We can't mention positives of Breastfeeding for fear of offending

[Silverclasp]

Recently there was an interesting thread about a husband not wanting his wife to Breastfeed (he wanted to give formula) posters were highlighting the positives of Breastfeeding (since this was the topic) but there was a response essentially saying that by pointing out the benefits that we are shaming non bf mothers.
It got me thinking that I actively don't speak about bf for this very reason, I feel like if the person I'm talking to doesn't bf it can be seen as "shaming" like I never post anything pro Breastfeeding on SM in case I offend someone. It's kind of ridiculous.
Interested in both sides of the argument.

So say I reposted an article on SM which stated that studies have indicated that breastfed babies have a larger thymus gland than formula fed babies and more tcells as a result. Would this be unreasonable and cause offence to non bf mothers?

Not all mothers could breastfeed, but historically most of them must have been able to. Otherwise the infant mortality rate would have been much higher than 15%. Think about all the advances in medicine, hygiene, and general standards of living in the last 100 hundred years. If a significant percentage of babies couldn't even be fed, once you add in all the ones who would have died of now-treatable conditions, there wouldn't be many left.

Look how many women on this thread say their milk never even came in. Clearly, something very serious is happening, and the scientific community is doing fuck all about it. If a male body part mysteriously stopped working across the population, we'd never hear the end of it! Researching it would absolutely be a priority for scientists.

@Radziwill

Please forgive me if this is offensive, but my grandmother’s personal theory is that it is down to obesity & chemicals disrupting our finely balanced hormones. She said she thinks fat tissue in the breast stops the milk production not sure if it’s true, just throwing it out there.

@Radziwill

Not all mothers could breastfeed, but historically most of them must have been able to. Otherwise the infant mortality rate would have been much higher than 15%. Think about all the advances in medicine, hygiene, and general standards of living in the last 100 hundred years. If a significant percentage of babies couldn't even be fed, once you add in all the ones who would have died of now-treatable conditions, there wouldn't be many left.

Look how many women on this thread say their milk never even came in. Clearly, something very serious is happening, and the scientific community is doing fuck all about it. If a male body part mysteriously stopped working across the population, we'd never hear the end of it! Researching it would absolutely be a priority for scientists.

Wet nurses and milk sharing in general? Far more common and socially acceptable historically speaking.

I recall reading an article on a breastfeeding page about the first bottle and what mums used to feed babies back in the day that couldn’t breastfeed, i feel like they used to latch them to goats?

Either way, it’s not a direct comparison historically speaking. Babies wouldn’t have been weighed at birth, at day 5, day 10 and 14 to check that they are thriving. A baby can be feeding enough to live but not enough to thrive by todays standards but historically speaking surviving would have been enough. A lot of women give up breastfeeding due to their baby not thriving early doors, whereas ‘back then’ they just wouldn’t have known.
Additionally, medications that impinge on breast milk production weren’t around. Neither were breast implants (that can sometimes interfere with milk production) or surgeries like mastectomy.

@Radziwill

What the fuck is happening to our species? Why are women losing the ability to produce breastmilk? And why aren't scientists doing more to find out why this is happening? It's extremely concerning.

I think low milk supply is an oversimplification of breastfeeding problems, though. I had plenty of milk and could pump bottles of it with an electric pump. It was my DD who couldn't suck properly and had to have a special feeding bottle to drink my expressed milk. She did eventually improve.

Still have no idea what caused a 9 1/2 lbs full-term baby to have this problem, despite having a lactation consultant

Also the fact premature/earlier babies, who find it harder to bf, are now much more likely to survive. There are a lot of slightly wary inductions as well (37-38 weeks), which although only a few weeks early, makes a big difference to the baby’s sucking reflex.

It's quite possibly true that a lot of women who've said they didn't produce milk, didn't have any milk [initially]. I wonder if those women had severe milk delay - mine didn't come in until 8 weeks, I have one friend whose milk didn't come in until 6 weeks after a planned, straightforward CS. I've seen women in combi feeding groups whose milk comes in around the 4-6 week mark after a difficult birth.

I only knew to keep going with BFing because of my friend's experience of severe delay. Otherwise, why would you keep doing something that apparently produces no milk? The BFing promotion makes no mention of milk being delayed, even though it's incredibly common (anything over 72 hours is termed late onset).

We've lost awareness of the realities of BFing in the rush to promote the 'positives' - that a certain number of babies will need to be supplemented, that milk gets delayed, that not everyone can produce enough milk, that not all babies can latch and suck effectively.

Instead of talking openly about this and how to supplement safely, how to combi feed etc, we just get endless stuff about the benefits of BFing.

Don't forget, in the past, even if a baby survived they may not have got enough milk to reach their potential - stunted growth (common in developing countries now with high EBFing rates), lack of brain development from not enough calories.