Why did my mother's generation not breastfeed?

[sushidave]

I asked my mum why me and my siblings weren't breastfed and she said something vague about how it wasn't 'in fashion'. I've no reason to believe she had other reasons so am genuinely curious as to why BFing was seemingly so rare 40 years ago. Is what she said representative of women at the time?

I'm BFing my 7 week old DD, am fully indoctrinated in the Breast is Best message, and objectively find it hard to disagree with the evidence behind the message. And more simplistically, as mammals surely feeding is what breasts are FOR!

So if anyone has any insight (personal or otherwise) into the polar shift in attitudes and practice of BFing, I'd love to know. Could it be due to the same reasons behind the relatively low rates of BFing in the UK currently: time constraints, embarrassment, lack of support (though that could be a circular argument), perceptions of complexity, lack of family support?

[yoyo123]

my mum breastfed me ( born 1957) , but when she had my sister in 1961, she was given tablets , when she asked what they were for ,she was told they were to "dry up her milk", she refused and was considered 'difficult'

[ByTheWay1]

I was fed Carnation milk from a teaspoon as I had a deformed palate and could not suckle - why Carnation milk I do not know??!?!?

[Porkster]

My mum breastfed, early 70s.

But she remembers being in the minority. She bf all of us for about 2 years; she reckons this was not the norm back then & tells tales of her friends adding baby rice to bottles & using darning needles to make the hole in the teat bigger!

[BearsLikeMarmalade]

Its only since having a baby myself that I've realised how unusual both my Mum and MIL were for BF their babies for a year + in the 70s.

Mum BF my older brother (1975) and me (1977) for 12 & 15 mths respectively. She used to take my brother to the chemist and weigh him there herself to avoid getting a flea in her ear about BF when she went to the clinics. I grew up thinking BF was normal and didn't even question whether I would do it or not. Mum was great at supporting me when I had DS, and I commented that she should be a BF counsellor. She then casually mentioned that she'd done the training with NCT when we were little. One of her oldest friends also credits my mum with being the reason she BF her daughter. My mum has dementia now and is often hard to get along with so I think about this a lot to remind myself how great she is.

MIL was told for some reason not to BF her first baby beyond 3 mths (1974) but was in Africa when DH was born (1977), and the only baby equipment she owned was a sling! She BF DH for over a year, and also his younger brother (1980 in the UK then). She's since said that she felt 'rebellious' for doing so as it wasn't the done thing. Her own mother was of the 'feed 4 hourly' school and seemed to think that she wasn't able to BF.

Very grateful to have had both mum and MIL pro-BF, I think it makes a massive difference to support if its seen as normal in your family to feed on demand etc.

[GettingObsessive]

My Nana had my DM and 4 siblings in the late 50s/early 60s and was told that she couldn't BF because her "nipples were too leathery"

Having said that, all 5 of them turned absolutely fine, but wonder what would have happened if she had been given better advice.

My MIL says that she didn't produce enough milk. DH can eat a horse and still come back for pudding, even now, but again I wonder whether she was following advice to feed every four hours (this was in 1980) and there wasn't enough demand to stimulate the supply.

[storytopper]

I am in my late 50s and BF both my DSs for about one year each in the early 1980s.

I was in the minority but not that unusual. Don't actually know the statistics - about the same percentage of mothers as today?

[glenthebattleostrich]

I overheard 2 old ladies discussing one of their granddaughters recently giving birth.

OL1 - Yes xx had a lovely little girl, but you'll never guess what she's doing with her.
OL2 - Ooh, she's not boobie feeding her, uurgh
OL1 - Yes, boob feeding. It's horrible to watch, she does it everywhere whenever the baby squawks.
OL2 - How common, you need to get her mother to sort her out and get the poor baby some proper milk.

[Wallison]

I agree with the posters who said it's to do with attitudes towards technology that were around in the 70s - the moon landing had just happened, we were all heading towards an era where we could take our nutrition from pills and zoom around on personal hovercrafts etc. With that, I think there was a loss of common knowledge about breastfeeding; nobody was doing it, and who wanted to put their faith in the frail and frankly not fit for purpose human body.

