Are we natural at breastfeeding? Or we have to learn the skills?

[Tirsit]

We human are a little different from other mammals. Unlike other mammals, we need to learn every step of our parenting including breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is also a skill we need to learn. Many moms couldn't make the first week of trying. Many more couldn't keep up the first three months with the development of the child and the gap until our breast adjust to the demand. And many also finds it hard to keep going up to the six month. The challenge is a

All this is rather poorly written and I’m going to have to guess what you’re attempting to convey.
Breastfeeding is natural and for many very easy and convenient.
But with more moms leaving the hospital before feeding is established, needing to go back to work early and not having good role models there are hurdles to overcome.

We have societal obstacles in place that other mammals don't have. Off the top of my head:

• expectation of covering up somewhat in public (and, in some places, disapproving looks etc)
• "nursing bras" which IMHO are an invention akin to a waterproof teabag
• silly messaging that convince mothers that babies only need to feed every 2-3 hours, or will sleep in 5 hour stretches...
• breast pumps

All of the above combine to sabotage breastfeeding for many.

Some women, rarely, have anatomical issues that make breastfeeding unusually difficult. Other mammals will have chances of issues too and for them it would lead to the baby not feeding enough and dying.

Personally I think formula is a medical miracle comparable to antibiotics and anaesthesia, for saving babies' lives. I'm very grateful that we have an alternative to feed babies when we (society) put so much in the way of breastfeeding successfully.

I've read about other great apes in captivity that needed to be shown videos of breastfeeding because they'd never seen it before so it's not just us.

I was one of those who injured my nipples by using them like a bottle because that's what I'd seen a lot of. People who grow up around breastfeeding are more likely to avoid that as they know what a latch looks like.

It needs to be learnt and it needs to be supported.

you learn by observing and by help. I had only ever seem my sister breast feed once ( and nobody else) before doing it myself. I remember seeing her toes literally curl with pain, so I was under no illusions that it was all natural and easy. She had support from a visiting midwife, so I heard their conversation. This 20 minute insight, 10 years before I had my baby was actually truly helpful. You don’t need to see or experience much, but you do need to have some frame of reference. A friend who gave birth 2 months before me described her struggles with breastfeeding which was also useful insight.

re support, I had no midwife / hospital help all, but my husband supported my decision to try breast feeding, which was a help.

after a week or so of trial and error I was a dab hand at it.

Most of this focuses on the mother’s skill, ability and perseverance. In my case it was my baby who didn’t know how to latch. I think that’s harder to overcome especially when it means you know they are not being fed.

Not to mention the huge industry of formula feeding which profits from the undermining of our bodies' ability to feed our children. Even toddlers are shown that dolls feed from a plastic bottle.

Then the tick box weight charts which tell us we're not doing well enough and pile on the guilt.

Most mammals don't have the external pressures and simply feed their children. We could too if we were just left alone

Agree with the PP. As the breastfeeding nurse said at the beginning of her session to expectant mothers. "We live in a formula feeding society where breastfeeding is not seen as the default".

OP reads like AI or spam, but the discussion is interesting.

Of course breastfeeding is learned behaviour, like almost all behaviour. Societal conventions and practise have made it hard for mothers in a thousand ways, large and small.

Imagine it being considered taboo for a mother to feed her baby! Formula feeding companies have achieved an incredible feat in disrupting culture.

First baby I was lucky enough to have great support in hospital. It took about 3 days to crack

Second baby was a shock. I assumed because I knew what I was doing it would be easy. It was very difficult. DD2 was very sleepy and turned out to have learning disability. I pushed on for 10 months with her but wish I had followed my instincts and swapped her to formula at 6 months. She started to thrive as soon as she was on formula

Oh, those flaky, non-persevering ‘mamas’🙄

I think the breastfeeding experience being so difficult and finding anyone who knew what to do was so difficult (I was on a maternity ward for days and only the LLL visitors could show me apparently. Nobody knew when they’d be in.. )
it was the first experience of how I did need to be taught how to breastfeed and how variable babies are and that has been good life lesson. I found someone to teach me at the nearest children’s centre breastfeeding drop in and cried with relief. Baby didn’t want a bottle. Nor being able to feed your baby in a way that works for everyone is extremely stressful all round.

