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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

Original poster

channel 4 breastfeeding programme

816 replies

lazycow · 23/01/2006 14:20

Just thought people might be interested if you don't already know.

Channel 4 on Weds 1 Feb. A programme called Extraordinary Breastfeeding is on. The write up in the magazine I'm looking at says:

"You'll be texting your friends about this as soon as it starts. It's about the phenomenon of mothers who breastfeed their kiddies well beyond the age considered 'normal' in this country. Seeing a feisty mum breastfeed her two-year-old twin isn't that disturbing, but the sequence of another lady suckling her 7 year old dughter isn't one we will forget in a hurry. "

I'm looking forward to seeing the tone it takes.

OP posts:
Original poster
lazycow · 30/01/2006 14:25

Is it the breastfeeding or the lack of periods that protects you? My periods came back when ds was 3 months old, despite exclusive bfing on demand for 6 months and then bfing until now (14 months)

OP posts:
prettybird · 30/01/2006 14:26

GDG.

And as I say, breast fed ds also suffered from ear infections, we think due to narrow tubes , as he never complained - it weas only when the ear started emitting gunk did we know there was a problem.

But apparantly I also suffered from ear nfections - and my brother even worse than me - and we were also breast fed (unsually, in the circles my mum came from, back in the early 60s) - so it is probably genetic.

As an aside, we've also just found out that my dad has a one-in-five chance of being a carrier of a nasty breast and ovarian cancer causing gene, which hits in the 50s/60s. We're assuming that his mother, who died at 89, didn't have the gene, but many of her siblings do (and the rest or thier offspring) are going to have to be tested. Whole swathes of the Danish/Grmand family have been decimted by it and when we raised it with my aunt in SOuth Africa, she realised that most of her cousins/aunts had also been affected. Dad will find out the result in a few days.... so I'll know then if I need to be tested.

JennyLee · 30/01/2006 14:27

its the lack of periods, can get the sameeffect by taking hte pill and not having too many pill breaks just straight on to the next packet

JennyLee · 30/01/2006 14:27

the pill

GDG · 30/01/2006 14:28

Gosh prettybird - hope the results are good for you.

Lazycow - I was wondering that, I thought periods still came back while bf sometimes. Btw, can't you change your name - hate calling you 'lazycow'!!!

Eulalia · 30/01/2006 14:45

No-one told me when taking the pill that I could take two packets at once without a break. I thought you had to always have a period. so yes taking the pill could help with breast cancer but presumably doesn't help with the other types of cancer which breastfeeding can help with.

The link to ENT problems and breastfeeding is well documented - I am surprised that any medical specialist should express surprise at this.

It's only recently that a lot of the benefits of breastfeeding are visable because of the time it takes to do studies, particularly where long term benefits (such as reduced blood pressure for example) are shown. Also of course it becomes problematic when doing long term studies because of the huge number of confounding factor involved in a persons lifestyle.

Stands to reason though really that it would be best for a person to be breastfed. But the amount of 'damage' done to someone who isn't also includes other factors such environment and genes and a bit of luck. For some people it may only make a small (not noticeable) difference for others eg those with allergies it would make a larger difference and for those at risk, ie poor societies then it would make a huge difference.

Eulalia · 30/01/2006 14:50

Also some people seem to think that breastfed kids should never get ill. Of course they get ill but not as often or as severe .... and its impossible to measure something that doesn't happen!

Got to go - ds in from school....

JoolsToo · 30/01/2006 15:00

Western women could reduce their breast cancer risk by nearly 60 per cent if they returned to pre-industrial levels of fertility and breastfeeding. The new findings help explain why breast cancer, virtually unknown 200 years ago, is now a major killer.

Lifestyles are somewhat different altogether from 200 years ago - women may not have died from breast cancer but they sure didn't live as long as we do today! (How long has cancer been a recognised disease?)

prettybird · 30/01/2006 15:23

Eulalia - I had ds 5 years ago and the breast feeding coulsellor I was talking to had been at the hosptial for yonks. She could have been talking about research that was done 10 years or more before that!

prettybird · 30/01/2006 15:31

JoolsToo - you might not have died of breast cancer, but you stood a fair chance of dying in child birth!

expatinscotland · 30/01/2006 16:12

'Western women could reduce their breast cancer risk by nearly 60 per cent if they returned to pre-industrial levels of fertility and breastfeeding.'

