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?

foxytocin where have I attacked women who are actually making a difference on the ground?

I wasn't trying to engage anyone at the time though. I was stating that many times we (including me) look for external reasons for our failures where none exist.

Guilt and blaming ourselves is something that some of us are culturally inclined to do. Repair this inner fault and we will make ourselves happier in lots of other ways besides child rearing.

Guilt is such a useless emotion.

you didn't attack anyone on the ground ISNT. other people in the thread are. Mostly out of ignorance at what the BAS initiative is about and who Little Angels are. I don't know who they are because I can't be arsed to go back and itemise them. I am not having a go at you or anyone else, for the record.

I am off to change my top and have a quality afternoon with my family.

ISNT, you're missing the point. Those women that cannot bfeed for medical reasons or failed to bfeed due to poor support, the ones that you refer to as feeling inadequate and guilty, they aren't the ones that the posters are aimed at. You say the campaign isn't hitting the spot, but they're trying to encourage people to feed, to normalise it, they're not comments on those that didn't or couldn't.

How far do you want to take this? Posters about best practice for avoiding SIDS. They are aimed at the women making the decisions now, if they make a woman who sadly lost her child to SIDS feel guilty for co-sleeping for example instead of using a cot, do we say the campaign isn't working? No we don't, we say that the woman's experience means that she brings a lot of emotion to the reading of a poster that others don't but it doesn't undo the veracity of the message or its importance.

I feel guilty and inadequate daily that I couldn't have a natural birth. Am I arrogant enough to assume that they should stop promoting the idea that a natural intervention-free delivery is best? Of course not. I'm more passionate about it, despite the guilt and feelings of inadequacy. I don't want to hide the message away, I want other women supported to not feel the way I do through encouragement, information and promotion and support for those few for whom the 'best' isn't attainable.

The poster further up who said 'breastfeeding is normal, am I ABNORMAL?' shows the problem. Breastfeeding is normal and needs to be normalised further in this country. No it's not a comment on you or an implication. FF is inferior. It is artificial. It might be the norm in this country, it might be an adequate substitute but it's not 'normal' by definition.

I have encountered problems, my first child was jaundiced, losing weight and sick, and there was no bf support in my hospital, who were pushing formula at us. i didn;t really expect any though as we have no nhs and even worse bf rates than the UK. I also had no family support.Which is why I had read and studied abour bf and found a BF support group and went out and learned and persevered.
I'm no superwoman and I'm nothing special. I'm just so sick of the attitude that its too hard and so many women saying oh I couldn't BF, I didn't have enough milk etc etc, when they could have really. This message that its always so hard and maybe you can try it but have the bottle ready when of you give up....you're doomed before you start with the prevailing attitude that its something thats too hard.

I think we need to go back to basics, we should be teaching children in school that nearly all women can breastfeed and thats its normal and even though it might take a bit of work you can all do it.

Thats ok MPuppykin, good luck with it all, there are people more in the know than me on here. I never thought that i would do this, but i have got the Politics on Breastfeeding and it all makes sense, seek out support yourself if you do plan to bf and do some research. Call the NCT and LLL and prepare yourself, and no to feel guilt or failure if things do not turn our how you plan

And it's not like an advert for bog roll not working. It's like people who can't defecate because they were born without an arse complaining that the advert makes them feel inadequate because they never had the choice to wipe.

Oh FFS! If you don't want to do it, don't. But don't complain about a campaign that tries to encourage women to do something that is beneficil to them and their baby.

But women do try to BF, the campaign has worked. The midwives promote it, the antenatal classes promote it, there are posters VDs blogs leaflets. Special classes. People listen and pay heed. They decide to BF. They make the decision while they are pregnant, which is when they see all this info.

Then they have the baby, there is sod all support, they try to BF and it's painful or difficult or more timeconsuming than they had expected etc and there is hardly any support. So they stop. And feel guilty.

Enough already with the campaign. It has got too much. it is all anyone talks about when you are pregnant. I have not said there should not be a campaign - not sure where you got that from - but it has got too much. Many other women on this thread agree. Many women on this thread agree that the reason women dont' BF is lack of support.

Well poo this is exactly why women feel guilt of failure if they cant bf, like they have not tried enough or are lazy and cant be bothered that most women should be able to bf so they are failures, where that is not the case at all. The decision for a mum to give formula is not taken lightly and the parents or mum at the time has to look at the whole siutation and do what they think is best and not be criticised or made to feel guilt.

I rather like the every breastfeed counts imo which it does. Poo It good that you overcame problems to continue to bf but we are not all you, as i said now i learned from experience that i will seek out support to bf instead of rely entirely on the NHS, it took me that to realise that i would have to do things myself.

There is support! GET THE PHONE NUMBER FROM THE DESPISED POSTERS and ring La leche, ring the NCT, ring the national bf line, get a counsellor to your house. There is loads of support if you can bother your arse to go get it.

If you take down the sodding posters there will be less support.

