Another article about how awful breastfeeding is, this time in a feminist publication

[Caligula]

I thought some of you would like to read this.

This misinformation bugged me:

"Times change though, and the formulas on the market are hopefully as close to what comes out of your boob, as they will ever be".

Wonder what the rest of you think

the new breastfeeding taboo

good point xenia. And also expat, true - we are harsh judges of one another and don't like to admit that.

Colditz - thanks for that.

My opinion is my opinion, what you read into it is up to you.

What i hate is the attitude, not an individual, sorry for any confusion there!

At the end of the day some people don't breast feed - purely for selfish reasons -and I think thats a shame for the baby. I think its about education on the subject - it needs to be more honest (all the literature ect.

Views and attitudes on both methods seem to be changing over the decades.

I just read this article and I don't really have a problem with what she's saying, I had an identical experience with DS1, where I was put on antibiotics for an infected epesiotomy (?) I am allergic to penicillin, so whether it was the particular type of antibiotics I was on , i don't know, but DS would just scream at me when I tried to feed him and was just rejecting my milk, I find it a little upsetting that some people have commented that tainted milk is 'nonsense' unless you have experienced it, you can't really comment. I was told it was 'nonsense' by one midwife, then told it probably was making my milk taste 'metallic' by another. I was so determined to BF, and I was frightened that this was going to put DS off feeding from me i ended up expressing and chucking my milk down the sink, to keep my supply going, and fed him formula for the rest of the week til i finished the anitbiotics. As we all know those 1st few weeks particulary with your 1st baby are hard enough, without having to cope with a complete lack of support and poor information. I was lucky that I managed to carry BF DS1 and am happily BF ds2 with no problem. I think it is just a shame this women has been so completely put off what is such a special bond.

personally I love bf, but would agree with the first week being hard. I bf my own children for varying lengths of time. ds 1 for only 10 weeks, as I was only 15 and went back to school to do my gcse's and leaky boobs were no fun at school! dd for 13 months, ds 2 for 15 months and ds 3 who has just turned a year is just starting to give up
I think it has to and always should come down to personal choice.
My take on the article is that the woman has a problem with the fact that she couldn't/didn't want to bf and for some reason feels that she needs to justify this and get everyone to agree with her and see her point of view.
I think it's really sad that she feels so insecure about her own choices!

Methinks she doth protest too much.

Like a spoilt child,, who has just learned she cannot have the toy she hankers after: "Well, I didn't want it anyway! So there! It's probably rubbish, anyway! Yeah, this one's much better! So there!".

This article peddles misinformation as fact and is clearly aimed at justifying her decision not to bf and to encourage others to join her little "club" of guilty formula-feeders-in-denial.

Befoer anyone jumps on me, let me make it clear that I am not saying that mothers should feel guilty for using formula - but rather that, despite protestations to the contrary, it seems to me that she is riddled with guilt about it all.

It's a shame that she did not find the type of support she so clearly needed, when she needed it. From what I can glean from the article, it seems that there was no reason why she could not have gone on to bf successfully. Sadly, I think that the "breast is best" message put forward can be counter productive. When the all-too-common difficluties in the early days arise, it can come as a huge shock to people whose only experience of bfing has been through seeing soft-focussed pictues of attractive mothers gazing adoringly at the contented infant sucking happliy at the breast.

Should also add that the author might consider that when other women told her of bad experiences with bfing, they were, possibly, trying to empathise. If someone regailed you with tales of woe about all the problems they had with sore nipples, latch, crying baby etc etc etc, it wouldn't exeactly be tactful to say "Well, of course, dd and I took to it like ducks to water. It's so wonderful isn't it? Love every minute".

Has anyone commented on the article in the magazine?

I do feel for her that she had a bad experience and that she resolved the issue happily. But, to say that she's not going to even try to breastfeed a second baby, that is so . Just because she had a bad experience first time doesnt' necessarily mean she will again. It seems to me that she's exchanged one dogmatic view (pro-breastfeeding) for another (against breastfeeding). She's almost saying, don't bother, it's more trouble than it's worth. Which is sad, because as Hunkermunker said, for a lot of new mums who lack confidence or are overwhelmed by motherhood, or feeling depressed, breastfeeding can be an area where they can think 'at least I'm able to breastfeed'. And for others, like Aitch who really had a hard time, at least you gave it your v. best shot, what more can you do? But to talk about bringing formula to hospital... I do actually think it's fine to bottle-feed from day 1 if you want (I switched to the bottle at 6 months and was v. happy with the decision), but it's just the fact that she has gone from being so pro to so v. against it that annoys me.

Message withdrawn

I have not bfed yet as am only pregnant for the first time (and bricking it!!) But..

Have read article and followed this thread, I'm new to MN and I just wanted to post a big, grateful thankyou to all of you.
Unlike the article in question there is a wealth of diferent experiences and views here, all interesting to a first timer -who hopes to bf- not to mention insightful, conflicting, funny, angry,informative, inspiring, cautionary... all quite facsinating really.
Maybe not a big deal to those used to internet stuff ( I can barely type!) but I think this is great!!

Many thanks

What about the virgin gut?

do not brick it, strawberry, but do take very seriously the advice to stay in your damned bed with your top off and that baby on you. i'm not having a guest in the house next time...

and let's leave the virgin gut talk til later, you've got aaaages .

well, no guests apart from a BFC with a lifetime's supply of domperidone.

kamikayzed - selfish in my view is when you don't breast feed (or even bother to try) for cosmetic/how YOU look reasons. Possibly also so you can maintain a social life (and/or sleep maybe)?

Having a baby in my view means certain sacrifices (in many different forms usually and probably mostly for the woman).

