to not beleive that a women not breast feed is selfish and using 'i couldnt' as an excuse?

[aleciawalton]

im a mum of 1 who bf till 15 months, and now pregnant with second and will bf. i also am a breast friend and took training to support mums who are bfeeding. ( learned how milk is produced, history, attachment...)

i just think that too many women use 'i couldnt bf' as an excuse. its only been in the last 50 to 60 years bottles and formula have been around. what happened back then??? did more then 50% of the babys die? no cuase back then 99% women breast fed! why could they do it then and not now???
i just feel it a cop out and the mums are just being selfish.
yes its hard, but so was labour, so raising a kid. however they choise to have the baby. i know it takes time and comittment and not having that all important wine drink. but i personaly think that its for how long??? if i can give my child the best start and yes it can take a year or 2 but is my child not worth it??
if some one said to you while prego you have a choise to either have your baby and make your child as healthy as it can be or just have the baby, what would you want? why do we give the baby vitamine K, if not to help the baby be healthy. would you not get your baby vaccinated?

sorry just makes me mad. when i hear my nipples hurt and thats cant be normal so i stopped. or babys 3 weeks old and wanted feeding all the time so it ment i didnt have enough milk so i stopped. or there's a xmas party i want to go to so im not going to bf. the exuces go one. i really love the one 'bf is not natural, its disusting'. WTF were breast made for then and why does milk come out of them???

Oh gosh I dunno harpsi.

I'm not sure how I fit into that analogy. First time around I seemed to manage fine on my own with little instruction and DD and I got off to a tremendous start and I b/fed for 7 months.

With DS I thought it'd all be fine and dandy, having done it before and it went completely awry after suffering thrush and mastitis, and DS just being a totally different baby. I struggled for 8 weeks in the face of criticism, admonishment and lack of support to continue from family and friends who thought I was an idiot (my terminology) for persevering with b/feeding when it was clearly causing me incredible pain and distress. I continued to b/feed DS for just over 2 years in the end though.

haven't read the whole thread, but have scrolled a little

well done you for feeding through mastitis

I firmly believe in breast feeding, and did DS1, oh but then got engorged, followed by mastitis, and then the abcess appeared - which was then drained by a needle in A&E without any pain relief as I was so determined to feed my baby

UPON medical advice was told to stop as I was crying over my baby whilst he tried to feed as I was in so much pain

it was doing neither of us any good

followed by the abcess filling up again and me having to go into surgery leaving my 6 week old baby for 3 days

come DS2 I wanted to try again to be told not to by my midwife after all I'd been through

I can't begin to put into words how comments like yours make me

given the choice I'd have happily breastfed but I COULDN'T

so do us all a favour get your facts right

Message withdrawn

oh and I forgot to mention the lovely scar left from having the abcess removed which was left as an open wound and took 4 weeks to heal with daily visits from a nurse

then the offer of plastic surgery to make it look nicer

noname - personally I LOVED the shields and would recommend them as a lifesaver, tho I guess they will of course be different to everyone..
When I mentioned them (the first time, never again) to the hv, she told me (whilst prodding the shield as if it was the work of the devil) in no uncertain terms that my milk would dry up as a result. Again, perhaps I was lucky, but ds was still regularly drowned in milk even after a couple of months of shield use. Hurrah!

I 'looked' after a mum who had a great aversion to a midwife touching her breasts when she was in hospital.

Her baby had nothing but expressed breast milk for the first few months of her life.

Mum would routinely disappear to her bedroom and subsequently produce vast amounts of breast milk with the aid of an electric pump.

Surely the baby and Mum had the best of both worlds?

Sadly some professionals think that unless the baby is almost permanently adhered to the breast,they cannot be getting the best!

noname - slightly at 'artificially feed'.

I bf'd easy-peasy with ds and then was blindsided by big difficulties with dd, which I got through by chance (OK, chancing upon La Leche number) really.

I think this term might irk me if I'd ff'd..
tho in general your posts are thoughtful and sensitive

Spink, you have illustrated exactly what is wrong with the people who are supposed to be supportive regarding feeding.

Good for you that you continued to give your baby breast milk.

Strange isn't it that many premature babies are given expressed breast milk and no one finds that unacceptable?

elfsmum
To the OP: What are you trying to achieve here? Most women who say they couldn't bf are actually telling the truth! Some of them may be misinformed, or neglected by health professionals but you can't berate someone who gave up bfing in the face of adversity, all you have to do is read some of the cries for help on the breastfeeding threads to see how some women struggle and sometimes sadly fail.
Yes, breast is best but the breastfeeding culture in the Western World has been so sadly eroded that sometimes, with the best will in the world, it doesn't always work out. Amongst my friends and acquaintances, those who choose to ff from the start generally say so, I can only think of one person who I know didn't try but lies and says that she tried and failed.
Most of the others, who did start to bf and then fall by the wayside were generally not given the right help and information at the time eg. my neighbour's GP told her she had to stop when she got mastitis, my GP told me that I should carry on when I came down with the same thing. My GP was better than her GP, end of story!
Don't judge till you've walked in the same shoes!

