was shocked by the amount of bottle-feeders in hospital

[misdee]

found it quite upsetting at times. my bed was by the empties 'bottle bank', so saw how many people on the ward were bottle feeding. in the 4 days i was there, there were 10 women on the ward in total, and only myself and another lady was breastfeeding. The midwives offered help to everyone, but most decided on bottles.

the reason i found it upsetting was because i didnt want dd3 to have formula but that choice was basically taken away from me whilst she was SCBU and was given formula by tube.

JoolsToo - your comment is exactly what made my friend write her own book on breastfeeding. Hopefully when women read it they will want to try it. Yes there can be problems which can be overcome with expert advice and support from professionals caring for women having babies. That is where the true problem lies IMO. Breastfeeding should not be hell and accepted as such.

I think it's very important that you are prepared for the time it takes to establish bf beforehand though. And also for the days when your milk supply is adjusting. It's supply and demand, but sometimes it takes a while. Or you might struggle when you are ill or get your period or whatever. This is normal, but of course it take sa bit more effort and determination than bottle-feeding.

I am amazed that my bottlefeeding my four children probably offended and upset many people at the time. I fed them the only way I could, so in my eyes was doing the best for my children. They are four happy, healthy girls (not one of them had gastroenteritis incidentally) and although I obviously know the huge benefits of breastfeeding, I niaively assumed that other mothers would realise that I was still doing my best for my girls although unable to breastfeed. This subject has been done to death on MN. But it always ends with bottle-feeders being made to feel like the lowest of the low for 'depriving' their children. Sorry if this offends, it isn't meant to.

Apologies for my rant. It's a bit of a touchy subject as you can imagine.

Miam - I agree with your post entirely. Why why why why are we labelled as doing something wrong.

My post was slightly more inflammatory than your.

wanda - this is just nitpicking isn't it? Obviously people are different and it won't always be the case because every person is different and many factors are present in determining a child's health. However the majority of babies who are b/fed get fewer illneses - "significantly less gastrointestinal illness" as the study shows and this is what people want to know about. And for the record I didn't use the words 'never' and 'always' - you did.

We do this when we make a decison about anything - try and gather as much information as possible. We all agree that we should wear seatbelts and you'd not think that a statement such as "seatbelts save lives" is a sweeping one even though there are probably people who have been in car crashes and who haven't worn a seatbelt and who haven't died.

It would be very tiresome to make statements and keep on adding on "except in certain circumstances .... blah blah"

However perhaps it would be better for me to say "taking a population sample of breastfed babies and comparing them with the same number of bottlefed babies one finds that the breastfed babies on the whole have fewer illnesses (gastrointestinal illneses being one example) but that there will always be some bottlefed babies who may not get these illneses due to other factors (eg genetic disposition, environmental factors etc)"

Does that sound better? This is actually what I said in my original post yesterday but just worded in a different way so we've just come a full circle.

I think you are labelling yourself though. I don't read this thread like you obviously. I can't see that I have posted anything "against" anyone choosing bottles. I think what people are concerned about is how to help more mums bf? Surely that is a good thing?A positive thing?

I was going to keep out of this, as I just truly believe that it's each to their own, and no-one should be made to feel they have to justify their feeding choices.

However, I do take exception to the accusation that breastfeeding mothers are critical of bottle feeders. When I was breatfeeding, I had more negative comments from bottle feeders than anything else. Comments like - "you can't possibly be feeding that child enough, you're starving him", "god, how can you bear to get your tits out in public", "your tits will be down at your ankles soon" (they're not, btw), "how can you stand not having a drink for all these months", "no wonder you're knackered, if you let your husband give him a bottle you wouldn't have this problem".

It's not always the bottle feeders that are entirely without blame either.

So is bottlefeeding your child the equivalent risk to your childs life as not strapping them safely in the car? Rather poor analogy I think.

Paolosgirl - Most of those comments were not a implying that you are deliverately damaging your child in some way. They are horrible comments though, and I must say that I've never heard anythign like that from bottlefeeders! I'm shocked and angry foryou. I hope you gave them a piece of your mind!!

