Why can't we just all breatsfeed?

[pupuce]

Seeing the recent debates on breastfeeding, I didn't want to take part in the discussion as I didn't feel I could add to the debate but I was reading this and thought.... why is it that so many women who ended up bottlefeeding have stories of "not enough milk", "baby not thriving", etc.... so we have a BF rate in this country of barely 1 in 2 babies breastfed after 1 week (that's not impressive if you do know that breast is best)... why is it that the Swedes have 98%....
I am sure it's a combination of factors.... but it does mean that too many people in this country have a "wrong reason" for not BF.... surely many women have not enough information about milk production to feel that they truly didn't have enough milk....

OK - am I starting world war 3 ??? hope not

mears, thanks for a lovely post.

And tiktok, I appreciate the stats. I like stats.

By self-attachment, do you mean guiding the baby to near the breast and letting them grab hold? Or do they do the whole "let the newborn crawl there" thing? I've always wanted to see that.

It's very interesting to me to know that the first hours make such a difference for bf. DS1 was nowhere near my breasts for the first 30 hours, and was rubbish at bf. DS2 latched on beautifully in recovery, despite epidural etc, and now feeds very well.

MtoS: most women's milk comes in between days 1 and 4 after the birth, with events like difficult birth, sleepy baby, separation of mother and baby making it towards day 4. It's unusual for it to be day 5 or later, but anyone whose been around bf women and heard stories will hear about milk not coming in till day 6, 7 or even later - but that is really, really, rare. Sometimes, like I said to pebbles, the mother thinks her milk hasn't come in, but it has. If the baby is weeing normally and pooing yellow stools, then it has come in.

If it really hasn't come in, the mother should be expressing long before this to get what colostrum she can to give to the baby, which will encourage her milk to come, and get calories and fluid into the baby, on top of ad lib feeding.

The not all that uncommon gap between the baby starting to get really hungry and the milk coming in is not days, but a few hours...babies really do not need formula in that time, but can be comforted by sucking, cuddling, whatever. It can be a difficult time, though.

Jaundiced babies used to be given formula routinely - that's no longer the case. If it's decided the jaundiced baby needs more than he is currently getting at the breast then the first options should be for the mum to be encouraged to express or to put the baby to the breast more often, helping this with skin to skin contact

NQC - separation of 30 hours would definitely impact on feeding - there are reams of studies and statistics on this.

I know I shouldn't get involved in this thread, but one thing that's really struck me is just how badly I was treated by the hospital and community midwives with ds1. I did end up successfully breastfeeding for 8 months, but it was through sheer bloody mindedness and I got no support at any point through that. I tried writing out exactly what happened on a separate thread but started crying so cancelled out.

Thing is, this was 3 years ago, ffs. Shouldn't I have gotten past this now?! It still upsets me terribly even though I "won" so to speak. Ds2's birth and feeding has been absolutely fantastic - the hospital we went to (we moved area in between) was exemplary, which highlights even more about how dire the first one was.

If anything can be done to prevent women going through that and more KNOWLEDGABLE support and information given to women no matter what their feeding choice, then I'm all for it.

One of the causes for delayed or difficult breastfeeding that Titok hasn't mentioned (I appreciate you didn't mean your list to be exhaustive) are postpartum haemorrhage and bad aneamia in the mother.

This morning (at 8AM) a woman rang me on the BF helpline and she was in tears, has a 4 day old baby who won't latch.... she was formula feeding and kept talking about guilt and inadequacy. I spent 30 mins on the phone with her, listening to her concerns and her wishes, gave her lots of tips and other resources (like where to find someone who could witness her attempting to feed to see what was really happening) but EQUALLY I spent a fair amount of time exploring her emotions and re-assuring her that FEEDING was most important and that there were alternatives to breastfeeding and that BF all waas not lost either, she had choices, she had to make the right one for herself. She sounded calmer when she hung up but who knows what will happen next - unfortunately we hardly ever hear how it "ended".

You're right pupuce....also, retained placental fragments can cause delay, and chronic low supply, too....though have to say I think this is rare, and I think the last time I spoke to a mother with this problem it was a few years ago. Any mother who's experiencing a deviation from the norm needs to get checked out. Breastfeeding may be natural, but we can't always rely on nature to get it right from the start. I do get cross when mothers are told 'just persevere, things will work themselves out' when clearly things are not all right at all.

GeorginaA - I am so sad for you. Yes, three years is a long time. Have you thought about contacting the Birth AfterThoughts service - I think they are on the web? They don't just counsel on birth issues. Even this late on, maybe a letter to the maternity unit would help you and other mothers. If the two experiences you had were at the same place, you could let them know you are happy they have moved on.