Sounds like the general attitude in Oz is more positive, I wonder what the public health organisations message is and how they convey it to expectant mums. Its obviously seen as successful if its unusual to choose to formula and breast is seen as the norm.

Agree with that - a lot of misconceptions out there unfortunately.

"selfish in my view is when you don't breast feed (or even bother to try) for cosmetic/how YOU look reasons. Possibly also so you can maintain a social life (and/or sleep maybe)? "

Am I missing something here - is this a joke, or is this comment serious?

If the latter, then who on earth are you to judge what sacrifices other women should be prepared to make for their children?
This post would also be deeply naive in dismissing sleep and social life as so trivial you are selfish if you think they are necessary.

Please tell me this is not what you are saying.

I haven't read the thread but I read the link and I agree. I didn't have as bad a time as she did and at 13 weeks I'm still bf. However, I do not find it a beautifully bonding experience (I prefer it when I give my girl a bottle as she looks at me then). I find it draining, tiring and occasionally painful - even when the latch is right.

I was determined to continue with bf as I accept that there are some health benefits but I think that bf campaigners are not wise to portray it as a bed of roses and "natural" - the implication being that natural means easy. I thought it would be easy and when it wasn't, I was confused and upset.

I do get rather fed up with the idealised portrayal of bf - perhaps from those lucky people who found it easy - as I actually think it's counterproductive. It puts huge pressure on women at a very vulnerable stage of life. I am glad I persevered but if I hadn't, it wouldn't have been the end of the world.

My girl still wakes up four or five times a night and my health visitor advised me not to talk to her when I'm breastfeeding in the night but she said "that's difficult when you are bf as it's so lovely to spend time together in the middle of the night, bonding over the breastfeeding".

I just thought "you're barmy". It's not lovely - I'm exhausted and I would love more than anything for her to have a bottle from someone else so I can have a break. I just think these unrealistic images are unhelpful.

Incidentally, there are some medical conditions that make bf difficult and I have one of them - thyroid conditions can affect your supply. Luckily I am not too badly affected but it took weeks of fenugreek tea and formula supplementing before my milk alone was enough. During those weeks my premature and jaundiced baby lost a lot of weight and was miserable - not good for bonding actually!

I don't beat myself up because I don't do baby massage every day or eat five fruit and veg a day or spend x number of hours on stimulating play with my baby and I think bf should be the same. Excellent if you can, not the end of the world if you can't.

Just in case it's not clear - still bf and pleased that I am - but I think we should lighten up about it.

There are some misconceptions. There are a hell of a lot of different opinions. And I think the two things get confused.

And this blanket anti-NHS information thing is misleading. It was all very pro-bf in my area (as for woman in article) and midwives gave out list of support orgs when discharged from hospital.

Sorry pointydog, imo handing out information leaflets is not good enough. Not when at the same time, as soon as there's a problem, so many mw's advise topping up with formula.

Not their fault that they're not trained of course, but I think we've got a major right to be royally pissed off with the performance of the NHS on this particular issue. They fail nursing mothers and their babies by failing to prioritise real support for breastfeeding. We have appalling low rates of breastfeeding. That's not all the fault of the NHS of course, but better support in the early days from them, the prime organisation with which new mothers are involved, would go an awful long way to enabling mothers who want to (the majority) to breastfeed.

They didn't just hand out leaflets. I only mentioned that point because so many people were saying that the writer should have been given contact details of people who could offer more support.

IN my area, midwives (and NHS ante natal classes) were very pro-bf to the extent they did not mention any negative aspect whatsoever. Very very pro in the wards, verbal advice, support etc. Didn't want me to leave hospital until I was happy with bf even though I was utterly deperate to leave.

But in all areas they're like that pointydog. It's like being in the Soviet Union. They pay massive, massive lip-service to the importance of breastfeeding, but are utterly incapable of offering genuine support for it because they don't prioritise it. All the midwives on the ward I was on, were extremely helpful and "supportive" in the sense of being very kind and helpful, but they were not supportive in a technical sense (ie a real one, in this context) because they simply weren't trained to support a mother to bf. And there's a school of thought that says they shouldn't be, as they're mw's, not bf counsellors. When I raised the issue of having bf counsellors on wards with the head of maternity services in my area, she said there was an issue there about de-skilling mw's.

So imo the NHS needs to make up its mind - either skill up MW's properly, or accept they can't do it and have BF counsellors on wards (or a different effective solution that I haven't thought of yet. What they are doing atm, is pretending they're offering support when they're not. And the proof of the pudding, is in the statistics.

Message withdrawn

I think I see what you're saying, caligula. Although when I phoned an NCT bf counsellor (maybe La Leche but I think NCT) i got exactly teh same advice as teh midwives.

So I'm not at all sure what real, beneficial bf support would look like.

CAn you clarify?

My maternity hospital had an antenatal bf workshop then there was a session every am you could go to after birht and a weekly post antal class too and also a bf counsellor came round to see you on the wards too.
The antenatal workshop went into loads of detail about things that could go wrong with really scary pics and all my friends whohad breastfed talked about the pain for first 6 weeks. I had no illsusions that it would be at all easy and was always amazed that women who went to the same class as me though it would be simple. I felt incredibly lucky as although I had supply and latching on problems I never had any pain.

Pointydog - Alex8's examples would be a start. Someone on the ward who really knows what they're doing.

Sometimes you're lucky and you have a mw or hv who knows what they're talking about when it comes to bf - you obviously had mw's like that and I was incredibly lucky first time round and had a hv who was also a trained ABM bf counsellor.

But most mothers aren't so lucky. Most mw's and hv's simply do not know enough about how to support a mother to bf, to do that effectively. The figures speak for themselves, I think.