To feel rubbish about this - breastfeeding groups

[Fiftycents]

I go to a local mother and baby group, it’s very casual and usually friendly. Made quite a few friends there.

Before the mother and baby group there is a breastfeeding group, there is a 30 min gap between the two but some mums stay on for the baby group.

Went to baby group as normal yesterday and about halfway through a lady stood up and announced some ‘good news’ and proceeded to hand out certificates for some breastfeeding mums, for 6 weeks and 3 months breastfeeding. We were then all asked to give them a round of applause for all they had achieved.

AIBU to think this is a insensitive to those that wanted to breastfeed but couldn’t? I tried for weeks to bf dd, we saw multiple lactation consultants, had tongue tie cut tried nipple shields etc but as she spent time in SCBU after she was born and was tiny she had always had formula and I ended up switching as she wouldn’t latch at all. I stopped expressing after 2 months as my own mental health was suffering.

YANBU - it was insensitive and they could have just waited for the next week to give out certificates
YABU - get over it

Often breastfeeding doesn’t work because women don’t know how. Because their own mothers never breastfed. I had to have someone else’s mother show me how to breastfeed (she even knew all the breast positions to use for tongue tie / cleft lip etc and spent time teaching me) because she bf all her children as did her mum. She wasn’t British though.

What on earth do you do with a certificate for breastfeeding?! 😂

Yes, it is insensitive to those who couldn't, undermines the choices of those who didn't and puts additional pressure on those who are doing but might want to stop.

I think this is majorly cringey and would be more appropriate to stay in the group but I wouldn't be cross about it.

I couldn't get annoyed with someone being celebrated for anything. I can't run a marathon (despite trying to get into running many times) but I'm not about to dull someone else's sparkle.

I should add I formula fed as never even produced milk despite wanting to breast feed.

Often breastfeeding doesn't work because the baby doesn't know how. Do you really think the woman who showed you did anything different to the dozens of midvives, health visitors, lacation consultants, friends, or relatives that the OP encountered? I mean there is only a finite number of angles and positions to try.

Certificates for breast feeding is OTT.
It's also maybe forcing women into bf long after they actually want to. It's peer pressure.

Absolutely no need to do that outside of the group. I could not breastfeed DC1 (truly horrible journey that definitely made my suspected PPD worse) and I would have been horrified if this had happened during that period.

Who runs this group OP? Please consider complaining. I truly would need to let someone know that this was not appropriate. Pitting mothers against each other (because that’s what it is when done publicly) who have very young babies and who may be struggling mentally is highly inappropriate.

ps - I could get on my soapbox very easily about the messaging around breastfeeding, particularly for first time mums. I was the only one of a large group of new mum friends who bottle fed before 6 months. Despite what everyone often says, my experience was that I was in the minority who bottle fed early. And do you know what, it saved me and DC1’s sanity and health. My DC1 was underweight, crying constantly from hunger and I was on the verge of a mental breakdown trying to exclusively breastfeed. Yes maybe it was stress preventing breastfeeding but no matter what the reason, when I switched to formula it was a lifesaver.

@ChiffandBipper I paid £1,000 on a lactation consultant who actually knew what she was doing and she got me and baby to learn how to breastfeed. I called her on day 2 from hospital when I realized the midwives in hospital and HVs were absolutely clueless and just pressured me to formula feed for an easy life. My baby is 6 weeks old and breastfeeding is going amazingly. That consultant will forever be my hero. So yes, I find midwives nowadays know fuck all about breastfeeding anymore and a bit of knowledge really does help.

Quite frankly being 'awarded' for feeding your own baby is really weird!

It's up there with '100% school attendance' awards. Like congratulations you wonderful child for not catching a tummy bug or needing your tonsils out this year?!

This was almost my reply 😂

Hardly. I didn't think I was going to feed past 2. My son is 2.5.

I didn’t just see midwives in the hospital I saw lactation consultants both private and NHS. It wasn’t really to do with positioning my DD was so tiny she didn’t have the energy to feed. She was born by C-section and poorly so we didn’t have skin to skin and she was bottle fed by the midwives (with my permission) in SCBU as she had low blood sugars and needed to eat. I expressed for a while but found it near impossible with a baby that wouldn’t be put down! I don’t think she’s ever managed to latch. She doesn’t even really like drinking from bottles.

