Why "choose" to bottle feed???

[Difers]

I am a breastfeeding mum and I meet lots of mums who said they tried to breastfeed but weren't able to which I can totally understand but My mother-in-law said she "chose" to bottlefeed and didn't bother even trying...

So I am wondering, given the benefits of breastfeeding, why would anyone "choose" to bottlefeed??

I wish MN had a gobsmacked emoticon

'"Is is quicker and easier to bottle feed then if you have loads of children?" '

yes,you can get the older dc to give the baby a bottle

PND kicked in for me when ds1 was about 4 weeks old and i was 'failing' to bf him,i couldnt get him to latch on,so often ended up feeding him in public loos rather than expose myself.then i would feel guilty he was having his dinner in the toilets.it was when i took to going into boots every day,looking at the bottles and formula,and crying my eyes out,that i realised i may be unwell

Mercy - Ah that's interesting..it wouldn't be worth starting bf'ing if you had to work after 2-3 months really would it??

mercy - this was my Mum that told me about the 10 day hospital stay with me (32 years ago) even the odd breastfeeding mother was presented with her baby every 4 hours for feeding. How messed up was that only granted access to your baby every 4 hours. You also weren't allowed to hold them until they were washed and dressed after birth.

Anyway getting back to the BFing question BFing so really rare up here most women I talk to know it's better for the baby but for some reason just don't do it.

Elkiedee - I guess though that bottle feeding does enable a quick routine to be established if the mother's determined to have one come what may. I guess you could do that with breastfeeding as well but it wouldn't last long.

Muppetgirl - great post. I think I suffered from PND as well and I was also struggling very hard to breastfeed DS. I would quite happily leave him to cry because I was so terrified of feeding him. I didn't feel like I loved him for ages and ages, but when I did "fall in love" it was amazing and overwhelming. And my PND was only mild - I can't begin to imagine how terrible it can be for some women.

no worries...i was just scrolling back thinking "was that aimed at me?"

i bf ds for 5.5 weeks, badly, had no support, PND, was in constant pain and a single parent so no respite and it was the most miserable time of my life. i was resenting him and hating myself for feeling that way. i expressed for a week the he was full FF from 6.5 weeks and the two of us never looked back.

BFing 5.5 wk dd at the mo and enjoying every minute of it, but had decided when pg to give it a fair go but not beat myself up if it wasn't working.

Well, if that meant taking 4/6 weeks off pre birth and then returning to work when your baby was 6 weeks old, I suppose so. I don't know tbh if a baby can be successfully breastfed up until 6 weeks old and then scuccessfully bottle-fed by someone else.

Daisy that post describes my experience exactly. I was terrified of feeding both of mine, I would be in tears in anticipation of the pain.

Muppetgirl. Big hugs and I hope everything goes well this time.

Divastrop - PND sounds very vile indeed so much retro sympathy.

I'm off to bed now but I just want to say that the only person who has ever said anything negative about breastfeeding is indeed my mother in law and I suppose the inverted commas in the inital question reflect that. She is a cold harsh woman who has never shown any physical affection for my poor husband who I had to teach to hug.

Goodnight Everyone!

There really is nothing worse than knowing your week old baby is going to wake up in an hour and want feedimg when your nipples hurt like hell, their latch isn't that great so they will get frustrated and cry. You being to dread every feed and at 3am when you're shattered it is so tempting to reach for the bottle. That's where the support should be to tell you it's ok it will pass show you how to latch him/her on.

I also have friends who didn't BF as they wanted a good drink and night out after 9 months of not drinking.

Sorry sweetkitty - maybe some health authorities did things differently.

My little bro is older than you and what you describe had been phased out by the time he was born. He was born at home which was the norm for a second + baby

Certainly applied to me though!

Better maternity leave might help, and there was an article in the Guardian by George Monbiot a few weeks ago arguing just that. But formula milk became popular at a time when some jobs still had a marriage bar and women weren't expected to return to work after having babies. There were always mothers who worked but staying at home after babies were born was seen as the normal/ conventional thing up to perhaps the 1970s. And my step brother's wife who has only succeeded with her 3rd child is a SAHM and has been since the 1st, although she's now considering training to return to work.

No I will not avoid stating that the midwives in hospital were like Nazis. they would march up, bully me and then march off. I didn't sleep AT ALL for 8 days, everytime I did they would wake me up, it was like torture...not one of them offered ANY practical support like changing a inco pad for baby and one of them told me they used ploys like saying that they didn't have any bottles to prevent mums from bottlefeeding. I had to beg for inco pads for babys cot, they would give me one at a time, (he had to be naked as had phototherapy) It was an awful experience unless you have had an experience like that I don't think you can tell people what to say.

still maintain that someone ages ago had a fab idea about soaps/tv shows showing bf as the norm and i think that it would make a HUGE difference.

Support to show you how to latch a baby on - yes, that was what I was missing out on, there was supposed to be that support, but it was one midwife in a busy ward with some more pressing medical problems for mothers and babies.

I'm sorry you had such a bad experience Difers - I didn't have the best post-natal care myself, although it wasn't that bad. It didn't come through as clearly in your 'breastapo' post. It is the case, however, that some people find the use of 'nazis' or related vocabulary atatched to a completely unrelated situation or group of people a bit offensive.

I chose to bottlefeed my fourth child in 6 years because I just couldn't face trying to recover physically without the best medication, and produce enough milk, which I had failed to do with my third child, leading to development problems for her, which I've never quite forgiven myself for.

Berolina - Do you mean you find what I said offensive and if so why?

Now Difers - are you just trying to get a rise out of people for shits and giggles?

i think,as many women have encountered health professionals like that,it would be helpful to find an alterative term for them,as 'nazis' is rather inappropriate.

the mws in the hospital where i had dd1 were like that.as i wasnt bf they refused to help me in any way,they didnt even give me any bedding for her (or tell me where to get it from) and every time i asked for a bottle they looked at me like i was scum.

saying that,i dont think they were any more helpful to the bf mums,i just think they didnt want to do any work

because the thought of someone attached to my boobd made me physically sick

Well, it makes my blood bloody boil like a very hot boily thing when people tell my what I can say or not say. They were like effing Nazi's. They goosestepped and everything!

this is a debate which will clearly run and run...

I find it quite interesting that there have been threads on here stating that women got no BF support at all from the PN midwives and were made to feel like they were time wasting, but equally there are women like Difers who were made to feel bullied into it.

The truth of the matter is that formula exists and in these days of working mums it is inevitable that a large number of babies will be given formula at some point in their lives.

It is and always will be a matter of personal choice which women should be free to make without feeling "got at" or inadequate or even odd for wanting to feed their child in the manner in which they chose wherever they may be at the time.