I am really glad i didn't breastfeed

[gracemargaret]

I am mum to 2 ff dds (6 and 7 now) and as a new mum I actually didn't produce any breast milk at all (not very bovine). I now look back and am really resentful of how I was made to feel by nurses/health visitors etc. Firstly they let my dd go a whole 5 days without anything at all to "just give my milk a chance to come in" (it didn't despite her latching on like a dream) - After nights of her screaming hour after hour and only being able to calm her with teaspoons of boiled water I gave her some formula (which I'd had to go and buy as was completely unprepared having planned to BF) but was so ashamed (after HVs tales of mothers "giving up") I hid it when anyone came round. I even allowed myself to be rigged up to a feeding bottle with tubes that I had to stick to my boobs with surgical tape every feed (used for mums who adopt) but still nothing. At no point, despite producing no milk, crying when the HV visited and my dd not gaining weight, did anyone suggest giving her a bottle wich I now feel was a despicable way to treat a new mum and her baby. I eventually realised a few things though - Breastfeeding is ONLY best for baby IF IT IS BEST FOR MUM - Rather than my daughters having a tired mum, with cracked sore nipples, having to do all the feeds, unable to go out without leaking milk all over the place, they had a mum whose husband did half the feeds, who wasn't exhausted, and who now has two daughters who haven't been to the Drs for anything except immunisations and are working way above expected level for their ages at school. The way I look at it is that yes BF is natural but in the past women HAD to BF - we don't have to now - we are supposed to have CHOICE. By all means if it comes naturally to you and you don't get cracked nipples/mastitis/turned off by the thought of cabbage leaves in your bra then go ahead for the miniscule and debatable health benefit, however looking at the kind of things being posted in this forum I think a lot of women (and therefore babies) would be far better and happier "giving up" and hitting the bottle!!

sorry, but just have to congratulate aitch on use of the word KEECH makes me proud to be scottish!

still trying to read the rest....

just wondering after breast feeding a baby constantly for hours on end for 6 weeks and the baby had still not put any weight on since birth, would you still say that it was better for the baby than formula.Or would I also be condemened as a bad mother who didnt try hard enough

i'm finding it interesting that the people who think that HCPs over-promote bfing do so on the basis of their local experience, whereas people on this thread who have said that their HCPs over-promoted ffing have been ignored.

yes, we go by what happened to us but if i started a thread stating 'yes i saw the posters for Breast Is Best in my hospital but when it came down to it every staff member from auxiliary up was pushing formula on me and i was the only person even attempting to bf on a ward with 12 women' (which i could legitimately do) - would i be ignored again? should i give it a whirl?

it's frankly getting on my nerves the way that people are extrapolating their personal experience and calling it a political reality when let's face it, formula feeding is the norm in our society and bfing is the aberration.

fiodyl. who is condemning on this thread? show me the names. if you are still smarting from your grim bfing experience then you have my sincere sympathies, but can all the 'failed' bfers (i am one, remember) stop taking offence where none is intended, please?

fiodyl,
If a baby can't thrive at the breast and is unable to put on weight and grow then they need to be bottle fed.

Do you think breastfeeding advocates are so stupid and nasty that they'd rather a baby starve than have formula? And that they're so unsympathetic that they'd 'condemn' someone who'd struggled with breastfeeding as long and as hard as you have? You must feel really persecuted and angry to say things like that? What exactly was said or done to you to make you feel so victimised? I've not seen anyone here being openly critical of women who can't breastfeed. Have I missed something.

Anyway - in answer to your question one would hope that any mother in this position (with a baby who fed constantly and hadn't regained their birthweight by 6 weeks) would have had the opportunity to work with a lactation consultant and/or breastfeeding counsellor (or more than one - if a second expert opinion was needed) so that the problem could be expertly assessed and solutions sought, before a final decision was made that breastfeeding was not a viable option for her baby.