Onebatmother I never set out to irk or offend anyone, but as amidwife I have seen the stress that some mums go through when trying to be the 'best mum they can'

Artificial feeding is an old term, a bit like me.

Breast is natural, formula is artificial. I have absolutely no prejudices against mums who use formula.

erm... this is a wind up isn't it ? I have scanned the thread and can't see the OP back again.

I am going to rise above her MN baiting nonsense!

i too found it really really hard, and i did manage to carry on, but only cos i had loads of excellent support and advice. i had 6 weeks of feeling like i was being tortured 10 times a day it was so horribly painful and whilst now, me and my ds are really close, i hated him for putting me in such pain.
back in the "old" days, and in more natural societies, women were freer and happier to share breastfeeding.so if a woman couldn't, no, her baby wouldn't have died, another member of the family would take over. they would also have more help from each other to learn how to do it with a good latch, so it wasn't so new and alien. we would have watched women doing it since we were children.
so yes, harp back to the good old days of breastfeeding, but not to beat up women who can't breastfeed!

How ignorant to say that all women who say 'I couldnt' are saying it just because they had a hard time in labour or just chose not too! As a mum of five, when it was time for baby no1 to come along I thought finaly, great the horrible constant sickness and fatigue is finally over! How wrong could I be! 72 hours later, after ventouse an episiotomy(stiches) and a blood transfusion, my beautiful baby boy was born. Not all great,He was then rushed away from me as he swallowed maconeyum (poo), (I didnt get to see him for the first hour and a half of his life). A total of 22 stiches on the outside alone (we didnt count the inside), but then to top it all, I bf for 4 days with a screaming baby, just trying him with waternow and then, just to be told 'sorry you dont have any milk'! 'If you had milk it would have come in about the 3rd day'. I went through the same problem with baby no2 again no milk. But then for baby's 3,4,&5 I had enough milk to feed britain, and the easyest delivery's ever. I didnt choose not to breastfeed no1 & 2, I had NO choice. I also hated every minute of telling people when they asked 'are you breast or bottle'? 'well I am bottle because I could'nt'! Please think twice before judgeing!

p.s I b/f the last 3 for 2 and a half years each.

Lucky those that can breastfeed!!! You sound sooo self righteous!! sorry but you do

'Strange isn't it that many premature babies are given expressed breast milk and no one finds that unacceptable'

Well hmmm, could that be because many premmies don't have the strength to suckle themselves? just an idea.....

In reality we're all bloody Lucky to HAVE formula! Its saved babies lives- DS1 had a complex set of dairy intolerances that were the reason he was failure to thrive, only soya was any good for him. Hallelujah for Soy formula!

Women aren't cows or sheep, they're not herd animals and each one comes with a very complex set of needs, situations and pre-programmed reactions. Some mums need to go back to work within a fortnight of the birth (still happens- when I ahd my older 2 was very common) and don't manage to get BF established for expressing. Some mums are run down by family situations- a sick baby or older child, parents requiring care, whatever. Instead of looking at one facet of the women and declaring her selfish we need to look at the eprson as a whole- or even more compassionately simplya ccept her ddcisiona s a mature adult.

breast IS best of course it is, and those who want to have a go shoudl be encouraged and given lots of support- but those who don't or can't- their choice.

MANCHITA
My post was to Ineedacleaner.

self righteous or just talking sense? how dare we judge anyone for not b/f. Sorry but last time I looked I thought we lived in a free country! So what the hell has it got to do with anyone else!

JV, I realised that pretty soon after I sent my reply and re-read the thread. Guess it's moving too fast for me, eh?
No hard feelings I hopexx

I haven't bothered to read the rest of the thread, but tbh I don't believe a word the OP says.

I don't believe you've trained as a breast friend, if you have, I'd like to know which organisation it is you've trained with. No decent breastfeeding counsellor would demand an "excuse" from women as to why they didn't breastfeed. They are trained not to feel entitled to explanations or excuses. You haven't been trained. Or if you have been, you weren't listening.

Oh and yes, YABU.

I think if the op is reading this thread she will, or at least i hope she will, think twice before being so judgemental and narrow minded as well as plain ignorant again.

I have had topics on mn where i have been knocked down a peg or two and have learned from people's experiences and stories. I hope the op has done the same.

Alecia, I hope you are as lucky with your second child. I exclusively breastfed my dd for 17 months. Both she and I took to it like ducks to water. I too used to think[perhaps not so rudely] that some people gave up to easily etc. I never thought in a million years that I would have trouble feeding ds. Well guess what different baby , different circumstances! Ds is mixed fed and is now 11 months.

I am not going to explain myself to you, but would like to point out the guilt and turmoil that I felt when feeding ds was problematic. You say you are a breast friend, well I don't see much friendliness in your original post. Have you thought of the effect that such harsh words could have on a woman struggling with breast feeding. Try showing a little solidarity towards womankind!

Manchita - no hard feelings at all

There are a lot of people feeling really bad on this thread.
I'd really like to say: it gets better, you know. It really does.
[veteran]
Don't let stuff like this get you down.

good analogy
I seem to remember clinging on to the side in the ice rink and inching my way round
like I said, good analogy