustingly tired I would be; how stressful it would be being the only one who could feed my child, all that responsibility. But subsequent to my birth it meant SO much to me to have that experience, for my body to do what it was supposed to do at least on this one point. Without it, I honestly think I would have spiralled headfirst into PND and PTSD; with bf to hang onto, with something only I could do for her, I was able to cope and move forward. My anxiety wasn't hopeless, it was active; learning everything about bf and doing everything I could to get it right helped me over that dreadful feeling the failed induction and c-section gave me of being, essentially, an unnecessary and dysfunctional inconvenience to the whole birth/motherhood thing.
We really hit our stride only after about 6 months(!), and tbh for at least the last 2 I've been ready to stop, as feeding a toddler can be quite silly and uncomfortable, but it's a two way thing and she's not ready yet so unless it becomes unbearable to me we'll just crack on with it for now, with some adjustments. So I had nearly a year of really actually enjoying breastfeeding.
The only major downside I found was that bf made it much harder to diagnose my daughter's CMPA. If she'd been on formula she'd have been spewing like The Exorcist and I'd have worked it out much sooner; as it is she was just very angry for much of her infancy and possetted until over 8 months, which is pretty unusual. I only finally cottoned on and went dairy free at nearly one year old. She's so much happier and less bloated. So if I have a regret about bf, it's that - she might have been an much happier little baby if I'd sussed earlier on she was allergic; although having said that, I would then have had to shell out fortunes for goat's/non-dairy formula, and would inevitably worried about whether she was getting everything she needed from that. So swings and roundabouts really.
No real point to this, but I just wish we could all tell our stories and have our reasons without jumping down each other's throats.