To ask your opinion on this #WorldBreastfeedingWeek debate

[Napqueen1234]

Sorry if this sounds childish referred to social media etc but interested to canvas opinions.

A friend of mine shared a post on Instagram re world breastfeeding week about how it’s the best thing for baby and mum, so proud she could do it, perseverance etc. She’s a very zealous breastfeeder generally (and why not!) and was a good person to go to for advice when I was struggling although did say she was ‘disappointed I had given in’ after 2 months. Anyway!

Another friend then shared a post about Fed Is Best (she struggled bf and switched to formula and has always found it difficult seeing bf women, a lot of guilt and sadness that I feel she needs to process somehow) and how WBW is just another stick to beat ‘failed breast feeders’ with and anyone who wants to breastfeed gets loads of support from midwives etc and generally society nowadays so it isn’t needed.

Both have since messaged me about the other stating they are upset (we are a close group of 4, the other doesn’t have DC so I suppose I’m mediator). Friend one feels like this is one week where BF should be celebrated and acknowledged is better. Friend two feels mother’s should be more understanding to the feelings of those that couldn’t breastfeed and not ‘brag’.

I have remained fairly moderate and tried to calm things but who do you think is right?

YABU- it’s world breastfeeding week! It’s best let them have their moment.

YANBU- it can make women feel very sad who didn’t bf or who ‘failed’ so social media posts should be mindful of this.

@EmpressoftheMundane - what do you mean by it’s not ideal to start life on a highly processed diet?

I put YANBU, the week itself is fine it is the Breastapo that come out spouting rubbish and demonising FF mothers. As you can tell I had to FF, my DD wouldn't eat for the first 3 days of her life so I had to use a bottle to let the milk slowly drip into her mouth to actually get any milk into her. She lost over 10% of her body weight in those first few days, luckily after day 3 she started to feed and hasn't stopped since at that point it was expressed breastmilk, but then I dried up at 6 weeks I tried waking up at 2 am to express, the tablets to keep my supply up, the biscuits, pumping whilst in the bath my supply still dried up, so I was onto formula. I felt like I had failed my DD massively and to this day i am 100% certain it added to my PND, I even considered suicide as I felt she would be better off without me, what with me being so useless I couldn't even feed her.
With my second, I said I wasnt even going to try breastfeeding, that I would express to start with but not breastfeed, but I forgot my expressed milk when I went into hospital, my DS latched straight away and I continued to breastfeed for 2 weeks, but everytime I fed him he came out in hives so had to stop and switch him to formula, the hives cleared up within 24 hours. Never did find out what it was in my milk that he was reacting too, as he isn't allergic to anything now.

Anyway back to your point OP, I can totally understand where your FF friend is coming from, I would continue as you are, staying neutral. This topic is a mine field.

@Parker231 Baby formula is not fresh food. It is engineered food with a very long shelf life. It’s called formula.

Formula gives babies an excellent start in life. I chose to use formula. My only regret is Perfect Prep machines weren’t around then. I give them as presents to new parent friends - very popular and makes life so much easier for new parents.

@EmpressoftheMundane

Are you aware of the health differences between a bf and a formula fed baby?

The UK has tight regulations on advertising formula and little concern about the water. Yes, there are formula companies working in countries with unclean water with little-to-no marketing regulation spouting false claims. It would be great if more could be done about that, but it's not really the issue here.

It could be said that advertising in the past helped to create a general culture that makes breastfeeding less common, companies (or the NHS) wouldn't advertise if it didn't have an effect on people's actions, but it's not brainwashing. It's one of many environmental factors.

Mothers all need better postnatal support, less ideological and consumer-driven care on all sides (formula may have more things people need to buy, but plenty are making money off selling to breastfeeders), and recognition that everyone gets judgement and everyone needs community.

For some, seeing WBW online will give them a boost to feel less alone, yeah for some it's a chance to feel smug, for some it makes them feel worse, and most it's a non-issue to be quickly forgotten.

What about the women who want to and are given wrong advice and bad support and stop when they don't want to? It's for them too

There is support for bf, heaps of it.

What needs to change is the language
The insinuations that women don't try hard enough or don't care enough, are selfish, the automatic oh how sad you didn't bf, insinuating formula is just ok or 2nd best when its bloody brilliant and gives so many women their life back, allows babies to thrive and live.
When a woman says she wants to FF from birth, don't try change her mind or create an environment where women feel they have to lie about how they feel to keep bf pushers happy and avoid judgement.
Offer women practical support, sure absolutely. But accept her choice if she says no, none of thisj ust try 1more day. Why make women suffer for just one more day, why guilt her into that? The ones who want to will push on and the ones who don't will feel supported in their choice not to.

@wolfgirrl sounds like you know. Happy to hear any info you have to share.