That happened to me fiodyl with my three dds.
I loved breastfeeding though and found it easy so carried on mixed feeding. Once the pressure was off and they gained weight it was enjoyable all round. I have to say though I did this in complete contradiction of what the HV was advising and certainly didn't get any support. This was hard the first time round but with the other dds I didnt give a toss.

Perhaps not on this thread, but on plenty of others I have seen on here there have been insulting comments Aitch. One example is on the current thread about the lady switching to FF because she couldnt manage to BF and her older child.
Its one of the few areas that people feel as though they are justified in looking down on other Mums for the way they parent.. such a shame.

Eek! Just realised my post sounds a bit judgemental. Sorry - not meant to at all.

Sabire - my HV just produced a tin of SMA ("the nearest thing to breastmilk") and told me to come back in a couple of days for dd1 to be weighed again.

I don;t thikn anyone here on this thread, or any other, or in real life would tell a mother to breastfeed at any cost

read some of the threads about 'failure to thrive', so many mothers are panicked by what is actually normal weightloss in a newborn...and then panicked further by HCPs saying, 'you don;t have enough milk ' or 'top up if baby does not gain x amount '

and topping up too early will interfere with establishing a milk supply, thereby making it 'true' that the mother does not have enough milk and she is right to give formula milk or her baby would have 'starved'

i have yet to see a thread where a formula feeding mother is given a thrashing, but plenty where breastfeeding mothers or pro BF posters are accused of smuggery, militancy, being breastfeeding nazis/police, etc....

how we feed our babies is emotional, but the simple truth is that breast milk is better than formula for babies. and if women make an informed choice to formula feed, then fine.. but what is not fine is not having the information or having BF undermined by HCPs giving the wrong info

producing milk is something all mammals do. it's no more bovine than it is feline or canine or human.

i thought you said your milk never came in - then why the comment about leaking milk all over the place?

yep, this happens a lot. 'i see examples of people condemning ffers for not bfing all the time but, er, i just can't find any right now'.

your one example, by the way, was in response to a hypothetical posted by someone who is training to help and support women with bfing why wanted to know if there was a good answer to 'but i won't have time to bf if i have ds1 to deal with'.

seemed to me it was a really good point, when so many people really have to work hard to bf, how do you get round that? and the answers suggested that sometimes, well, you just couldn't, and some mums talked of taking difficult decisions that weren't actually that difficult when they took their whole family and circumstances into consideration.

there was one poster, a new name so wiith no prior record of this on the bfing board afaia, i saw on there making twatty comments who was immediately called to account. hardly 'all the time' blah blah blah. it happens very, very rarely.

what's very much more frequent is the description of bfers as smug, rabid, zealots, nazis etc, and what? they just have to take that on the chin cos they managed to succeed where so many of us have failed? not fair.

dont all me bovine
get over your bad experience without dissing others
and BREASTFEEDING IS BEST FOR BABY. FULL STOP

whether it is possible is another matter

Yes i have had enough of bfers getting this shit.
People are too damn quick to take offence on this topic, rarely does anyone 'condemn' ffers, and when they do they are quickly put right.
This thread and another one have made me really angry.
Knowledgeable people on MN who try to help people on this topic must sometimes feel like it's just getting flung back in their face, I wouldn't blame them if they don't bother. I suppose they do it for the individuals (like me) they help and who are grateful rather than the idiots who call them names.

needtoasksomething, i don't think a single person on mumsnet would suggest a baby should starve rather than have formula. I guess this is one reason i secretly think formula on prescription would be good ( although i know it could never work). Mums who COULDN'T feed would have prescriptions and therefore freed from feeling judged - they'd have a medcal reason. Some bfeeders are judgemental and look down on ff. Some ffers are judgemental and think bfeeders are rabid zealots.

Some people are nice and some are not. It's got not to do with their feeding choices ime!

Oh god not another bloody sociology student

moo moo moo!
your problem grace is the same of 90% of ff mothers. Failed by aftercare and support. You would not feel the need to offend so many in defence of your choices. You do not need to defend or explain. Your ire would be better written and sent to your maternity unit/ delivery suite.
I adore breastfeeding and luckily found it suits me and my kids. Its not for everyone I totally accept this.

