To still feel so guilty I gave formula 'top ups'?

[Nguilty]

Two years on from my difficulties breastfeeding and with a healthy thriving toddler, I still feel so awful now some of my friends have subsequently had children and breastfed them.

At two weeks old my daughter hadn't regained birthweight and I was told to give over 500mls 'top ups' in 24 hours. She was vomiting this all up (I couldn't even get a third of that down her tbh) and I suspected this wasn't right, stopped the top ups and I paid an independent lactation consultant who gave me advise on positioning and attachment and said she didn't think there were any supply issues- I just needed to carry on BF her.

I really struggled with the new positions and trying to get her in them, especially at night my husband wanted to take the baby out of the room at one point as I was so wound up trying to get her to latch correctly.

The midwives were extremely skeptical and said she would have to be admitted if she didn't put weight on within 72 hours. I was really stressed and tearful.

The feeding specialist from the hospital agreed to see me too and said the new positioning was good and as she had dropped from 75th to 9th centile I could give top ups. The midwife was ringing me and scheduling every other day weigh ins. I was still struggling to latch the baby effectively consistently.

I knew the risk of top ups affecting my supply but I caved and said I'd give her two lots of formula in the night whilst I pumped whilst I got the hang of the new positioning and latching.

I spend all day watching videos of breastfeeding, pumping after feeds, and practicing latch. I pumped in the night but didn't attempt to latch her and gave her expressed milk and formula. When I did latch her in the night she vomited so I was afraid of trying again.
Of course we ended up finding one position we could consistently do- but my supply was destroyed by the night time disruption to feeding and ultimately lost the feeding relationship. It dragged on for many more miserable weeks and months with increasingly fraught efforts to sustain it but she ended up FF by four months. I ended up with severe PPD and nearly committed suicide.

I just can't seem to get over it and feel so guilty and culpable that I made the decisions that ultimately wrecked things.

I'm sorry you're feeling this way OP. I mean this kindly, your feelings and guilt about bf struggles are disproportionate, and I'd echo others advice that you should think about seeking some therapy.

I had struggles myself for a number of months. I'm not being flippant, but my own mental health wasn't affected, I was able to take the approach that all that mattered was that my child is healthy. But for whatever reason, you weren't able to feel that, which is why I'd recommend getting support.

FWIW, that child I agonised over feeding is now a healthy teen, eats well with a healthy weight, and apart from the usual chicken pox, and a dose of Covid, has barely had more than a sniffle in all these years.

You didn't do anything wrong. You didn't wreck anything. Formula isn't poison. You have a healthy child, that's all that matters. Take care and be kind to yourself.

YABU and I think you need to get some perspective. You have a healthy and living child. It really doesn’t matter how you got there.

You poor thing. Formula was necessary. It was medicine. You breastfed for 4 months! That's a massive achievement.

I had some major breastfeeding traumas too but by 2 years all the pain and guilt had faded. Kindly, perhaps seek counselling to help you move on from this. No one at the school gates talks about whether their kid was breastfed or not.

My youngest needed top-ups for survival. Just couldn't latch properly until almost 4 months of age. It's no different from giving necessary medication.

I'm all for breastfeeding and think it's great but each baby is an individual. They all have different needs. You did what was right for you and your baby.

Between my two kids, you can't tell which one was exclusively breastfed and which one wasn't. They're both utterly hilarious little creatures who fill me with equal levels of joy and despair depending on what kind of day they're having 🙃 They're both caring, clever and love a good cuddle. I have no regrets about how either one of them was fed.

Don't feel guilty. I feel guilty I didn't give top-ups after being so militant about them not having a drop. Reason being they all had CMPA in early childhood which was a nightmare and caused them discomfort. New research has discovered that EBF babies who don't have any formula are much more likely to develop CMPA. It would be fine if the UK diet wasn't so dairy heavy, but knowing what I know now, I'd have given them some formula before 6 months to reduce the risk of dairy sensitivity.

I had to go to mixed feeding within about 10 days and give up of bfing entirely by 12 weeks with my oldest.

I really want to say to people in a similar position:

Guilt is not mandatory. You're not being any more of a loving, capable mum by wracking youself with guilt than if you're not. No one is judging you but yourself. I felt no regrets at all, in fact I'm glad I did it.

