Emily Oster on Breastfeeding - minimal benefits.

[IamOvercome]

I am pregnant with my first and am an economist so I was recommended books by fellow economist Emily Oster. The books don’t give advice. They review the statistical studies underlying pregnancy advice and whether they are any good or not.

It’s been such an eye opener. For example it is pushed pushed and pushed some more that breast is best. But when you review the evidence there is minimal evidence for benefits of breastfeeding for babies. The strongest evidence is actually for mothers that it can marginally reduce chance of breast cancer in later life.

Same with not introducing babies to bottle to confuse them when breastfeeding. Literally no concrete evidence for it.

Yet this is all pushed as clear cut facts by midwives and other health professionals.

I was pregnant with my son in 2019 and attended a breastfeeding antenatal class in May at the North Middlesex University Hospital. I was shocked and infuriated during and afterwards. The lady giving the class had two columns drawn up on a wall. One was titled 'breastfeed' and one 'formula fed' and she asked us to put a bunch of words and phrases into the column we thought they belonged. These included things like 'more likely to be obese', 'less likely to be good at sports' which went in the formula column (according to her) and other phrases such as 'less likely to develop cancer' (seriously) and 'will do better at school' which of course went on the breastfeed column.
Now, I was intending to breastfeed if I was able and if my milk came in. I couldn't believe what I starting and seeing. It was such utter nonsense.
I was aware from my cousin's experience of her milk never arriving that this could potentially happen to me. We were told in the class that this was 'not a thing.' So, my cousin lied? To who? Herself?
This was all information endorsed by the NHS and it is just so damaging.
It is such a display of how little women's wellbeing and mental health matters.
I struggled hugely to breastfeed with both of my babies. The pain was immeasurable at times and yet, the only 'advice' or so - called 'support' I got from midwives, health visitors or breastfeeding support volunteers was to 'push through'. I pushed myself through that searing pain when the reality is, I was still recovering from the major surgery of a cesarean and should have been kinder to myself. Instead, it always felt like what I was supposed to do. Nowadays, any issues that my 2 year old son has, I always blame myself for not deciding to breastfeed him longer.

We all need to normalise however a woman decides to feed her baby, be it breast or safely prepared formula milk. Either is a wonderful thing and as long as baby is fed, we all have to allow women to just recover themselves and just enjoy their new babies without guilt.
I'm sick of the breastfeeding mafia!!

I was pregnant with my son in 2019 and attended a breastfeeding antenatal class in May at the North Middlesex University Hospital. I was shocked and infuriated during and afterwards. The lady giving the class had two columns drawn up on a wall. One was titled 'breastfeed' and one 'formula fed' and she asked us to put a bunch of words and phrases into the column we thought they belonged. These included things like 'more likely to be obese', 'less likely to be good at sports' which went in the formula column (according to her) and other phrases such as 'less likely to develop cancer' (seriously) and 'will do better at school' which of course went on the breastfeed column.

That is absolutely disgusting. If you've decided to attend an antenatal breastfeeding group you most likely already want to breastfeed and don't need to be convinced (although i don't believe that's the way we should encourage people anyway!).

They could have spent the time talking about useful things like latches, showed videos of how the baby's mouth looks when sucking and swallowing so you know they're taking in milk, how your milk usually comes in around day 3, how to express colostrum antenatally, how cluster feeding us normal and about the 4th trimester. Things that might actually contribute towards successful breastfeeding, not just getting people in a room to slag off formula.

My period returned 6 weeks when breastfeeding!

Not sure why people are saying it isn’t ethical studying new mums. I participated in research with all my babies from newborn to 6yrs (and counting)!

That sounds exactly like the NHS BFing antenatal class I attended - at a Baby Friendly Hospital. It was 3 hours long and led by a midwife/IBCLC lactation consultant and you'd think, in that time, they could have included some useful/accurate content. But no, instead we got:

• lots of the type of thing outlined above where it was made clear formula was BAD and the only acceptable choice to EBF. Including some games involving building blocks that emphasised the superiority of breastmilk.
• no mention of problems, other than possibly needing some nipple cream in case of sore nipples.
• cluster feeding was described as a 'lovely snuggly excuse to watch a boxset'
• all women can EBF
• do not use dummies!
• do not use bottles. If you really have to (for EBM obviously not the BAD formula) then definitely not before 6 weeks
• formula is expensive and unnecessary!
• shown a video of a newborn crawling up its mum to latch on and have that first blissful BF. It was heavily emphasised we had to latch on immediately to ensure success.