There’s an assumption sometimes that because it’s entirely natural (it is) that breastfeeding will just come instantly to mothers (and babies; there are two — or more with multiple births — elements in each breastfeeding equation!)

It’s often this ‘expectation vs. reality’ part that trips us up/makes us quit. We encounter obstacles and think ‘surely it can’t be this hard, I’m obviously not doing it right.”

Breastfeeding is a learned skill. It’s easier to learn when there is a supportive environment and an expectation there may be bumps along the way before it’s super easy, and these days that’s not always a given.

My first baby was premature and I spent 12 hours a day with him in Neo-natal. There I received a lot of help with breastfeeding and we continued after leaving hospital. With second baby I was left to get on with it. As soon as I mentioned I was struggling to feed him, a bottle was shoved into my hand. I persevered with breastfeeding second baby, but was soon told he was dehydrated and I should give him bottles! Unfortunately, despite it being the most natural thing in the world, it’s not always that easy and help and guidance would really help a lot of us. Just thought - in the ‘old days’ would this help have come from other women in the family?

I think in the "old days" most women would have benefited from knowledgeable friends and family and also experience of others breastfeeding around them. You'd know that cluster feeding is normal because you'd have seen and maybe even supported someone through it by fetching food and drink for them for example.

That being said infant mortality rates were higher so we shouldn't romanticise things too much. Some babies did die or have to be topped up by someone else's milk.

We don't like to admit how influenced we are by the formula industry because most of us like to kid ourselves that we're too smart for advertising. Traditional formula feeding was very routine based and lots of the older generation have absorbed that as normal for infant feeding hence why you get all the "he's not feeding again is he?".

Breastfeeding 'knowledge' is as much part of cultural heritage as baby rearing practices. By the time I had my babies my grandmothers (the last women in my family to breastfeed) had died. My mum, sister, cousins never tried. My mw at hospital never had kids and so had no practical experience. If it hadn't been for the Nigerian mum of one of the other mums at the hospital I would never have known that there are actual techniques to bf a baby with a tongue tie.

Even if something is "natural" it doesn't follow that it should therefore a) be easy or b) be pain-free or c) work every time with no bad outcome.

I mean, look at childbirth, right? It's a natural thing. Still painful and difficult and stuff can go very wrong.

Breastfeeding is also natural, still painful and difficult (at least initially) and can go wrong.

I would like to add that birth is a lot more medicalised nowadays than it used to. Interventions like C-sections, forceps, ventouses, or even epidurals, can save lives, but make it potentially more difficult to establish breastfeeding. For example, a baby born via forcepses will have pain in his jaws, which will make it harder for hom to latch properly.

That’s true. In Dublin Zoo they even got breastfeeding women to volunteer to feed their babies in front of a glass enclosure to demonstrate to an orangutan so she could learn. Amazingly, it did encourage her and she copied the women’s actions, although unfortunately it didn’t work out in the end.

I ebf for six months and bf for nearly three years. On the one hand I was glad I went to classes/ groups and read up about it. On the other , a lot of the information didn’t apply to me. It made me feel overwhelmed and unnecessarily anxious, so double edged sword.

Humans and animals need to learn to develop most things, even things that are central to survival. Very few things are completely innate/ instinctive.

That poor orangutan mum. That brought a tear to my eye reading that.

Before having my first I read several books about breastfeeding and they had helpful diagrams. (Tbf I do like learning things from books with diagrams, like ikea instructions.)

I also, like pp above, thought you were supposed to use your nipple like a bottle teat until I got the books.