Reasons why women don't breastfeed

[ohthegoats]

Today's breastfeeding 'news' from Brazil. I finally heard a sensible comment on the story at about lunchtime today - a woman saying that there shouldn't be surveys on whether or not it's a good thing to breastfeed, because everyone knows it is. The research should be into why so many women don't do it, or don't stick with it.

Here are my reasons why I don't like breastfeeding - has anyone got any to add? Or ideas to mitigate the issues?

After being so out of control of your body during pregnancy, being poked and prodded and 'nanny stated' out of your mind, you want control back.

Little help available when you have problems - I know this isn't true for all people.

Having to wear such unflattering underwear in order to be able to get your boobs out easily. Why hasn't this been sorted out? Why so few underwired options that actually work without causing duct blockages? Why so expensive to get even a crappy underwired one?

Having to wear clothes that are mostly unflattering too. I have one reasonable breastfeeding top out of the 10 I have bought - H&M for a tenner in the sale, not been able to find it again. They are all either too plain coloured, too low necked, horrible material, too tight in other places etc etc.

Getting stared at in public for doing it.

Being confined to the sofa for days on end.

Waking up covered in yoghurt for reasons you don't understand.

Boobs squirting milk during sex.

Think that's my starter list.

I'm 5 and a half months into ebf with my baby... plan to start moving away from it at 6 months. I've done it because it's the 'right' thing, but I've mostly hated it.

I agree that it's all about your baby and I'm sure he is happy and healthy which is all that matters.

But I don't think you can really argue with the fact that it's wrong that society makes us feel that breasts are something naughty and therefore make us not want to breastfeed as we feel they're just for sex.

I was not having a go at anyone and you do not need to get defensive. I respect your opinion.

I don't want anyone sucking on me

Whether you be my partner, son, daughter or lover. It's simple don't suck on my boob. It's not how society as made people feel it's I don't want people sucking me lol

Fair enough

Flinging melon: I totally agree with you, you should never have to make excuses. I think you have every right to rant about this.

I didn't want to Breast feed full stop.

Nothing whatsoever to do with my Breasts being sexual objects.

I get really tired of hearing this over and over on here.

Pinningwobble: I am not entirely sure it is right or fair of you to say you think it is 'sad' that mothers choose not to bf because it 'grosses' them out!!

Having just told us you haven't even tried bf yet, don't you think you should wait until you have before you say such things? For all you know, you could and may very well have the bf experience from hell and wish you had not been so judgemental!!! It is not a good way to go to call anyone sad.

It is actually gross for lots of people to bf, believe me when I say this is far from an unusual experience. Just because you don't think so, well that is you, but we are all different. Breasts are not there for sex or feeding they are part of a women's body and she has the right to choose how or if they are used. It is quite unbelievable that you seem to think that there are only two ways or functions for breasts. Sex or feeding. Why does it have to be for either? They belong to no one except the very person they belong to.

Do not judge until you have tried it.

I'm not saying anything of the sort - sorry if I wasn't being clear. For all I know I may hate breastfeeding! I just feel that it is sad IF the reason you choose not to breastfreed is because you feel they're a sexual thing. I didn't say that's what they were or weren't. I know women have many reasons why they do or don't breastfeed. I may not like it, I have no idea.

Anyway I wasn't trying to upset anyone, so sorry if I did.

I don't think I realised how much the 'ick factor' was an issue until the Claridges story broke last year. I could not believe the nasty anti-Bf comments I read online, and it was only then I realised how many people think it is somehow revolting or distasteful.

Of course I knew some people felt that way, and for some perhaps it's a phobia, but I had no idea how widespread it was. The comments that really shocked me were people comparing BFing to pissing in the street - as if all bodily fluids are equally icky and unpleasant. And in any case, I have seen people pissing in the street with tourists walking past - there are public urinals in central London a stone's throw from Trafalgar square and to me that's far more unpleasant than public breastfeeding, but men were using them quite happily in broad daylight when I was last there.

With that in mind, it seems to me there is such an anti-BF prejudice ingrained among some people, any amount of BF support for new mums still has a huge amount of opposition to overcome. All that positive work done in BF classes and support groups, and the money spent on them - I agree the support is not always good, but there are really excellent people out there supporting struggling mums, I have been there myself- is being offset by the fact that so much of the population seemingly think BF is somehow filthy and disgusting. What would it take to overcome that? How much education and public campaigning and research would be needed? I doubt any incoming government would make it a priority, sadly.

