To think breastfeeding is less important than a healthy diet?

[Chocaholick]

Just a musing really but I follow quite a few ladies on Instagram who are very very passionate about breastfeeding - lots of posts about the health benefits and how amazing breastmilk is and so on.

But once their children start solids, they (and the dads) seem to give them absolute junk - McDonalds twice a week, frozen pizza, Iceland type oven food and loads of unhealthy snacks, slushies.

Of course the ‘ideal’ is both to breastfeed and give healthy food, but AIBU to think a year or two of breastmilk is in the scheme of things less important than 18 years of a reasonably healthy diet? And it’s odd to be so health focussed about your baby’s diet for the first year but ‘anything goes’ thereafter?

Because it's the working class that do it

You might not "think" there's a sufficient amount of difference but the research is definitive on this. Formula milk is wonderful in many ways and has kept many, many babies alive who otherwise would have struggled. It's saved the sanity of countless women. But there is absolutely no question that breastmilk (in particular breastfeeding, not just pumping) is far more nutritious, protective, easier to digest and generally beneficial for babies.

Edited to add: sorry, just noted that you said not a sufficient amount of difference to justify the suffering of women struggling to breastfeed and I totally agree with you there! Far better to ensure a happy and healthy mum, always, however she chooses to feed.

There are mums who are passionate about breastfeeding up to and after the child is four years old. Some project an almost holy sense of being more virtuous than others. I agree that a long term healthy diet is more important overall. Occasional fast food treats are fine. But stocking your home with ultra-processed junk and raising children who wouldn’t recognize a vegetable in the wild is not.

But it's odd to be a zealott about one and not the other, isn't it?

I suspect they're just doing it all for followers.

Mmmm maybe but god knows I thought it'd be easier to feed my child a healthy diet than it actually is...

This is my point really, that generally the health conscious people I know see it in a holistic way, eg most aspects of their life are healthy. I just find it odd that people so passionate about ‘health and nutrition/formula is poison’ don’t see a slushy as poison 2 months later.

I think you would probably know more what I meant if you knew the people I’m referring to - multiple posts every day about breastfeeding, all the facts about how alive and amazing breastmilk is, to go straight from that to twice weekly McDonalds is a bit at odds to me but there you go.

Both are incredibly important for long term and short term health and developmentS No idea which matters more. Incidentally, breastfeeding has numerous health benefits for the mother too. Plus of course emotional benefits for both mum and baby. Breastfeeding is about far more than just nutrition - it supplies antibodies and helps with proper jaw development, plus much more.

I was breastfed until past 1. I have an appalling diet. I had 3 snickers bars for breakfast today, a Greggs sausage roll for lunch and to be fair I’m eating a healthier dinner of…. Heinz vegetable soup with some bread and butter. 🤣 (I’m naturally slim but I am well aware that is pure luck)

I have breastfed all my children, however I have also occasionally given them a McDonald’s or a fruit shoot, Greggs sausage roll etc as I think swinging one way or the other too extremely is silly. I don’t demonise any food, it’s 90% ‘healthy’ stuff for my kids and then of course treats and upfs sometimes. I don’t want kids to feel deprived and then develop unhealthy food habits when they have control of their own food choices.
That being said I don’t do any junk really until well after 1; I did get into an argument with my SIL that I wouldn’t let my 6 month old baby have some chocolate buttons or ice cream. She thought I was being precious, but I personally don’t see the need when they’re that tiny. When they’re old enough to ask for some, or they feel left out then I relax a bit.

IME women who breastfeed tend to be more concerned about providing their DC a healthy diet anyway.

I am not super health conscious but i do breastfeed on demand and i attribute my breastfeeding to a love for convenience/ease.

Breastfeeding and laissez faire attitude to food does go together. Doesnt need to but i can see how someone who chooses a convenient easy way of feeding her child (hang boob in baby mouth while scrolling instagram or sleeping) would just give her child whatever she is eating. I am often guilty of the same lol but i try my best to give him healthier choices. I have been known to give a pouch or 2 though!

Sure but there are other benefits - bottles are a serious faff, boob is on demand, formula is expensive etc.

You should what your kid to be healthy from borth onward - but then I guess that’s easy for me to say as it was important to me that my kids were breastfed, ate organic, no sugar till one and then extremely limited in toddler years etc.