@Parker231 It’s certainly adequate, I’d even say the modern formulas are good. Excellent is tough to argue successfully. It’s like us having a Huel for lunch rather than fresh food.

Express - of course formula is excellent. Huge numbers of babies thrive on formula. They grow up healthy without any medical issues. By giving my DC’s formula I knew I was giving them an excellent start in life.

Live food that is full of omega3 and good bacteria to feed the baby’s gut, is clearly better.

Let's see about this
Say a mother is gunna bf at all costs. This woman is a junkie, smokes, drinks, never eats good food, hardly sleeps but still somehow produces milk, it happens.
You'd say that's a better start?

That's the language that needs to change. Dd had a better start in my eyes cos I was able to cope, was not resenting her or feeling like a cow. I'm a smoker so also not great. Formula was a much better start for us in ALL areas of life, not just 1 area.

Parker I agree

It's bloody amazing stuff

Supporting the option to breastfeed in public and accepting that some women cannot breastfeed should not be views that a person can only support one of and not the other.

Those men and women who want no public breastfeeding belong in the dark ages in my opinion.

@EmpressoftheMundane

There is no one thing it guards against completely. The differences are so minimal they can only be seen on a country-wide basis.

So on paper, the benefits are amazing, but they are never quantified.

I'm not putting people off- it's a good thing to do if you can and want to, also for the environment and your own health- but it is disingenuous to say the benefits are huge or even noticeable.

There is support for bf, heaps of it.

That may be true in some areas, but in many areas there isn't. Online events like WBW is all some women have. Part of the issue is women wanting to breastfeed and then getting little beyond lipservice, if that, and it can take more than 'wanting to' to push through or feel comfortable stopping or mixed feeding.

Society creates these big messages that this time and what we do when they're tiny is very important and then does fuck all about it beyond judgement and marketing, the dissonance is part of issue, and for some trauma. No matter our choices, many are left to flounder, the negative remarks tend to stick in most at a vulnerable time, and women end up feeling isolated and like they're fucking up something important. It's why community matters, we need both the support to do what is best for us, acknowledgement that the social systems spouting shite are fucked up and hurting many of us, and that while it's a bit part of infancy, feeding is just a drop in the ocean of factors down the road.

Why on earth would anyone disagree with celebrating BF when everyone knows it’s best for babies and the UK has a very low rate of BF? There’s no doubt it’s harder for the mother- all the more reason to celebrate them.

@Her1mum

Why on earth would anyone disagree with celebrating BF when everyone knows it’s best for babies and the UK has a very low rate of BF? There’s no doubt it’s harder for the mother- all the more reason to celebrate them.

You may not agree, but If you read the thread people have explained why.

I didn't manage to breastfeed past a few days on each (my mental health suffers when I'm over anxious) but I'm so proud of all the mothers who work hard and nail it. Breast is best but thank god these formulas are made so well these days as my toddler and baby have not suffered physically at all.

It's so frustrating that for a proportion of mums, they cannot celebrate breastfeeding without demonising formula. On social media, it is far more accepted to breastfeed nowadays than it is to formula feed, in my opinion. You see far more mums breastfeeding and talking about their journey than you see mums bottle feeding. I think a lot of formula feeding mums try to hide the fact they're feeding formula like it's a dirty secret. Why? Because if they have any sort of following at all, they'll get anniliated in the comments for not breastfeeding.

I've seen it over and over with vloggers. As soon as their followers get a glimpse that they're no longer breastfeeding, they're on them like a pack of wolves. Then the vlogger has to spend time 'justifying' their decision, regardless of whether they breastfeed for 6 days, 6 weeks or not at all.

I completely agree that there is a huge lack of support for BF mums. But there's absolutely nothing for those FF. No one goes around the hospital giving you a breakdown on different formulas, different bottles and what they do, the best way to sterlise bottles, how to use and clean a perfect prep machine properly, etc. Absolutely nothing. And Health Visitors? The most they'll ask a mum who's formula feeding is how much they baby is drinking and how often. That's it. That's hardly support, is it? But I have huge problems with how HV are trained as honestly, I find a lot of them sub par in all areas. So that's a whole new rant itself.

Formula feeding mums also have their achievements undermined due to the way they've chosen to feed their baby. If a breastfed baby is thriving and gaining weight, it's something to be proud of. If a FF baby is? Well, it's shrugged off, isn't it? It doesn't 'count'. It's 'easier' to FF. It's the 'lazy' option, isn't it?

We need to empower all women. Just just BF mums. FF mums are just as important.

In addition, there’s a whole industry that’s grown up around breastfeeding, preying on the emotionally vulnerable and hormonally charged:

I shelled out over £200 for a breastfeeding consultant to try and help me BF: she advised that the only way to get my supply back up after having given him formula (required to ensure my son didn’t starve following his latch difficulties, those who’ve read the thread might recall) was to express and breastfeed basically round the clock. She also cut his tongue tie, to be fair.