I didn't experience this in person the first time round, I didn't feed in public all the time but did quite regularly, and never felt any nasty looks or judging. But now having seen all the awful things said about the Claridges lady, I don't feel nearly so confident about feeding in public. My DD2 is quite a fussy feeder and I don't really want to struggle with her in public places until I feel a bit more confident. Plus half our local cafes have uncomfortable chairs or not enough room between chair and table to sit comfortably. Only the library has comfortable enough sofas and that isn't open every day.

I'm not sure I've answered the original question, but I do think the underlying anti-BF prejudice in society witch the Claridges story exposed is a big reason why some women don't BF.

Pinningwobble: Women generally do not stop bf because they want their breasts to remain sexual, the reasons run far deeper than that. The very last thing a woman cares about is sex after having a baby. Quite the reverse.
Bf is an enormous issue, mainly because everyone becomes so judgemental and the NHS and the targets only add flames to the fire. It really has become a battleground of epic proportions and someone who is not in touch with the depth of feeling surrounding it will soon discover how difficult and thorny a subject it is.

It is just feeding, it is not life or death. FF or BF a baby thrives and blossoms either way with love, attention and care. It is simply creating bad feeling and division by saying one thing is better than the other, nasty women competing and trying to be better than the next one. No different to any school playground. Every baby is different, every mother is different and they can and will decide what is right for them.

Marshmallows: No one should make you feel this way, I think you must absolutely continue to breastfeed your child and go out and enjoy your life.
I did read the comments about Claridges, but figured it was just lots of old duffers with nothing better to do. I am sure the majority of the public do not even notice when you bf, and those that do and make you uncomfortable should be (very) ashamed. But then they will probably pass comment about everything and everyone and are just generally sad and miserable with nothing better to do. I am sure they would have something to say however you choose to feed your baby.

I didn't personally enjoy bf, but it does not offend me in the least to see others feeding, quite the reverse. I think any mother feeding their child (either ff or bf) is a beautiful sight. It is a lovely moment to look into your child's eyes and enjoy the quiet moment you both share. It is intensely bonding.

Do not let others make you feel anything other than the contented happy mother you are. It is their problem not yours.

heartofgold I agree with you but I didn't say one thing was better than the other. The point I was making was just that I didn't understand it because it's always been such a normal thing to do in my family. I was saying I was grateful reading this thread because it has taught me about other reasons I was not aware of! not trying to be divisive at all. and obviously not including women who are physically unable to breastfeed, as indeed both my auntie and best friend were not.

I did, however, like marshmallow think the furore surrounding the claridges woman was completely unacceptable, and I did take offence to my colleague saying breastfeeding was disgusting because breasts are a sexual thing. not the first time I've heard that from someone either.

Pinning wobble: I said the subject was divisive not you, and that it is a thorny issue. We were talking generally rather than personally. Lots of women are divided on this subject, as you can see. It evokes great feeling on both sides. It is all rather pointless in the end.

I think your colleague was either young and just being silly or joking with you. Nobody in the 21st century seriously thinks that breasts are just for sex. It is a joke no?

Pinning wobble: I said the subject was divisive not you, and that it is a thorny issue. We were talking generally rather than personally. Lots of women are divided on this subject, as you can see. It evokes great feeling on both sides. It is all rather pointless in the end.

I think your colleague was either young and just being silly or joking with you. Nobody in the 21st century seriously thinks that breasts are just for sex. It is a joke no?

I know, I was so shocked she said it I really didn't know what to come back with! she is in her early thirties so not young and silly. she really meant it.

The main issue to me is that breastfeeding is made out to be an 'easy' and 'natural' thing. Women have been doing it for millennia and it's just easy and straightforward, the way babies are supposed to be fed.

That's partly true of course but it ignores the reality of bf not being as easy in the current society that we live in and also the truth that many women in the past, especially the wealthy, used wet nurses. I remember reading an account of Dickens wife who felt enormous guilt because she couldn't feed her first baby. These stories are ignored by the pro-bf side so anyone who has problems will feel they are unusual or having bad luck with bf when in reality their experience might be normal.

Formula was invented for a reason. It's within the realms of normal experience to struggle with bf and find it hard work. Doesn't mean you should give up at the first hurdle but bf counselors, midwives, NCT need to do a better job about being honest about bf and managing women's expectations so they don't feel like failures when bf is difficult.

Piningwobble- But they might be, for your colleague, a part of her body she associates with a lot of sexual pleasure, especially the nipples which are often an intensely pleasureable area for arousal and therefore she might feel very odd about feeding a child from them- although she no doubt recognises that is what they were intended for. They will have become associated with sexual pleasure first.

Pinning there is an excellent blog post from The Badass Breastfeeder about how breasts are both sexual at times and for feeding at other times - and it's up to the woman to control that.
I see them as like lips - the same lips can be sexy/romantic, speaking lips or eating lips. The problem only arises when someone says "you use those lips for kissing so you can't speak about politics" or "I use my lips to eat so I'm better than someone who uses them for sexuality".
Except men have lips so no one ever says these things.

