To think it’s disingenuous to say breastfeeding is free?

[Jerrui]

When pregnant encountered lots and lots of breastfeeding promotion- often it’s cited it being free as a benefit.

I have personally found as soon as you actually have a baby and are feeding it there is absolutely zero support. In my area there is no infant feeding team etc just community midwife who told me to substitute BF with FF at two weeks old when baby failed to regain birth weight.

I have spent hundreds of pounds on lactation consultant, double electric pump, milk storage, trying to keep breastfeeding going.

I have added formula top up and was shocked how cheap it is. We got bottles for free in those Emma’s diary type packs, and Aldi formula costs £2 a week.

I think trying to promote breastfeeding as a more economic option to pregnant women is stupid.
I feel actually public funds would be much better spend on training and recruiting to provide actual support to mothers trying to breastfeed, rather than health promotion with misleading, simplistic and dumbed down messages.
I feel it’s no wonder breastfeeding is mainly the preserve of the middle classes when you have to invest so much money to get any help!

Bf can be free and there is support out there but you have to be clued up on where to go and you have to be very assertive, which is hard for a ftm.

Up front costs also are balanced by potentially years of milk supply.

Agree that there needs to be far more info about how hard it is for the first two months. I think if people realised that then rates would be higher. I see so many people give up at 6 weeks when they're so nearly out of the worst bit.

Yanbu.
I ended up ordering pizza several times a week and eating loads of ready meals as I didn't have time to prepare my food. I was stuck to the sofa all the time.

Breastfeeding is free if it all goes well.

I agree breastfeeding support is dismal.

Absolutely agree with you OP

I would never have said/thought it's free and I don't remember seeing any promo material saying so either just things like breast is best.
I bf because I found it convenient and I could
IMO both methods have associated costs, it's just a matter of going with the one that works for you and your baby

I agree tbh and I suppose for some people that is true. For me it was expensive, nipple shields, nipple cream, breast pads, a breast pump (x2 as one broke), storage bags, 3 different kinds of bottles. We had to express milk to give to baby as she wasn’t gaining enough weight. Although we’ve swapped to formula now and £12 every 5 days isn’t much better!

It's been free for me. I don't express and I'm fortunate that I haven't needed to leave my babies under 6mo. Mine have never drank from a bottle- breast until 6mo then a sippy cup introduced at meal times with weaning while continuing to bf alongside.

For me it was virtually free.

During pregnancy as I needed to buy bigger bras I bought nursing ones instead of regular, so maybe slightly more expensive but not significantly and I needed the bras anyway..
I didn’t buy any specific breastfeeding clothes except a couple of nursing vests from H&M that I slept in.
And a packet of reusable breast pads.

That was it really. But I was lucky that I found it easy, didn’t need nipple cream or anything, certainly didn’t need a lactation consultant.

I had to pay £125 to get my baby's tongue tie snipped privately because the NHS midwives would not contemplate the thought that there might be an issue there. This was despite the fact that it was my 4th baby, and he was still losing weight at 4 weeks old (Fwiw, the NHS solution was that I should buy an eye wateringly expensive pump, and exclusively express, which is another whole level of hell)

@Eminybob

I also think the constant insistence that breastfeeding is sooo easy is harmful too

I agree there needs to be a balance, but there are an overwhelmingly high number of people who don’t even try for themselves because of the insistence that it is hard.

At least if people think it’s easy they will be more willing to try for themselves (and for many many people it is easy)

80% of women in the U.K. try to breastfeed according to the who, so I don't think it's fair to say that an overwhelming amount of mothers simply aren't bothering

Well… it is cheaper than formula feeding, it is not £2 a week for Aldi formula if you feed solely formula, it’s about £10 a week rising to about £15/£20 a week as baby gets bigger! Plus the need for steriliser, bottles, change of teats etc so yes it is free in comparison to that, you could argue lactate consultants etc but not many can afford that!

Dd was EBF for 9 months then topped with formula for weight issues.
My local NHS infant feeding clinic was a godsend. So it was free for me. I assure you I'm not middle class. And the area/town my infant feeding clinic is located is towards the more deprived side of town. They also had lactation consulting and tongue tie clinic as part of it (DD had a severe TT).
Maybe I got incredibly lucky, I do feel for women who don't have such support locally like I did.
It actually incenses me that what an above poster had to pay for privately I could access for free in my town and why it isn't like this over the rest of the country.
Midwives/doctors/health visitors all were CLUELESS about breastfeeding and all missed my DDs TT even after I specifically asked for them all to check.

This genuinely reads like some type of formula campaign.

What absolute nonsense.

I think your perspective is a little skewed by your personal experiences. Many women do manage to feed without needing to pay for support, regardless of socio-economic circumstances.