But wait a minute - isn't it the bf mothers who are in the MASSIVE minority? Something like only 1% of mothers are still bfing by 6 months? Like Aitch pointed out, bfing is actually an aberration, so why do posters feel the need to come on to (any) internet chat to defend their ff choice/subtly have a go at bfers? We (bfers) are already a dying breed in this country, so we should probably be given 'protected spiecies'status and put in cages/fields to graze not have to fend off attacks by breast-obsessed husbands/HVs/some mothers who ff/ignorant relatives...etc..

And what's more, I can't be doing with mothers who place ALL of the responsibility on the shoulders of the NHS/HV/whoever. We have so much information available to us, which is NOT available to mothers in most other countries , or people who lived in the past. I had an awful first week after a C-section delivery with no milk, baby losing weight, midwives telling me my baby would be damaged if I didn't ff pronto... But through it all, I KNEW from what I had read what I wanted, which was to bf. So I fed my baby formula until my milk showed up, and 14 months later, still going strong.

PhDiva - could bfers get protection under the law as some kind of minority group

Also why the need to justify choices and condemn others - we all (parents) do things differently, so why worry about what others think?

sushi - here's a few reasons why formula on prescription is a non-starter (though I know your suggestion/wish comes from a good place )

• doctors know nothing about infant feeding so would be unable to assess the need for it or not
• whether to use formula should remain a mother's choice
• there are non-medical reasons for using formula
• the problem of lack of decent information about formula, formula brands, formula preparation would remain unaddressed
• it would be enormously expensive for the tax payer (mothers and babies get free scrips for a year)
• it medicalises infant feeding choices , when they are primarily social and cultural

So that's why it won't and shouldn't happen

fiodyl - please come back and answer the points made in response to your post.

Why are you happy you didn't BF? All I got from your post was those of us who BF seem a bit stupid.

Likewise... Dd was a fail to thrive was told to ff by hv totally ignored her and demanded paed appt.
turns out dd had a rare heart condition and syndrome and luckily I did continue bf as her condition was so perilous that to have ff would have compromised her condition.
I love instinct.
also had very little advice just got on with it. I'm very fortunate that it was this way.
had dd not been my 2nd child, had I not trained as breastfeeding support officer following ds1s birth... Then without a doubt dd would have been ff as I would not have had the guts, instinct or knowledge to trust myself and demand more from the health providers.
my choices in no way reflect or call into question any other mothers feeding choices. I know I have fed my kids the absolute best I can, from breast to beyond. That's my opinion only of course ;)

Why is it BFing is called bovine and BFing is likened to being cow like but taking the breastmilk of another species (and a big ugly one that lives in a field and farts a lot) and drinking it or fermenting it into food stuffs is seen as acceptable?

I always find it amusing that people in general find breastmilk distasteful but the breastmilk of another species is fine.

If your milk never came in then you didn't choose to formula feed, the choice was made for you.

From your OP: "By all means if it comes naturally to you and you don't get cracked nipples/mastitis/turned off by the thought of cabbage leaves in your bra then go ahead for the miniscule and debatable health benefit, however looking at the kind of things being posted in this forum I think a lot of women (and therefore babies) would be far better and happier "giving up" and hitting the bottle!! "

I find this glib attitude offensive. Breastfeeding did not come naturally to me. I struggled for weeks. I had all the things you mentioned and more. I had 3am sobbing. I had a baby possiting (my) blood after every feed. I struggled. I am so very proud that I didn't give up. BFing my little girl was the most rewarding and wonderful experience. I look back on it with a warm glow, and with pride.

I would never judge anyone who gave up.
I would never judge you for being unable to breastfeed.
Who are you to judge me for struggling so hard to do what I believe is best for my little girl?

Way to go PeggySioux . I am always in awe of the Mums who continue to BF despite having a hellish time of it. It was relatively easy for me in comparison.