Don't get me started on the oft spoken idea that some cultures don't find breasts sexual. Some don't fetishise them visually or cover them up in public. They are still recognised as erogenous and attractive. To say otherwise can smack of orientalist exoticism ... ie these mystic "other cultures" that are "at one". Yes this is something I'm a geek about sorry.

squizita is so right about sleep and mental health.

Nowadays when very few women will bf each other's babies, I think the pressure on one single woman's body for 6 months is very intense, and a historical anomaly. I am sure there were always women who have done everything themselves, breezily through choice for the robust ones, or desperately through lack of choice for the less robust ones, but nowadays any woman who doesn't want to ff a little baby has to do it all themselves, and for some this is a very, very harsh pressure. I am sure there were times when friends or sisters of the less robust ones would have come round one afternoon, seen a mother sobbing into the laundry, and said "get to bed, give me the baby, I will feed him if he gets hungry".

Formula was invented for a reason
Yup, indeed so: to use up leftover milk products, and to provide a food for babies whose mothers could not feed them (for whatever reason) which didn't have the risk of TB that cows' milk had at the time.

I think talking makes a good point: women used to feed each other's babies as a matter of course - and I used to wish someone would feed mine so I could go out without spending bloody hours trying to express about 10ml of milk.

One reason I didn't want to FF was because of the way the FF companies have behaved over the years, esp with aggressive marketing in the Third World.

TikTok, as the severity of IGT varies from woman to woman, as I'm sure you know, very frequent feeds will only work for some. I was told my only chance to ebf would be to feed 'constantly' but as it felt like I already was (feeds every 30 minutes or so other than at night luckily) and she wasn't gaining weight, it never seemed feasible.

Instead I was pressured by GP, HV and this particularly unhelpful LC to offer ff top ups, and I ended up doing so of course. Only later did I get told about pumping to build supply, herbal supplements etc. IGT was completely unknown to everyone else, and the clear links to PCOS, hormonal imbalance and insulin resistance, which result in routine endocrinological involvement on diagnosis in the US remain completely unexplored here,

Some women with IGT of course cannot breastfeed at all and never know why.

There are SOME things that can help; it's not true to say nothing can be done. But given the link to PCOS and the growing prevalence of IR, I think it's reasonable to suggest that the number of women with IGT may well rise and need to be a more visible issue.

• very very painful to breastfeed for some

-constant source of infection for some

• for some, baby has multiple allergies and can't tolerate breast milk

Really, MehsMum? You think formula was invented to use up extra milk?? The practice of 'dry nursing' as it was called i.e. feeding babies substitutes for human milk has always been around but grew in popularity for a variety of reasons in the early 1800s.

It was actually concerns about the safety of some homemade 'dry nursing' recipes and rising infant mortality as a result that led to scientists like Justus von Liebig developing powder formulas that were based on what knowledge they had at that time of the composition of human milk. There were also concerns anout the safety of breastfeeding in some populations who led unhealthy lifestyles. Common ideas at the time about how disease was passed on made people worry about the cleanliness of breastfeeding (ironically given what we now know).

What the bf extremists never want to admit is that women were practicing dry nursing and other means of reducing the obligation to breastfeed long before formula was invented. Formula milk was developed as a safer alternative to the homemade options some mothers were using anyway. Yes, it was over marketed as a norm from maybe 1940-1980 but formula is not only some vast conspiracy by evil corporations. It came about for a valid reason: some women wanted other options for feeding their babies besides breastfeeding alone. And some women still do. And that's their prerogative.

Fair enough: I stand corrected, though I would have thought that the significantly higher mortality of bottle-fed babies pre-sterilisation would have been noticed.

Yes, it was over marketed as a norm from maybe 1940-1980
Sadly, formula is still over marketed, in many places. If not wanting to put money in the pockets of companies who do it (and cause infant deaths as a consequence) makes me a 'breast feeding extremist', I guess I'll have to suck it up.

Solas Ellie: What a great post. Meh's Mum: I am sorry but you do sound a little like a bf extremist. It is the capacity not to be able to tolerate a different point of view, the militant stance and low lying aggression that features throughout the thread. It is unnecessary and the reason we feel so strongly is because you are ruining motherhood for thousands if not millions with your misinformation.

Love your posts tooextra
Think things must have changed since I happily bf my second DD2 25 years ago. I never could express but went back to work pt when DD1 was 9months . She was 'eating' by then so I just fed night and morning (and if I'm honest in the day when I was at home )
attitudes and lack of support have a lot to answer for