Incidentally, I did manage to make bfing work with my second - there's no difference in health outcomes or bonding between the two kids. I always support mums doing whatever keeps the baby fed and her able to function, which also means not doing bfing it makes her miserable, trapped, in pain etc

I stopped breastfeeding first after 24 hours because I just didn’t like it. Didn’t even bother trying with my second.

I can’t imagine what difference breastfeeding would have made to my life or theirs, it’s completely irrelevant to all of us. They’re perfect and thriving. It’s baby formula not arsenic, they bloody loved it.

You’re obviously struggling with what’s happened though, which to an outsider seems massively irrational, but I’m sure does not to you. I hope you’ve got the mental health support that you need. Your baby couldn’t give less of a fuck where their milk came from, I promise you.

OP, kindly, I think you need professional support/help. I have three kids, I was determined to BF first time round, similar story to you, she was dropping massive amounts of weight, she ended up fully FF by 3 months. The guilt and shame I felt was horrific but I got over it and now don’t give it one seconds thought. Second baby didn’t have one drop of breastmilk as I just didn’t want to put myself through it again- and I also had a GA section and was totally out of it for a while. Third baby I did a small amount of expressing for a few weeks just as he was small and I had time but tbh I produced very little milk and felt no guilt stopping. Please seek support, you have done NOTHING wrong and your toddler is fine.

I mean this kindly - but you need to put this in perspective. A lot of babies died in the olden days, before formula milk was a thing; I suspect that your baby (as well as my first child) would have been among them without them. You did your best and you fed your child and your child is now thriving. What is being a good mother if not that? Please be kind to yourself and move on to the next stage of parenting. Do not agonise over the past, especially over something that was out of your control.

This is a problem inside your head - you sound unwell and to be honest, what you are saying is irrational.

I bf two babies for over two years each. The third had tongue tie and was always mixed fed due to problems gaining weight, and I stopped bf at all when she was a couple of months old. Do you think I'm a bad mum?

You're being so cruel to yourself.

I’m sorry you are feeling so bad about this. So much pressure/expectations placed on mothers to breast feed, but it doesn’t go well for everyone. As others have said, fed is best and you now have a thriving toddler.

I had a similar experience with my DD who had failed to gain any weight by the 6week check and was a tiny scrap at birth anyway. Old ladies wouldn’t believe she was 6 weeks old as she was so tiny! I too had to top up and she moved to be completely formula fed.
She is now a healthy and successful 20something - I doubt being exclusively breastfed would have improved her life in any way.

Please don't beat yourself up over this.
I bf my daughter until she was 6 months. I couldn't express as I didn't have much of a supply and was absolutely exhausted by the lack of sleep and not being able to have a break but suffered until she was 6 months old and o was told that was the minimum.
When my son was born he was always starving so I topped up with formula a a my husband gave him a bottle at 2200 so I could actually get some sleep. It did mess up my supply and I stopped breastfeeding when he was 6 weeks old.
The kids are now 19 and 17. They are healthy, happy and I have a great relationship with them. My decisions did not harm them, they are fine.

Please be kind to yourself

Excuse the typos!

I'm sorry you're feeling like this, and that you've been through PND. You shouldn't feel any guilt about what you did, and agree with someone else that the way youre addressing yourself sounds cruel. I don't feel guilty at all about only breastfeeding my babies for a couple of weeks - it just wasn't comfortable for me, I didn't want to go through more pain, I wasn't very committed to it anyway. So I switched to FF and it was fine - great actually. By your account I should feel the lowest of the low for that, but I don't! And that's ok

Also had to do this with one of mine, never crossed my mind to feel guilty. I did my best at the time. We also started to wean earlier than is now recommended and I don't just mean by a week or two. But we the parents, the hospital consultant, and the health visitor were in agreement. We had a bumpy first year but that child thrived once we got the feeding right, and is now a fit and well adult.

They make out that newborn feeding is the most important thing. In the scheme of things it’s nothing. There’s so many more decisions you’ll need to make but you make them with love and with the information available at the time.

my dm - who I love dearly - breast feed my brother but couldn’t me. However, over the years that followed she fed me the most incredible meals, baked my birthday cakes, was there for every show/assembly/sports day/when I was sick/when I failed at things etc the list is endless, and that’s what I remember of my childhood.