This is something I feel very passionately about given my experience. I wasn’t able to breastfeed due to a breast reduction operation I’d had before having my sons.
While in a ‘baby friendly hospital’ with my first son, after a long and difficult birth, I was kept awake and lectured by the midwives about why I wasn’t trying breastfeeding, even though I’d made a firm decision for good reasons. It left me feeling inadequate as a new mum.
I then went all out with both my son’s food when they were weaned. Absolutely homemade everything, including the stock!
I’m pleased and proud to say both my sons are and have been incredibly healthy and have grown into amazing young men.
Breastfeeding is not the be all and end all some think it to be. Diet and attitude to food is far more important in my opinion as it sets the tone for lifestyle choices into adulthood.

I think it’s probably developing healthy food habits in childhood (which last a lifetime) which is the most important. And I say this as a huge breastfeeding advocate, I have volunteered as breastfeeding support and I bf all my own children until two years old. I really believe in it but also I can see that the impact of breastfeeding isn’t very obvious in the older years, whether it is very plain to see who has a good or bad diet by around 10/11 years old. Sometimes younger, if it’s really bad.

it starts to affect hair and skin visibly by then.

How much exercise kids get is probably the most important I would argue. I have worked with families in homeless accommodation and seen kids lacking the most basic movement skills by 5 years old and I wonder what their health will be like at 60.

Breastfeeding is just one piece in a large jigsaw puzzle of what makes up a healthy childhood.

Birthweight is an enormous determinant of future health right throughout a person's life - regardless of whether you were breast feeding. Doctors don't tell you this because it is very difficult to increase birth weight even with perfect nutrition. Overall, a 10 pounder is always going to be healthier than a 4 pounder. I was a 10 pounder and somewhat distraught my sons were only 8 and a half pounds each. My MIL thought my babies were simply enormous so I suspect the rot set in from her side.

Is it pure luck?

Do you have an evidence for this?

I would be more worried about the 10 pound baby honestly, in case of undiagnosed gestational diabetes.

Bizarre to be upset about having an 8 pound baby.

Clutching at straws as I don’t know anyone who has done this to the extreme that op is describing but I suppose it depends on why they breastfed. For some its cost, it’s free to breastfeed (if you don’t pump) or attachment. So maybe it was never about nutrition.

What would you say it is? Genetics? Who knows. But if my husband ate like me he’d be absolutely huge.

It's too early to tell if there will be any long term effects but I'm glad I breastfed both of mine for a long time...DS1 has a healthy diet/eats anything but DS2 has turned out to be mega fussy (we are working on it but it is slow going).

Breastfeeding is the holy grail and will give your child so many health benefits and the absolute best start in life.
It can never be compared to formula, its like day and night.

People will feed their children junk if they are that way inclined.

It’s probably healthier to be breastfeed and then fed junk than formula fed and then fed junk. Though a childhood of being fed healthy food probably has a bigger impact on overall health than whether the first year is breastmilk or formula.

But I don’t how you really know what people’s children eat day to day though. My kids have a fruit shoot at a kids party because it’s often the only drink that’s provided for children. They might have a McDonald’s if we’re travelling or something. It doesn’t mean they’re raised on a unhealthy food.

I think you’re getting confused with birth weight and prematurity.

A premature baby may be more prone to health issues throughout their lives than a full term baby. When my almost 5 year old has a health issues we get asked about his birth and if he was premature because these things make a difference longer term.

A baby who is 10lbs because of gestational diabetes is also more likely to have health issues later down the line.

Babies weight percentile can absolutely change from their birth weight. My son was around the 40th percentile when he was born, just under 8lbs but by 3months old he was up to the 95th percentile (breastfed) and tracked that until he was around 3 years old. Equally I know people whose babies were born on the 60th percentile but by 3 months were around the 20th and tracked that for years into childhood.

Both were hugely important to me. No point arguing over which is better.

I know overall breastfed babies are supposed to eat a wider variety of foods.

Mine was an absolute nightmare with weaning and I don’t think breastfeeding on demand helped. She didn’t want to eat anything and coupled with being constantly ill over the winter ended up in hospital due to low iron. At one she would have been getting most of her calories from breast milk. I felt like a failure and had honestly tried every thing.

To start with she started taking more of the processed crap (no doubt people on here would judge for that) but now at 3 she has a very balanced diet and I’m very conscious about her iron intake. Although it costs a fortune, her favourite foods are berries, salmon, lamb and prawns 🤪