breast is best

[Haitch27]

Is anyone else who is pregnant sick to the back bloody teeth of the 'breast is best' campaign being shoved down your throat everywhere you turn and being badgered by health carers to attend breastfeeding 'workshops'?? Maybe its just where I live but it seems to be everywhere yet the one thing no one says is "are you planning to breastfeed"? Assumption that all Mums will!!
Curious to know as I said if it is just my area or is it everywhere?

RubyBuckleberry, no, most women who know the facts don't choose to breastfeed. That is why we have campaigns to change cultural perceptions of breastfeeding.

i agree with milly - don't get it. perhaps it is nature's way - survival of the fittest and all that.

gasp - highly controversial i know but its just a thought

millymoomoo-how do you work that one out.I did not feel the need or the urge to be a milking machine as I had a brilliant alternative so what is the problem?

what are these campaigns that challenge cultural perceptions?

change

The campaign we have been discussing on this thread - the be a star campaign aimed at young mothers.

Message withdrawn

"Wouldn't anyone, knowing the facts, and medically able to do so, breastfeed their baby?"

Well no, they wouldn't. Which is the problem that people are discussing on this thread. Women are given the facts. Many choose not to BF for reasons like peer pressure,society, the norm in their environment. Others choose not to for reasons surrounding their bodies and how they feel about them. Others will make a decision based on their home and work situation. and so on and so on.

There are a myriad of reasons women decide not to BF, and some of them interact in a complex way. Which is why having all the posters and midwives saying "breast is best" every 5 mins is not having much of an impact.

There is also the fact the Bf rates drop off very quickly, with many women who try to BF at outset, no longer BF after a few weeks. That indicates that there are women who have taken the message on board but then who stop anyway. The intention was there, why have they stopped? I would say lack of practical support.

maybe i am not the audience for that campaign as i have never come across it. that's one - i am talking about a major campaign aimed at everyone.

TBH, I'm 16 wks pregnant at the moment with our first so am going through the NHS ante-natal system at the moment and have had next to nothing on breast feeding...certainly ni shoving down throat or pressure. The MW asked me what I was planning on, I told her I was planning on BF (simply because that's how I've always believed it was done) and she said 'great' and circled an option on the form. She said that some people found it very difficult so to keep an open mind, but that on the whole it was absolutely fine. She gave me a copy of 'Emma's Diary' telling me she wasn't supposed to give it out any more as it was seen to support FF, but that she thought it was a nice thing for pregnant women to have as it gave a lot of information on different topics in a chatty fashion.

It certainly wasn't thrust down my thoat one way or the other, and I can't say I've seen any posters either. I know where to look for support as I have done a lot of research on the internet.

I have been told that the ante-natal classes will have a session on BF-ing, but that this wasn't meant to alienate anyone but there wasn't time to cover both during the courses and more support/education was needed for BF than FF. (Both are covered, but more time on BF.) BUT, it said that if any ladies wanted to FF then to mention it to the leader and she would either fit in some more time or talk to them seperately.

I think the fact that it is better for the baby is indisputable, however FF is better than nothing at all which is the option faced by those who can't BF for whatever reason. And FF your child is not going to 'poison' or kill them, the formulas are great now. I think choosing not to because of body image sexualisation is an odd choice and one I disagree with, but certainly not enough to ever vocalise it to the person in question. Choices are choices, many people prob won't agree with every choice I make for my child, but they are my/our choices to make and I would certainly never see fit to make a judgement to someone.

aimed at MILs, DHs, extended family, friends - the whole of society!

Sorry, many typos.

Not least in last para, meant to read: "body image or sexualisation".

For example there are women on this thread who chose to FF. They knew the facts and chose to FF.

Or don't they really exist?

Just because you personally can't comprehend of another way of thinking, doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Posts like yours I think show the real reason a lot of these campaigns don't work, people are preaching to the converted and unwilling to even try to understand the actual problems that are out there.

christiana why wasn't it a brilliant alternative.Did my kids well both thriving non allergic non excema covered individuals. Me tall slim back to healthy weight etc so why wasn't it brilliant?

I totally agree with all the support that women need, I just didn't see how one woman saying one thing would put someone off breastfeeding.

LadyintheRadiator - Well said.

I thought Allidon's post, from the perspective of a formula feeder, was a very good one.

I don't think it would be possible to have a campaign aimed at everyone, because people's feelings about breastfeeding are so diverse that it is better to aim at specific groups of people.

Although I do think we should target people long before they have children. Breastfeeding should be a bigger part of sex education in school.

Haven't read all of this but I hate threads like this. They just make me so very

I tried and tried to bf my DD but I didn;t get the help I needed when I needed it. She ended up back in hospital at 5 days old, on a drip, severely dehydrated. I nearly killed her trying to bf her. A bf midwife came to the children's ward and shouted at me for giving her formula, which the consultant had given her to immediately get something into her. I cried solidly for three weeks. I couldn't bear to give her bottles and a felt like a total failure. In the end though I managed to mixed feed for 6.5 months.

Fast forward 20 months and a bout of illness left my unable to care for dd for a good few weeks. All those feelings of being unable to care for my baby came back, and I'm now on antidepressants, have have been for nearly a year.

We're ttc no.2 at the moment, and I'd very much like to bf this time. We're better informed, and we'll be able to get help much sooner. But if for whatever reason it doesn't work out, I'm not going to spend the next two years of my life mourning for the lost breastfeeds.

I was just going to post if i'd known bottle feeding added inches to my height it might have been a whole different conversation lol

ladyintheradiator-my opinions are just that.I express myself as I wish, thank you.

Already the majority of UK mothers start to breastfeed and then 90% of these mothers stop before 6 weeks stating that they are not ready to stop.

We already have plenty of mother initiating breastfeeding, what they need is the support to help them to continue until they are ready to stop.

The fact that women know that FF costs the NHS millions, increases various risks to their baby(ies) and still do it, is a damning indictment of some women's attitude in general, as well as a damning indictment of today's society, in particular the representation of women in society, and how in many ways we have totally ballsed up our thinking on fundamental aspects of human life.