Very true. I can't count the number of people who told me bf was the reason my babies didn't sleep through and the reason why I was so tired all the time. Possible even true. I don't know. I think bf mums sometimes are more tired and their babies less prone to sleep through. Worth it in my books though!

OMG - I hope Blossomhill doesn't see this

Fairymum - Perhaps not your comments, but there are some on here that are.

Toothache - in what way was I putting you down? Sorry if you have taken offence. I was merely correcting what I felt was an incorrect fact.

You said that "So after the 1st year it's not that different!" which isn't true. And I didn't totally disagree with you - I said that the immune system was built up gradually which is also what you said... its just that continuing to b/feed beyond a year will still provide benefits for the child.

Can't help but add a post here.

Toothache, your post shows precisely how these debates always go wrong. Eulalia did not say that bottlefeeding your child poses the same risk as not strapping your child in. Please read her post again!

round and round, back and forth - I'm off (again )

No bottlefeeding is NOT the same is not strapping your child in a car (sigh) - I am speaking about how we make decisions on the basis of health statements. YOu could take any example it doesn't matter what circumstances you use. Stop trying to deliberatly twist things and make out I am some sort of ogre.

You could also say "toothcleaning prevents decay" or "eating 5 portions of fruit and veg a day prevents heart disease" but there will always be someone who doesn't clean their teeth and doesn't have cavities and who never eats fruit/veg and who is healthy....

OK?

Thanks emkana - I am off too ...

Of course it will provide benefits to your child Eulalia.... It'll FEED them for starters!

Merely correcting facts??..... hmm then in that case that's just what I was doing to.

I am having difficulty getting time to read this thread and respond appropriately as I've got 2 hairy blokes who keep walking behind me! So perhaps I should bow out til later when I can word my responses better.

Toothache - if someone came on here and told you that you were starving your baby by giving him bottle milk instead of breast milk, I think you would feel as if you were being accused of deliberately harming your baby!

Moondog, in all seriousness and putting the silly little bitchy comments aside, what is your problem with me? If you really didn't like the comments I made to Misdee, which Misdee and I totally dealt with ourselves, why didn't you address me directly? Why did you start bitchily making fun of the way I speak, to another person? It doesn't strike me as a very nice way to behave and definitely not in the spirit of MN. You honestly can't believe that you know anything about me by my username which is a joke by the way, started years ago when I was at university. If I was really trying to portray myself as some snooty lawyer I would at least spell it correctly. The deliberate misspelling is to show I'm taking the piss out of my own name. Yes sometimes I don't spell correctly, sometimes I use the wrong punctuation, why does that make you so bitchy towards me? Really, you don't know anything about me, you shouldn't make the assumptions you have made. If you want to keep on having a go at me, feel free, but I hope you find another outlet because I'm finding your anger towards me a bit strange to be honest.

i am sorry for starting this.

I know that this subject has been done to death but I would like to share my experience. I decided I would breast feed my ds but unfortunately things did not work out, I could not get him to suck at all. It started off badly in hospital when I was told by the midwife that I did not have a hope in hells chance of succeeding unless I sat up straight, I was hooked up to a cathetar and drip as I had a c-section, so it was not that easy. Everytime I called her (as I could not get out of bed) I was asked why my baby was still hungry and told that I was upsetting everyone on the ward (I was very upset as it was quite clear that my baby was hungry) I was visited in hospital and at home by two breastfeeding experts plus numerous health visitors and midwives who all tried to get him to suck to no avail. I was told to express instead, however I could never get more than 10ml, I don't think anyone believed that I was expressing every 3 hours and I was told that every woman is capable of feeding her baby therefore if I tried harder the milk would come. At 1 week old my baby had lost far too much weight and I gave him formula. After 3 weeks I gave up the expressing (I could not produce enough milk to even give one full feed.

My baby is happy and healthy and so far we have had a wonderful time together, yet still I am made to feel guilty about not giving him the best start. I have friends who found breastfeeding difficult and admit that they did not bond with their babies for the first 6 months because of their experiences. Surely this more detrimental to the mother/baby than giving them a bottle?

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