Bit of a shock to be readmitted on day 5, having been seen by the same idiotic midwife/IBCLC on day 3. with baby seriously ill with dehydration, no sign of my milk coming in and formula saving her life.

I did complain about the useless class both to the hospital and Baby Friendly but doubt they changed anything.

I was lucky the lactation consultant was away when I did my breast feeding session at my NCT class so the NCT instructor took it.

I did warn my DP when he said we should go to it before we knew the lactation consultant was away, that if she said formula was evil or similar I would make a scene and walk out.

We went to the NHS antenatal class at the hospital DD was born at. It was fucking hopeless. Birth was demonstrated by a knitted toy lamb being shoved through a plastic pelvis. No mention of the possibility of instrumental/assisted delivery. No mention of caesareans. Epidurals made to sound like novichok. Pethidine WILL make you vomit. Then we had the breastfeeding lady, who made this concoction out of water, washing up liquid, and glitter to show the magical ingredients of breastmilk, except she'd run out of glitter so we just ended up looking at this fishtank of murky water and foam. No mention of formula AT ALL. Then we had the cloth nappy lady - I did like her, and did use cloth nappies with DD while she was EBF because they were so easy to deal with.

Overall, though, I'd give it a 3/10. And that's all for the nappy lady.

OMG @SpaghettiNotCourgetti that sounds worse than mine - a toy lamb (surely they could have managed to at least get a baby doll from somewhere?!) and glitter?!

I must say that the other NHS antenatal classes were excellent - including one with a women's health physio on back care and the pelvic floor, and the birth one was very thorough and included birth in the MLU plus all the pain relief options on the labour ward, right up to instrumental birth and birth under general anaesthetic! The midwife who led that one said she'd opted for an epidural! It did make the BFing one seem like cloud cuckoo land though - at the time I didn't appreciate quite how bad the content was but it was only when I realised the reality bore no relation to what we'd been told that I began to wonder!

@SpaghettiNotCourgetti

We went to the NHS antenatal class at the hospital DD was born at. It was fucking hopeless. Birth was demonstrated by a knitted toy lamb being shoved through a plastic pelvis. No mention of the possibility of instrumental/assisted delivery. No mention of caesareans. Epidurals made to sound like novichok. Pethidine WILL make you vomit. Then we had the breastfeeding lady, who made this concoction out of water, washing up liquid, and glitter to show the magical ingredients of breastmilk, except she'd run out of glitter so we just ended up looking at this fishtank of murky water and foam. No mention of formula AT ALL. Then we had the cloth nappy lady - I did like her, and did use cloth nappies with DD while she was EBF because they were so easy to deal with.

Overall, though, I'd give it a 3/10. And that's all for the nappy lady.

To be fair, pethidine was a uniquely awful experience for me (unlike the lovely, wonderful epidural ).

I only took it out of desperation because they kept saying it was too early for an epidural. I wasn’t sick but I was doolally AND in agony rather than just in agony.

I am really frustrated with another mum. A total stranger to me and one of these people who has decided that she is best placed to tell people what she thinks.

I sometimes take my DD and DS to the Palmers Green Library. They have a lovely children's area with lots of books for all reading levels and toys for the little ones to play with.
Last Friday morning, 1st July 2022 a woman came in with her baby son and a young girl. I was sitting on the platform step with my 9 month old baby daughter who was negotiating climbing up the step, when she came over and sat next to us with her baby. My daughter cooed excitedly when she made it up the step and this woman decided to say - to her - 'you are very loud'. She said it very sternly and loudly, that her voice boomed around the large room. It was the way someone who has never had a previous encounter with a baby or child speaks to them.

Now, I was thrown that a) a total stranger would even think to address my small baby (no, this is not acceptable, I do not know you, nor does my baby. Do not speak to my children strange person) b) that she thought my baby or I needed to know her opinion. (Clue, we don't).

I think it is the first time I've experienced this unexpected judgement from one of those mothers who thinks another mum or, more shockingly, another woman's baby, needs her opinion. I've heard my mum friends talking about their experiences but I hadn't had it myself up to now.