My mum made loads of comments when I was breastfeeding; when my son cluster-fed, she said it was because I wasn't producing enough milk and maybe I should give him formula. If he was going through a growth spurt, again he was feeding so often because I wasn't producing enough milk. If he wanted feeding more than every three hours, again with the not producing enough milk comments. And all this despite him starting out as a tiny preemie and then racing through those bloody centiles. But it's because that's what she had been told when she tried to breastfeed us. It makes me feel really quite sad and cross that so many women were discouraged from trusting their own bodies and not being made aware of their capabilities. I'm sure my mother could have fed us, and actually she has since said that having watched me feed my son that she feels sad, even after all this time, that she didn't. Of course on one level to me it doesn't matter a damn that she didn't because she's my mum and she's ace, but I am angry that she has been left feeling that way.

[firstpost]

My MIL is so anti breastfeeding it would take your breath away. I was feeding my 5 day old baby and she looked at me in disgust and said I was turning her stomach, it is revolting and I was making her feel queasy.

In turn FIL jumped up like a jack in a box everytime I sat down with DS, he made it very clear that he would not be in the room if I insisted on getting my breasts out as he would be too embarassed :(

MIL influenced her daughter so that none of her 4 children were breastfed. She is from NI and says in their part of the world nobody does. Allegedly the midwife told her daughter definitely not to try breastfeeding child number 2, 3 or 4 as its only possible with a first baby.

[CitrusyOne]

I was born in the late seventies, and mum tells me of how her milk didn't satisfy me, and that when I was six weeks I wouldn't stop screaming me and she'd given me 20 minutes on each side, so Dad fetched formula and I slept right through the night. I also was taken away to the nursery though the night.

When I got pg with DD, I was open minded and thought I'd give bf my best shot but not beat myself up if it didn't work out. I went to an NHS workshop, and met mum for a cuppa afterwards where she asked what id been told. I relayed all the current advice about how to latch baby on, feeding on demand etc. She is now so full of guilt bless her, that she wasn't told all this, and is now fascinated and full of praise for me as I feed DD who is now 15 weeks and exclusively bf!

[monsterchild]

My Mom was a lone parent back in the 60's living with her parents and working when my oldest three brothers were born, so she FF, as expressing and giving that to her parents to feed the boys wasn't really done. When the second litter came along, she had my Dad, but was still working full time, so we were again FF.

My sister tried to bf her kids, but a combination of physical things (including undiagnosed tongue tie) kept her from BF. She expressed for 8 months, which I think is pretty amazing.

I am lucky that I am able to bf my ds!

[monsterchild]

Oh my Ds also has a tongue tie, but it's not prevented him from feeding just fine!

[SeeYouSoon]

My mum definitely bfed both me and my brother in the mid 70s but not sure how long for. My stepmum bfed her two in the same era, ad admits to "cheating" at the 4 hour ten mind per side rule, probably one of thf reasons she fed them both till 9m successfully! Mil had hers in the 60s and 70s and didn't manage to get bf established. She always thought she was "doing it wrong" because she left maternity hospital ffing due to no milk. It wasn't till I explained how bf works with supply and demand etc that she realised it wasn't her fault that it handnt worked out for her.

I do think that those who succeeded in those days of babies taken away and brought back every 4 hours either had very plentiful supply or 'cheated' like my stepmum.

My brother was born in aus in 1971 and apparently there babies were given water at night in hospital rather than milk - my dad swears my bro was sleeping through from going home due to this.

[EndoplasmicReticulum]

My mum did, I was born in 1974. She was a bit of a hippy though.

[soaccidentprone]

I was born in 66. DM tried to bf me, but as I was only allowed to feed every 4 hours and was constantly hungry she was told her milk wasn't good enough and that I needed ff.

it wasn't the fashion then to feed on demand. dsis was born in 71 and was ff from the beginning following a very difficult pregnancy. DM was in hospital for 10 weeks before giving birth.

dsis had nephew in 93 and was living with DM. she tried to bf, but DM wasn't very supportive. ds1 was born in 95. DM kept telling me my milk wasn't rich enough that's why he needed to feed so often. kept telling me I needed a top up bottle for ds. also tried to make me drink stout as it's got lots of iron in it

ended up having a massive row with her and didn't speak to her for 2 weeks. dsis had to intervene in the end. HV was also crap. ds was 2 weeks early and every time I took him to be weighed she'd put the cross on the chart in the wrong week, then tell me he wasn't gaining enough weight. it's a good job I am stubborn. bf ds1 till he was 10 months, until he started biting me hard.

ds2 was born in 2002 and DM had given up saying anything by then

my cousins all had babies in the 70's and they all ff.

with ds1 a cafe told me I couldn't bf him as I might offend the other customers[angry, but I also took him into some secondary schools as part of an nct initiative to try to reverse the trend for ff.

with ds2 I made a point if feeding him in loads of cafe's etc I bf till he was 2.