Does this also take into account lifestyle issues like diet/obesity, smoking and alcohol consumption?

JoolsToo · 30/01/2006 16:30

exactly expat - imo breastfeeding is a great thing to do for your baby but if you're taking it home to a smoke filled home and a crappy diet later on - kind of cancels out all the good work.

prettybird · 30/01/2006 16:43

514 post before the programme has even aired!

Wonder how many there will be after it has aired!

tiktok · 30/01/2006 17:04

Jools - in fact, home circumstances don't cancel out the benefits of breastfeeding. There is good evidence that breastfeeding reduces inequalities in health, caused at least in part by smoking and crap diet.

JoolsToo · 30/01/2006 17:51

sorry, don't believe that!

fastasleep · 30/01/2006 18:10

Ladies! It hasn't even been on yet! FGS!

misdee · 30/01/2006 18:25

oh are we now breast/bottle debate?

fact: breast is best, some people carry on longer than the 'norm', heck i am bf dd3 at 11months, not something i'd ever thought i'd do. i may still be bf her at 4, depends on when she gives up. she is the least sickest of my kids, dd1 was bf form 6weeks, dd2 for about 8 weeks.

yes i think the idea of bf a 7 year old is weird, but you dont suddenly pick up a 7 yr old and feed them, you feed them from a tiny baby and just continue with it. i very much doubt this child will continue to b/f when she is a teenager.

GDG · 30/01/2006 18:26

I don't buy that either. Absolutely not - so you are better to be breastfed and live in a smoky house than to be formula fed and live in a non-smoky house? I'm not going for that at all.

My kids may have been formula fed but they live in a smoke free environment, eat a good 5 portions (if not more) of fresh fruit/veg a day and eat pretty much no processed food. Not to mention their genes which they are very lucky to have (we are a very healthy family - no allergies, no illnesses, no obesity). I don't believe that someone who was breastfed but eats MacDonalds and take aways and has parents that smoke are more healthy.

expatinscotland · 30/01/2006 18:31

i was thinking the same thing, GDG. smoking and obesity are THE leading causes of preventable death. there's NOTHING that negates the negative effects of smoking except stopping and/or not being around smoke.

deaths from excess alcohol consumption are also on the rise, especially amongst women.

the factors must be taken into consideration when making conclusions about cancer.

expatinscotland · 30/01/2006 18:32

As for WHO recommendations, I'd love for them to have paid my rent and fed my family for the 2 months after my full pay maternity leave ran out so I could stay home to bf DD2 for 6 months.

beansprout · 30/01/2006 18:37

GDG - I don't think that is what tiktok was saying. I think she just meant that the benefits of b/f still stand no matter what the environment is and hey, if a baby is in a smokey house, it will need all the benefits it can get!

GDG · 30/01/2006 18:38

I love the way the WHO recommendations are bandied about as gospel when it comes to breastfeeding, yet a good many people on here ignore their recommendations on MMR.

I should reiterate that I do of course believe that 'breast is best' and I don't argue that - I also agree that there needs to be more promotion and support.

However, I really don't think that formula causes as much damage as some would have us believe and I also don't believe that method of infant feeding has as big an impact as the food you eat, whether you smoke, drink alcohol, exercise, genes - I think being breastfed can contribute to your health and wellbeing but that there are bigger factors at play. If I'm wrong, then then the fact that I eat healthily, exercise, am a size 8-10, didn't grow up with smoking parents, don't smoke myself and rarely drink alcohol should be making no difference to the fact that I was formula fed and I should have been dead by now!!

harpsichordcarrier · 30/01/2006 18:40

"but you dont suddenly pick up a 7 yr old and feed them, you feed them from a tiny baby and just continue with it." absolutely misdee

JoolsToo · 30/01/2006 18:43

but at the end of the day - all the breast feeding in the world can't screen the effects of the daily inhalation of a smokey environment - it isn't a cure all.

breast is best but let's not get carried away - it's like saying all cancer sufferers were formula fed - of course they weren't - there are other mitigating factors that cause the many cancers that sadly some people fall prey to.

beansprout · 30/01/2006 18:43

I don't think anyone is really suggesting that formula babies have a shorter life expectancy!