Biggest waste of money ever. There was no way that advice could realistically be applied; that kind of focus on breastfeeding to the exclusion of practically everything else in my life would have landed with me with PND, no questions. And I would have missed any enjoyment of the first weeks of my son’s life.

Don’t even start me on the Medela Symphony that I hired to try to achieve this well-nigh-impossible endeavour, which arrived not working, causing yet more hassle and stress at a time of huge change and upheaval.

@stretchedmarks that’s so true. Both my children are top centiles and with DC1 it was ‘be careful of over feeding, cut down on feeds, distract and space them more, it can lead to childhood obesity’. DC2 was breast fed, followed the EXACT same centile and it was ‘wow mama has gold top milk, keep going your doing fabulously, feeding 24/7 completely normal, you can’t over feed them’. They’re both perfectly healthy and I never over fed DC1 but the different responses to the exact same growth patterns were stark. I worried endlessly about DC1 (waste of time she’s 4 and slim as anything now). There’s an assumption that FF mums will be forcing the ounces down when that’s not the case IME.

I think it's still trying to undo the decades of advertising that means many people's mothers and grandmothers think BF is selfish, a bit 'icky', something that you only do if you're in a third world country, that the baby will fail to thrive, it'll cry all the time, possibly starve, it'll be too clingy, you can't go back to work, it excludes the fathers and grandmothers, that breasts are for men and not babies, etc, etc.

I think most of us who have breastfed have stories of how some people reacted. I had 'so and so told me after you left 'that baby is hungry', you have to stop before she starves', 'Don't be silly, companies know exactly what a baby needs, all this Earth Mother stuff is attention seeking nonsense when they're absolutely fine with bottles and at least you know how much they're getting', 'So and so's baby cried and cried and cried and wasn't putting on weight, so they switched him to normal milk from the milkman at 5 months and he slept all night every night from that first day' and a partner who was so fucking jealous that the moment she was actually latched on and feeding, he'd be right up in her face cooing at her so she broke off to smile, biting me every single time.

If people actually accepted BF and made it expected to provide food and drink and quiet places if they're wanted, not make women feel like they're abusing their kids for the physical sensation of feeding, it wouldn't be so polarised.

Yes, fed is best, but breastfeeding in itself is best of all. Like having food is best, compared to dust and ants, but proper food is best of all, compared to blended protein shakes and a multivitamin.

Yes, fed is best, but breastfeeding in itself is best of all...

I know this. I’m a highly intelligent, informed woman. There’s really no need to repeat it ad infinitum and dream up yet more tedious comparisons to the differences between BF and formula. It serves to make FF women feel shit and will do precisely nothing to increase BF rates in the U.K. - I guarantee it.

Page 16 before someone said "breastapo". Must be some kind of record. And there was me thinking we'd get one discussion on breastfeeding without someone using that ridiculous word

Of course formula is highly processed. That's just a fact of how it's made. Yes, your baby can still have a good start with formula, but it's not possible for it to be as good as breast milk due to the many, many live elements it contains (antibodies, bacteria, hormones, enzymes, stem cells, etc), which change regularly throughout the day, week, month, year/s that you feed your baby.

As regards the "brainwashing" from formula companies, perhaps people don't feel "brainwashed", but it's present every time a child gets a doll and it comes with a bottle (because a child pretending to breastfeed a doll would be weird, right? ), when a pregnant woman stocks up on formula "just in case", or someone's mother in law asks, "feeding again? Are you sure you've got enough milk?", or going through (normal) cluster feeding and their partner comes home with formula, or going to the HV or GP with issues with latching or weight gain is met with "just switch to formula".

There are no restrictions on advertising so-called "follow on" milks, which are entirely unnecessary, but which allow the formula companies to build up brand recognition, which in turn helps the sales of their infant formula. Not to mention the fact that it's a law that's often not actively monitored, so formula companies frequently breach the law and undermine breastfeeding with little to no consequences.

I think it's still trying to undo the decades of advertising that means many people's mothers and grandmothers think BF is selfish, a bit 'icky', something that you only do if you're in a third world country, that the baby will fail to thrive, it'll cry all the time, possibly starve,

Which an odd stance (that I've had from many an older relative/friend) as not so long ago for ima companies forced formula in third world countries, had employees dressed as nurses telling mothers not to bf and to use formula that they couldn't afford. Truly horrific and many babies suffered and/or died because of it.

Not that that's a big issue for us today in the uk, but it shows the horrific nature of these big companies.

@AlmostAlwyn breastapo.

You mightn’t like it - but that’s what FF mothers feel it’s like every time someone expresses surprise or tries to deter an unhappy mother who actually would be much happier giving a baby formula is like feeding it poison.