Friend Breastfeeding...Do you think it was appropriate advice

[jiji]

I just wondered what the experts on here think. A friend of mine has a 12 week old, she is breastfeeding, but has just started giving formula as she is worried he isnt getting enough milk. I asked her if he wasnt putting on weight, or producing many wet/pooey nappies. She said she was getting 7 wet ones and three poos a day. And he was putting on weight, but feeding a lot, and didnt seem to settle. Ive breastfed two, and said in my experience mine cluster fed round this point to get the supply up to satisfy them, but it did get better after a week or so, and that it sounded like a great number of wet nappies, and he didnt sound like he was starving at all...I gave her the la leche number...and asked if she was happy feeding..It seems like it was just the fear he wasnt satisfied...

She is doing a grand job, and I told her I thought she was a star and her son is so gorgeous.

Now I fear that I might have said something wrong...

Does this sound like appropirate advice....I hope I didnt come on too strong with the if you add bottles your supply decreases type thing...

It sounds like perfect advice to me.

It is extremely rare for a mother not to have an ample milk supply, although for some reason, many mothers think their supply isn't good enough, and there are plenty of GPs/HV's/Midwives who suggest putting babies on a bottle.

You're correct about the baby wanting to increase supply but I guess many mums in the lag time between the cluster feeding and increasing the supply, think they don't have enough and swap to introducing formula, which in turn, like you said, decreases their supply.

Advice sounds spot on Jiji.
What a shame that your friend has lost faith in her body.

Perfect advice. He is probably coming up to a growth spurt so he really does need all the breastmilk he can get.

Unfortunately the "downsides" to breastfeeding are often played down and poor mum thinks something terrible is happening. I remember (for example) having a 3 day nurse in (45 mins on, 15 off day and night) and being desperate! I asked on another forum I used to use and got all the "mommy paci" (Americans) comments. Eventually I found out it is normal and didn't mind it so much, but why can't people just tell us this when we're pregnant so we don't feel something is terribly wrong?