ISNT - I have never heard of that dehydration thing, however I am very tired and run down due to bfing ginormobaby so I will not click the link and give myself cyberchondria - but will have a pint of water instead! Very good point about lack of info about hydration. Would add nutrition, too. New mothers are often anxious to lose weight (whole other debate there I know) yet bfeeding works best with an increased calorie intake. It's really hard to find the right balance of food that provides you both with good nutrition. There is a danger of either eating too little, or completely giving in to all cravings for cake and chocolate and storing up problems for later on. I'm talking mainly about mothers' nutritional needs here, since as I understand it breastmilk maintains a good quality for the baby even on a very poor or restricted diet.

Foxytocin, that Roosevelt quote is one of my favourites. I do think though that self esteem is particularly fragile on the maternity ward. Isn't it a common saying that you "leave your dignity at the door?" New mothers commonly feel that matters have been taken out of their hands. I certainly did. My self-esteem was nowhere to be found for years after my first, so permission to feel inferior was granted very easily.

For some however much support they have for various factors they will not be able to bf.

Breast is best. What's the problem?!

And midwives should assume everyone will breastfeed as it's the normal thing for us mammals to do.

Piglet, in that case we need a massive study into why exactly British women physiologically cannot breastfeed, when in other countries almost 100% can? There must be something really bad happening, because before formula was invented 99% + people were breastfed, what on earth has gone wrong.
You're buying into the lies. And saying that you are made to feel guilty is perpetuating the myths. There is something between being physically unable to do it and being lazy or not trying.Think about it.

I'm currently bf'ing my 3 month old dd and have found the support of hcp to be superb from day one, although I know our health authority are going for a UNICEF award that has probably brought funding with it. I'm aware that friends outside of the authority have had miserable experiences. My biggest grief has been from well-meaning non-hcps who, when I was pregnant, would ask whether I intended to... Erm... Not your business but I'd like to try. 'well don't be disappointed if you can't. Not everyone can.' I've had people move away from me (in a hospital!) although I'm as discreet as can be. I've even not gone out when dd was being a bit fussy and kept on knocking the shawl away. I've also had lots of, 'you're so lucky's from people when a) I didn't bring up the subject and b) went through weeks of hell and currently have mastitis. I too would embrace a breast is normal poster... Especially on M&S caf!

Sorry... Poorly boobs

QN I bet you needed that rant!!

ISNT, but poo is right. Without those leaflets or posters, I wouldn't have had support. It's where I got the number from for a bfc and info while I waited for her arrival.

If you don't want a leaflet, say no thank you, if you don't want to look at the posters, read the one on contraception next to it, if you don't want to talk to the hv about infant feeding then don't see them. Don't take the information away from others. Go to a toy shop and look at the dolls with bottles, look through websites and leaflets about babies in general and play spot the bottlefeeding child, go and watch a growing up milk advert and then come back and tell me what other messages are out there that we should be tackling instead of complaining about a poster stating a fact.

Like you wouldn't believe!

I wish people would realise that not every woman in the world is able to breastfeed. Be it by choice or not. Imagine if everyone in the world could do math or speak 10 languages. It would be great!! But we can't, and the same goes for breastfeeding.

I know it is supposed to be natural but there are many things in the world that are "natural" and people can't automatically do them.

Yes, I too am sick of it and when I wasn't able to breastfeed my baby, those exact words were shoved down my throat by everyone I met...."Do you know breast is best?" .
I had enought to worry about, as if I needed more guilt at this time of my life.

I don't know what area you are in but it is rife here too.

But the posters are up in the antenatal wards, when you have had a baby you are in the postnatal ward and then at home.

Which is why the midwives, nurses and HVs need to tell people about the phone numbers when they need them, and provide support when women are BFing.

The targeting is all wrong. The message is everywhere you look when you are pg, when you actually have the baby and try to put it into practice it all vanishes.

The problem is that, like many on this thread, it would seem that people know best and rather than listening to feedback they go into attack mode because they know best and will have no truck with dissent.

the campaign is demonstrably not working as it stands. Why not try sometihng else? Why the attachment to the current way of doing things? if something isn't working, try something else. I'm not sure why that idea causes such vociferous opposition and anger. maybe it's not the people with the different ideas who are the ones who are too emotionally involved in all of this.

Going out now look forward to seeing how this progresses.

Poo your comments are a bit harsh and imo are not helpful to promoting bf. As i said a lot of mums are not clued up, and if the NHS cannot provide support MW or HV can give out these numbers to mums and put mums in contact with support outside the NHS, isent that what they are therefore to help if they personally cannot help.

If the posters are only in antenatal wards, why are so many complaining that they are guilt tripping them after they have a baby and are FF? You can't have it both ways.

You say that you need the support when you go home and there is none. There is only none if you wait for it to come to you, do you expect HV to magically appear when you are struggling? Get a phone book, get on the internet and go and get yourself some help.

I really don't understand these arguments. The people complaining that there is no support are the same people complaining that there is a breastapo trying to force it onto people. They just can't win either way.