I expressed milk at work where they had a mothers room. had to make a bit of a fuss to get that room too.

[rosy71]

I was bf (born in 1971). I think it was probably only for about 12 weeks though and 10 minutes each side like others have said. My mum said they made lots of fuss about it in the hospital - I think she was the only one breastfeeding - and kept making her express all the time so she didn't run out of milk. When she had my sister at the same hospital in 1973, she decided to bottle feed rather than deal with the nurses again.

My younger brother and sister (born 1978 and 1982) were both breastfed. Apparantly attitudes had changed and breastfeeding was encouraged. I think they were still both weaned at 12 weeks or so thoguh.

[amothersplaceisinthewrong]

I am the mother of a 24 year old and a 22 year old, so born in 89 and 91. I chose not to breastfeed despite HUGE pressure from all the health professionals so do do because I wanted to be able to leave the baby with DH/grandparents etc and have some freedom which with BF you can't.

I had very contented healthy babies and would make the same decision today.

[monstermissy]

My mum always said she never fancied it, she also said that no one knew smoking was so bad either. I'm guessing my mum was busy smoking and holding fondue parties/tupperware parties so too busy to breastfeed. I was born in 77. (My mum is awesome by the way) :)

[TondelayoSchwarzkopf]

DM did 4 hourly feeds, ten minutes each side with me. I was BF for 6 weeks before she 'ran out'.

Younger DSises were BF on demand. They were BF for a year.

I explained to DM why this was but she was having none of it!

I grew up in 70s in a very large working class rural family. BF was the norm among family and friends. It went through a cycle in the 80s, 90s and 00s where FF became norm but now most of my young cousins and family members BF at least for a few months.

[TondelayoSchwarzkopf]

Don't want to start a bun fight or derail but you can BF and have freedom.

[sleepyhead]

My mum had my brother and I in the early to mid 70s.

With me, she assumed she would bf because her mum and all her aunts had, but the hospital were quite anti. It was 4 hr scheduled feeds, babies taken away overnight (and mums given a sleeping pill), bf babies were weighed before and after feeds and if the required weight gain wasn't achieved then a bottle was brought.

Luckily for my mum (since I was pretty weenie and slow to get going) there was a more experienced mother in the bed next to her and she told my mum to say to the midwife that the baby wouldn't take the bottle when she saw her getting upset. Still, I was formula fed overnight. My mum asked them to bring me to her (she refused the sleeping pill) but they never did.

Both my mum & I had a lot of problems bf'ding because of massive oversupply, but for my mum I suspect that's the only way her supply survived 10 days in hospital - it's amazing she didn't get mastitis with the long breaks overnight though.

They also routinely gave you a pill to dry up your milk at the drop of a hat, so once you'd said you'd bottle feed there was no going back.

With my brother 3 years later in a different part of the country the midwives were more supportive and my mum was more experienced, so she said that it was much, much easier.

[VinegarDrinker]

My DM BF 5 of us, all to over a year (born between 1981 and 1992). We had bottles of formula when she was at work.

My DH was BF to 18 months also in the early/mid 80s. His Mum considered BFing a big part of her feminism.

[thesnootyfox]

My mum breast fed her first children, she hated it and found it difficult. By the time I came along early 70s formula was more widely available and my mum couldn't bear the prospect of having to bf for a 4th time.

[5madthings]

You can have freedom if you bfeed and yes bottle fed babies can grow up to be fine but evidence shows that breast milk is better for babies. Its a bit of a no brainer that human milk for a human baby is going to be better for them IMO, its what they are biologically designed to have.

[ouryve]

FiveFlowers Fri 01-Feb-13 19:49:35

My DD1 was born in the early 70s and I intended to BF her. I read all the baby books I could get my hands on and every one I read gave the same advice - "10 minutes each side every 4 hours, or every 3 hours for a premature baby." - And that was it.

When DS1 was born, 9 years ago, there were still books around advocating this.

And a lot of maternity hospitals in the US routinely put babies in nurseries away from mother and gave formula. I was on a msn due date group at the time and quite a few of the mothers had to be quite adamant in their birth plans about rooming in and no formula (never mind not being automatically treated like a piece of meat at the obstetrician's convenience during the birth). OBEM illustrates quite nicely that the culture hasn't changed a lot over there, in some hospitals.