Aloha - I just had to tell you, you aren't the only one who had a terrible experience with a midwife, mine really takes the biscuit! When I had ds1, we were in a massive teaching hospital in London, very basic, no frills. I got admitted 3 weeks early for bleeding (turned out to be nothing, just an early very heavy show). Anyway, I'm on the ward, bleeding, worried sick as you can imagine thinking I'm losing the baby. Finally, I think "am I still supposed to be losing this much blood" so I hobble to the midwife station (god knows why I didn't ring the bell) and there's this HORRIBLE midwife sitting there reading cosmopolitan. I start telling her my story (she doesn't even look up or acknowledge me in any way) finally end up crying saying I think I'm losing my baby, and she just keeps turning the pages of the magazine, not looking at me and says to go to the toilet and see what's there..... it was around this point I lost the plot, started shouting, saying I was discharging myself, going to a different hospital, get my husband on the phone NOW, that sort of thing!!!! Anyway the upshot was the delivery midwives were horrified this had happened, said she was agency staff and got me a private room afterwards to make up for it. I still get really angry when I think about it.

leglebegle that is awful!
What a cow!!!

What a bitch that woman sounds! You just cant believe that people like that choose to go into midwifery can you?
(I feel like looking her up and giving her a good hiding!)

leglebegle . That's horrific .

Bloody awful Leglebegle. I had a very similar experience in a large teaching hospital in South London about five years ago. Almost all the midwives there were not just unkind, they were negligent. I don't know whether they were agency midwives or hospital ones, but I would have thought that the standards of care and training should in theory be the same for both. I actually discharged myself early, because I figured that at least if I was at home, I'd be looked after. At one point, I was told to lift up a heavy bucket of sterilising solution and another time I was told to push an immensely heavy trolley with the breast pump down the corridor. This was all within 2 days of having had a caesarean section. And the awful thing is, with the trolley thing, I did it; I later found out that my stitches could have burst, but when we are always being told we live in a compensation culture, you don't really expect medical professionals to advise you to put yourself at risk in that way, do you? So you follow their advice. I drew the line at the heavy bucket thing though, because I knew I wasn't physically capable of carrying the weight when I hadn't had surgery, let alone two days after I had! But that was the level of neglect that was going on in the maternity ward. I sincerely hope it's changed since then.

I got told off for not knowing (ie not having been asked) how to empty my own catheter bag

Caligula - not St George's in tooting by any chance was it?

No, it was Lewisham. I sent a letter to the Head of Midwifery about six months later (it took me that long to get round to it!) and she sent me a long and detailed response. She had been fairly recently appointed, so i think she had plans to change quite a lot of things that were going wrong there, and I do hope she pushed through some changes.

Snap MI ... Kings by any chance??

I got told off cos my catheter bag was overflowing, about an hour after I'd got told off because my urine output wasn't sufficient and I needed to drink more .. I was still paralysed from the spinal block used for my c-section BTW

Some of this stuff is mindboggling. I am beginning to think the UK breastfeeding stats are actually quite high given what happens to women when they've given birth

Okay, here's one of my horror moments with the MW, I go into the bathroom and notice to my distress that the toilet is really full of blood. We had hired a doula so I had her come in to see, asking "Is this normal?" She gives me one of those looks like she's really scared but is trying to act normal says "No, it's not" (she is a lay MW) and goes to get the MW on duty who is off somewhere drinking coffee. They decide to check to see if I have placenta previa, decide I don't, tell me to carry on and leave with me never knowing WTF is causing all the blood loss. Just acted as if it was no big deal.

yes I am very shocked too at the recent posts about callous treatment by MWs. MI - just curious as to how common it is to have a catheter in after a vaginal delivery? I had one in for about 36 hours, due to some problems after delivery.

tiktok - thanks for the info about milk coming in late. I think my milk came in about day 5 - I remember the MWs being concerned my milk was coming in late, and checking for DS nappies to have changed from black (?meconium) to yellow.

I didn't BF my son as I had a really negative experience while in the hospital. When I asked for help the nurse was really snappish saying I wasn't doing it right etc and when the next feed was due I was too nervous to ask again so said I'd changed my mind and was given a bottle immediatly.
When I got home the next day I did try again to BF but without enough support I just found it too hard. Also I'm very shy and was uncomfortable feeding in front of people and with so many visitors coming to see the baby it was a nightmare.

This time around I was determined not to be put off and nearly 10 weeks later I'm happy to say I've stuck with it and can't believe how easy I found it.
I do still have issues with feeding outside the house but am getting better and not letting my shyness put me off going out. In fact today I fed my daughter at a table in a cafe as the feeding room was awful. So I'm making progress...

ks, I'm not fibbing here, but my midwife was called Jan Bastard!!

ks, when ds2 was born we were readmitted to the pn ward at a week old with quite bad jaindice, and the mw there told me he may suffer brain damage and/or die! There always seems to be one who doesn't like me....even got told off for taking him out of the bilibed to bf him ffs!

Mummytummy, did she live up to her name?!

She was absolutely lovely. She said "this will take your mind off the pain. Look at my name badge and tell me how to pronounce my name. I politely guest at B'stard (as in Alan B'stard) and she said nope, its spelt the same way as its pronounced. Its spelt Bastard, its pronounced bastard and it saves calling your husband one when it comes to pushing!!!

It's amazing that people have got to the 20th/ 21st century and not dumped names like that!