Don't feel guilty

I breastfed by 1st child for 18 months. Right from the start he latched on and it was a total breeze. I was a breastfeeding superstar, fed him everywhere with ease.

Then I had a 2nd child who had undiagnosed jaundice. At 7 days and rapidly losing weight she was re-admitted to hospital. I was at my wits end, she wouldn't feed, screamed the place down as she was hungry. In hospital I gave her formula whilst breathing pumping and within about 2 weeks she was exclusively formula fed. Whilst in hospital a retired relief midwife came in to my room at about 2am and suggested that I needed to try harder and not bottle feed- I almost threw the breast pump at her and actually it was a cathartic moment as I knew it wasn't me- sometimes it just doesn't work! The Consultant apologised to me the next day (the baby was very unwell and needed feeding as a priority and bottle feeding was part of the medical plan)

Had he been my 1st I would wrongly have felt such a failure but It was the circumstances- just like you

They are both very healthy adults, no difference in bonding or attachment.

Stop torturing yourself, you really really tried. There is bigger stuff to sweat over in parenting.. FWIW when I got put on antibiotics with dc2 and wasn't allowed to bf I saw it as my get out of jail free card

OP, you are not fully recovered from your PPD.

It doesn’t matter how babies are fed, as long as they are fed. Me and my first BF and loved it. Me and my second, not so much and moved to FF quickly. I feel no guilt as there is nothing wrong with either method you just have to do what feels right for you at the time.

Please seek out some more counselling x

Oh OP, I'm so sorry you had that experience. Breastfeeding support in the UK is woeful. I recognise many aspects of your story myself, having battled through 4 months of undiagnosed tongue tie, triple feeding regimes, and weight loss.

I strongly recommend the following, easy to read and short book:

Why Breastfeeding Grief and Trauma Matter (Pinter & Martin Why it Matters: 17) https://amzn.eu/d/fvIWFDf

@Nguilty I am so sorry to read this. I wasn't able to successfully feed ds. Contradicting advice, lack of support, unbelievably sore breasts including infective mastitis. The guilt was unbelievable but so too was the breast is best mantra from midwives and he's whilst being spectacularly ignorant about techniques, support and the disadvantages if mother AND baby aren't happy and well.

I failed miserably with DS and managed to feed DD successfully until she was 8 months I felt equally miserable about it when ds was 2. However to cut to the chase:

Both DC had bronchiolitis, asthma, eczema and rank ears. Both grew up fit and strong. DS did his first degree at Oxford, DD at Cambridge. DS did his DPhil at Cambridge.

Your son won't remember being breastfed or anything from that time. He will remember giggles and raspberries after the bath, his favourite stories, you yelling encouragement when he scores his first goal or try, you wiping away his tears when he grazes a knee or gets chucked by a girlfriend, waving from the quad as on his way to Senate House to collect his degree. Those are the memories that matter.

OP, I get it. Are you on social media? Please follow Professor Amy Brown or buy her book "breastfeeding grief and trauma" if you can afford it. It'll help you regain your sanity I promise z

I didn’t have the slightest bit of interest in trying to breastfeed.

It was much easier to use formula and that’s what we did. In fact we mostly used the little ready made bottles and cartons.

I honestly hadn’t even given it a second thought again until I read this thread.

As long as your child is being fed I really don’t see what the issue is.

OP, look after yourself now for the next years with your DD. That's what she needs and what you can enjoy together.

It's far too common that new mothers don't get the support they need and end up stressed beyond breaking point. Having a first baby is mentally and physically the most vulnerable point in most women's lives. We ought to be caring for them, not putting them through all this trauma.

But what you can do now is follow up the therapy suggestions PPs have made. And be kind to yourself - you are clearly the loving mother your DD needs. Hopefully you'll be around to give better support when she has her own children.

I agree with PP’s that you need to ask for some help, you shouldn’t be struggling with guilt like this. 💐

So many new Mums have problems bf, I did with both my children (they were terrible at latching) and had to go down the lactation consultant route, pumping, trying different positions like you. I also needed to top up with formula per the pediatrician’s advice and guess what, I have two healthy teenagers.

I was solely formula fed back in the 1970’s, as were many people, and I’m a healthy specimen too. 😀

It sounds as if you may be struggling with anxiety, please speak to your doctor about it.