Now, if this was you, and if you read this, you will know who you are, I wasn't going to say what I wanted to say in front of my children or disturb other families using the space, but what you need to do is to stop giving your opinions to other mothers, or indeed other families. We have our own thing going on and we do not want or need your input. I'm sure there would be plenty that could be said to you, but the reason you do not get it said back to you is because you are of no consequence to us or to how we are raising our children. And to be perfectly frank, it's just plain rude.

The next time you feel an urge to express your thoughts to a complete stranger, or a complete stranger's baby, no less...DON'T!

Mate. This is a thread about breastfeeding

Plus. Maybe your kid was annoying ?

It just doesn’t make sense to not at least try the natural way though. No other mammal routinely offers other mammals milk to their newborn. Few people don’t at least try to conceive prior to trying IVF. Conceiving through IVF isn’t bad or wrong but it’s certainly not the biological norm. So why would feeding your baby be any different?

Because society has sexualised and fetishised breasts so women have a complex relationship with what they’re “for”; there’s lifelong pressure to have “the right” breasts with fashion dictating what style of breast is in – seriously, there was a guardian article a couple of years ago declaring big breasts “over” ; women may be the primary earner and need to go back to work ASAP and want to stop their milk coming in, not encourage it, and ensure their baby gets started on formula; difficult and traumatic births so the mother isn’t in a position to start breastfeeding; because it’s the woman’s body and she’s been displaced for nine months to bring the baby into the world and perhaps wants to share the work and reclaim her body; no experience of breastfeeding in their family and friendship community groups; lots of pressure to formula feed so grandparents can do the feeds and look after the baby; pressure from partners; unwanted pregnancies; simply not wanting to.

Look I BF but I can think of a million and one reasons why some women might not want to start, it doesn’t take much imagination.

@SNWannabe
Some women can't or don't want to latch on even once because of previous abuse. That's up to them and needs to be respected - it's also no one else's business if someone doesn't want to BF and no need to explain why. Some women can't because they need to take medication for their own health.

The biological norm is that some baby mammals from a litter won't survive (this would be unacceptable in humans!) and entirely normal for eg lambs to need a milk substitute replacement because the ewe doesn't have enough milk. Or for a % of a wild animal litter not to survive. Nature is far from perfect!

And some of us get conned by BFing promotion into doing things the 'natural way' and end up with a seriously ill baby because of this. I EBF for five days resulting in a baby seriously ill with dehydration who had to be tube fed formula to save her life. The Emily Oster book starts to redress the balance, so that families can make an informed choice how to feed - I didn't make an informed choice about infant feeding because I was denied info about the risks of EBFing and told a lot of untruths about formula.

The thought of it gave me the heebie jeebies.

couldn’t give any less of a fuck what others do. You can breast feed your 5 year old topless in the middle of Trafalgar Square and it would not put me up nor down. I will support your right to do so.

But I didn’t want to do it. It was nothing deeper than that. My girls have thrived. It has made zero difference.

Is there much about the mothers diet when breastfeeding? We had a discussion about this recently few friends,one friend admitting how bad her diet was post baby that she actually stopped breast-feeding as felt there was no way her baby was getting all the vitamins and nutrients needed as she lived off fast food,oven food and chocolate. I felt was a really valid point and 1 I hadn't considered

How are you on mumsnet if you don't like babies? You must not be familiar. Babies make noise

Ok, my posts are going into the wrong thread. I am doing something wrong -please ignore

@LaBoda You need to come out of this thread by clicking on Talk > AIBU? at the top, then click the “add thread” button

If you don’t want to breastfeed then don’t.

Well, it's clear that if the mother doesn't get enough food (examples in Syria and other war-torn areas) they don't make enough milk so infants' growth is stunted and they starve. That was on BBC News.
Research in the developing world where mothers don't get an optimal diet shows high rates of stunted growth amongst infants and children.

BFing requires an additional 300-400 calories a day (one of my problems with it being promoted as 'free' - those calories need to be paid for somewhere!) so if someone is already not getting enough for themself they aren't going to be producing optimal amounts of milk.

And we also know that BFing women need to take a supplement of vit D (as do their babies and all of us during the winter months!).

My understanding is that both while pregnant and while breastfeeding your body will strip your own nutrients if it has to. Obviously there comes a point where even that isn't enough but I think that the greatest risk of that diet by far was to the mother.