"arses - I don't think some women who become angry about their experience of bf have a distorted perception because of being over-sensitive or whatever else you accused me of saying. I think the specific conversations you experienced were unpleasant and the women who said those things were unkind and judgemental. I was speaking more generally, and speculating that bitterness and sadness do make some women see hostility and criticism where none exists - there have been several examples of this on mumsnet. Feeding a baby is an emotional issue and seeing things in perspective comes with time, I think."
Sorry?
I didn't accuse you of anything, nor did I address any post to you.
Your point here is valid, but you could have left out the 'accused' bit.. it makes your post seem aggressive.
I am hiding this thread. Funny, back out of this, it is not doing anyone any favours, least of all you.
I am completely in favour of breastfeeding information and sharing, pride and advocacy. I do think that sometimes it would be best discussed on threads that were not inevitably going to turn into a breast vs bottle debate. I still think that the crusade to let people know that they could have bf'd if they had x or y or z advice at x or y or z point when they didn't and hadn't is counterproductive. Particularly when it descends into discussion of 'need' with reference to formula as the decision to move from breast to bottle is often underscored by many different levels of need, the breasts are only one part.
Again, I say this as someone who did everything 'by the book' after the first 2 nights in hospital - e.g. feeding two hourly and expressing and refeeding to establish supply, but still had poor milk transfer which was eventually put down to a structural difficulty (high arched palate/back tongue tie), probably not aided by a) the fact my mother had issues feeding me/supply problems and b) poor initial support in the hospital. I only know this because I worked like bejaysus to find that information out, so it disturbs me when people talk about statistics related to the physiology because unless I had pushed and pushed for further intervention, I would not know this about why I couldn't exclusively feed. I doubt I am the only one.
I mentioned that I introduced formula at 20 weeks and it helped my bfing relationship continue in the context of having done everything possible to EBF to that point. . I am not in the business of 'accusing' anyone of anything, I just feel that sometimes the bald facts of how bfing words doesn't match the experience, and that there's a time and a place to discuss whether or not people 'need' to formula feed e.g. on different threads. I also think it's reductive of human experience: I know many women who struggled to maintain feeding/expressing their ex-prem babies, for example, and I think the 'need' for formula in this case is more emotional (when a woman is at breaking point) than physiological.
I think you can share information while maintaining an empathetic tone and without saying 'to hell with sensitivity' and being all gung-ho about it. Part of persuading people to bf should be that they will find support no matter what, not just if it all works swimmingly and a dash of formula never passes their baby's lips.
But I fear that would never, ever be understood on this or any other thread like this one on MN.