Breastfeeding doesn't reduce eczema, eczema is genetic.
I'm sick of seeing this, both my dh and I have eczema so it's not a shock our ds has it. Also dh mum bfed him mine didn't you would think if bf did bugger all for it dh wouldn't have had it but there you are.

Now, breastfeeding is good for immunity boosting, and nutritionally probably slightly superior to formula (apart from needing to supplement vitamin d as formula has that in it, also being careful what you eat).
No one is arguing the benefits that are actually confirmed by science, but I wouldn't say its cheaper unless you are one of the lucky mothers who breezes through it without help.

@Jerrui

When pregnant encountered lots and lots of breastfeeding promotion- often it’s cited it being free as a benefit.

I have personally found as soon as you actually have a baby and are feeding it there is absolutely zero support. In my area there is no infant feeding team etc just community midwife who told me to substitute BF with FF at two weeks old when baby failed to regain birth weight.

I have spent hundreds of pounds on lactation consultant, double electric pump, milk storage, trying to keep breastfeeding going.

I have added formula top up and was shocked how cheap it is. We got bottles for free in those Emma’s diary type packs, and Aldi formula costs £2 a week.

I think trying to promote breastfeeding as a more economic option to pregnant women is stupid.
I feel actually public funds would be much better spend on training and recruiting to provide actual support to mothers trying to breastfeed, rather than health promotion with misleading, simplistic and dumbed down messages.
I feel it’s no wonder breastfeeding is mainly the preserve of the middle classes when you have to invest so much money to get any help!

I found establishing deeding very difficult. I got zero help from the formula obsessed midwives/health visitors. Eventually I managed it with the help of a £30 electric pump, the local NCT and a freezer. And that saw me though 2 kids over 23 months. Not free but excellent value for money

Completely agree. I breastfed mine including one who couldn’t physically breastfeed and was fed expressed milk.

Unless you are able to completely stop life and the planets align then it’s an expensive exercise. I couldn’t take much time off and worked opposite hours/days to DH. With the first it wasn’t too bad as he mainly brought them to work for a feed and just gave one bottle if expressed overnight and an emergency one if I was delayed home in the morning. Was harder to drag the siblings around with subsequent babies.

So, we still had to fork out for bottles, sterilising equipment, top quality hospital grade pump, pump kits. Add to that breast pads. Throw in private fees for two tongue ties. While overall, this still may be much cheaper than formula feeding, if you added in time then by golly you are in a huge deficit. And to the smart arse above who said it was sad that people felt like that with their babies, I had one where I had to sacrifice significant time for several months with both my baby in NICU and their siblings while I either pumped in a designated room in the hospital or continuously at home. That came at the expense of spending time with my baby and my other kids. So the whole ‘value/time’ thing does not necessarily have to be monetary.

Sorry, but a 'lactation consultant..'
As they say, 'a fool and his money...'

It is free if you have no issues, which many women fortunately don’t. For me it wasn’t easy either, but I didn’t have the kind of money to pay for what OP has paid at that time. I bought a pump from Tesco and pumped and bottle fed for month 1, then tried my DS on the breast when he was a bit stronger (he just couldn’t latch) and he just started feeding and then we had no problem until 8 months when I weaned him onto bottles. My DD wasn’t that easy, tried to do the same when I had a bad cracked nipple but then ended up in hospital for 5 days on IV antibiotics due to a severe infection. That was the end of my BF with DD!

@EmiliaAirheart

I’ve also heard: breastfeeding is only free if a woman’s time is worth nothing.

What a disgusting view to hold about spending time with your child.

[quote NumberTheory]@Mrbob
EmiliaAirheart

I’ve also heard: breastfeeding is only free if a woman’s time is worth nothing.

That’s a pretty depressing view of your child

It has nothing to do with how anyone views any children. It simply points out, as with so much that women do, that people frequently ignore the labour involved.[/quote]
But actually there is far more labour involved in formula feeding. With breastfeeding baby is hungry and you pop them on and either sit relaxing or put them in a sling and carry on.

Formula feeding is a faff!

Completely agree there is a cost to women in terms of their time and in some cases their mental health

My DD is still BF now and she's 18 months. I've never fed her formula as I just haven't needed to not because I've got anything against it. I've also not spent anywhere near the amounts spent here. I bought some bottles, milk storage bags together for about £15 and a haaka pump for about £10 in the beginning as I thought I would pump a bit so DH could feed her. I did twice and realised I couldn't be arsed so didn't do it again. So for me, BF has been as close to free as I could want really.

Breastfeeding for 2.5 years cost me one tube of lasinoh and one V pillow. I didn't have access to feeding consultants etc.

I only needed breast pads.