Humanity wouldn't have survived if babies didn't know how to breastfeed. In countries where breastfeeding support is properly funded, breastfeeding rates are much higher, despite the fact that babies are the same worldwide, and breasts are the same worldwide. There are a very tiny number of women who cannot breastfeed and a very tiny number of babies who cannot latch, for whatever reason. Formula is a lifesaving miracle for that tiny number of babies, who in the past would likely have died.

It’s also a miracle in that it gives women a choice. Thankfully women aren’t forced to breastfeed if they don’t want to.

No, they certainly aren't- in fact, given ~85% of women state a wish to exclusively breastfeed and only about ~1% end up doing so, I'd say it's quite the opposite and women are forced to formula feed by inadequate education and support, along with increasingly sophisticated and insidious formula company marketing techniques.

My experience was kind of like this. I wanted to BF but the midwives in the hospital didn’t have a clue. They tried to pressure me in to giving him a bottle and wouldn’t let me go home until we had ‘established’ BF… it was strongly hinted that I could go home and ‘give up a bed’ if I switched to formula. I pumped and pumped to feed him what I had but I had no idea about colostrum and how you only produce a tiny amount of it so I thought nothing was coming out. Another said I only had to feed him every three hours and not to bother waking in the night to do it. Another said ‘even if he only latches for a minute that will probably be enough. He may just want to play with your nipple’
They were useless and he was tiny.
We got home and I still struggled until I fortunately was able to access some good advice. Luckily for us, it was a simple size issue. My boobs were too big for his tiny mouth to latch on to. Simple fix was to hand express a small amount before I fed him to ‘soften’ my boobs and then it was easy to shove my nipple in his mouth. From then on it was so much easier (apart from cluster feeding and sore nipples and thrush and all that other wonderful stuff!)

OP, for what it’s worth, I genuinely think that what you feed your child from weaning age, until they are grown up, has a much, MUCH bigger impact on their overall health than breast milk as an infant.

I agree that those who want to breastfeed need more support.

Not everyone wants to breastfeed though and I still stand by the fact that it’s good that women aren’t forced to breastfeed. Formula is a wonderful invention.

OP just to reassure you that you don’t ever have to justify why your DD is bottle fed. I felt the need to do this with DC1 and looking back it truly was not anyone’s business ♥️

And I still stand by the fact it's bad that many women are forced to formula feed.

Like I said, more support for those who want to breastfeed is needed.

Those who don’t want to though should be left alone after an initial discussion.

I wanted to check the statistics posted on the thread which led me to this site

https://www.unicef.org.uk/babyfriendly/about/breastfeeding-in-the-uk/

More than half of mothers were still breastfeeding at 6 weeks and over a third at six months.
81% of new mothers started breastfeeding
Just 1% were still exclusively breastfeeding at 6 months

Although it also says that 8 out of 10 women stopped breastfeeding before they wanted to. But I'm not sure that we should hold women to a decision they made before baby arrived and before they knew if it was even possible. Alternatives are good for mothers and babies who either can't breastfeed at all or who can only breastfeed at significant cost to the mother. Exclusive breastfeeding seems a very high bar to set.

Is it always a case though that most women who intend to breastfeed stop because of lack of support or formula marketing techniques though? While I don't doubt those are factors, is it also not a case of many of those 85% of new mothers who intended to breast feed found that in reality they simply did not want to do it? They disliked the feeling of it or underestimated the demands of it? However, the societal pressure to do it is huge so when asked why they are not breast feeding they will resort to saying things like 'oh, I can't produce enough' or 'my milk took too long to come in' rather than simply admitting 'I just don't want to.' As I said earlier in the thread, I formula fed from the start so none of this applied to me and when asked I would always state that I had chosen formula, but maybe women who change their minds feel under pressure to give an acceptable reason.

How is there societal pressure to do it when the vast majority of women don't? Formula is normalised, breastfeeding is not.

The vast majority of women start out breastfeeding. There’s definitely societal pressure to do it during pregnancy, even if a woman doesn’t want to.

It’s also a reason why so many women feel guilty when they stop breastfeeding for whatever reason.