"Breast-feeding Militia" or "Bottle-feeding Defensive"?

[CalaLilly]

I have been struck by a conversation on another forum I visit that there seems to often be very polarised views on these methods of feeding and that people often (though obviously not always) join a camp. From the safety of each camp it's easy to be patronising or insulting about the other camp for example you can say "Breast feeding is repulsiive and really shouldn't be done in public" or "bottle-feeding mothers are selfish and haven't done the best they could for their baby".

The thing that makes me most sad is that it seems near impossible to see the middle ground and to unite together as "mums", resigned to the fact that motherhood is tough and the nutrition aspect is a challenging part of that. I personally love the Baby Friendly Program but I think that, in addition to many benefits, it has served to pronounce this split.

Have others noticed this division? How can we unite... if indeed we should unite? How can we provide robust education on why BF is so great and also good support for Mum's trying it without making Mum's feel pressurised or a failure if they bottle feed?

Mumsnet though is terribly unrepresentative; most women formula feed and it's only a very tiny minority who breastfeed, hence the minority attitude, including evangelical pro b/fing, and also the defensive stance some people take.

"chilly.. thats what bugs me.. you might think you're being an advocate for the baby, but you're not."

Sorry - why are bf advocates not advocates for the baby as well? Because you don't want us to be?

"I appreciate your passionate, but both of your posts on here reek of someone who wouldn't be above telling a mum who's decided to FF that shes wrong/stupid."

No - that's completely unfair. What you're saying is that you think my strong opinions about artificial feeding make me a nasty, unkind, brutal person who would hurt a mother's feelings for the sake of making a point. Nothing I've said in my posts supports your view. I would never say anything unkind, unsupportive or judgemental to a mother who had chosen to formula feed. That doesn't mean I can't have and express strong views about the fact that the majority of babies in our society are not breastfed for more than a few weeks, and that, in my opinion, they are deprived of something important for their health and development. I honestly think that the reason why you have made this critically aggressive comment about my morals and my attitude is because it's your way of discrediting my general opinions and stance on this subject. I appreciate that as a mum who has chosen not to breastfeed it is hurtful to read opinions like mine, but it doesn't justify a personal attack.

"Accusing a mom of 'depriving of something that is important for their health and welfare' is automatically going to put her on the defensive and make you sound horribly judgey."

I'm sorry - but if you believe that breastfeeding is very beneficial for a baby's health and development then you - logically - are going to feel that a baby who is not breastfed has been deprived of something that is important. You have rephrased my comment in a rather nasty way, to make it sound like I was accusing mothers of deliberately hurting their babies by not breastfeeding them. Again, this is manipulative and very unfair.

Kingcanute - I stand by my opinion that most women who choose not to breastfeed are not aware of what the medical literature says on the risks of artificial feeding. Gosh - in most forums the very concept that there are any disadvantages for babies in being artificially fed is considered outrageous propaganda. There's very little understanding that in midwifery circles (at least among midwives who have trained in the past 10 years) it's an idea that's common currency and is something that causes a great deal of concern among health professionals responsible for improving practice in infant feeding.

And why should we expect mothers to know this infomation anyway, when it's not commonly available to them from the usual sources - mother and baby magazines, the bulk of NHS sponsored parent information and through parenting manuals? I didn't know anything about it myself until I started researching the issue in some detail- reading scientific papers, searching out information through the World Health Organisation, Unicef and by reading up to date midwifery textbooks. A lot of women who post on this board are unusually well informed about this issue - but it is almost always women who are strong advocates for breastfeeding. Women who profess neutrality on this issue who can discuss the subject in as much detail and draw on a wide range of evidence in support of their beliefs are as rare as hen's teeth - on mumsnet and in RL.

I thought I was an advocate for my baby when I insisted on carrying on breastfeeding her and would not listen to the HVs who pointed out that her weight was getting dangerously low.

What I refused to accept was that you can choose the best option, do it all correctly (had had plenty of help with latching on) and still have a baby who for some reason is unable to suckle. These were of course the babies who would simply have died in an earlier era.

Dd was luckier: we ended up in hospital and were able to turn her round by syringe feeding. 11 years later I was told what went wrong.

I still believe breastfeeding is a good thing. But I should have been more flexible, not believed in it as the only salvation.

Cory - I appreciate there are babies who really struggle with feeding. The problem is that we have to make decisions about what we should do in the face of a feeding problem in a context where the vast majority of women are falling by the wayside with breastfeeding for lack of truly knowledgeable care. Sometimes for lack of really basic care. I can see that some breastfeeding problems are more challenging than others and need expert input, just like some other health problems are only understood, and sometimes resolved after the visit to the right consultant. I know women who have seen many bf experts in their quest to get to the bottom of a particularly intractible bf difficulty, who have through sheer bloody-mindedness (and good social networking)eventually managed to find the right person to get to the bottom of their and their baby's specific difficulty.

Encouraging 'flexibility' (by which I suppose you mean being prepared to stop breastfeeding or use artificial milk without too much agonising) in that context is a bit problematic IMO. I know so many women who have overcome huge barriers to breastfeed their children only by being completely stubborn and inflexible. It's hard to get the balance right.

This subject really gets to me because:

95% of my mummy friends tell me that they wanted to breastfeed but were in the rare 1% that didn't have enough milk and that formula milk is much closer to bm these days.

I hear it all the time and it makes me very angry, and it makes me sad for the mums and their babies.

Am I being judgy? Yes, - but not of the mums and their ffing. Because the majority, if not all of these friends have been horribly misled and let down.

Now my rl experience tells me that a poster on here that ffs is likely to have been a victim to the same crap advice and support and I feel moved to do what I can to make up for it a little. Often, it is too late or the logistics too impractical for a sleep-deprived stressed and vulnerable new parent and I have never seen a thread that berates an OP for being in this situation.

I think, that often strong emotions expressed by bfers are in frustration at the system and anger at hcps giving at best poor advice and at worst dangerous advice. I have seen these high emotions but never have I seen them directed at an OP.

Finding out too late that wrong advice has led to the premature ending of bfing can possibly lead to the feeling of 'stupidity', but this is not the fault of the people who contradict the poor advice and support.

Anger directed at them would be better spent in a strongly worded letter to the relevant HCPs instead of challanging or shouting down pro-bfers.

If HCPs could be trusted to give better information then the bf/ff would truly be about choice and the bfing police could all go back to their day jobs.

I find this debate very interesting as I feel I have been on both sides of the fence.

When my ds was born I assumed I would breastfeed. I was not prepared for the various problems I encountered, the worst of which being that as it was so unbelievably painful I hated doing it. I found having no 'time off' from feeding a baby two hourly incredibly hard. I was on the verge of hysteria for the first ten weeks. I was about to give up when I found mn and started reading all the threads on this topic.

To begin with I felt gutted. My decision was made and here were people telling me that it would be better if I carried on, that feeding two hourly was normal, that if I tried hard enough I would manage to bf, that I could cut out the formula tops ups, that formula WASN'T as good as breastmilk. I hated breastfeeding, I wanted validation in my choice to give up - not what I got which was the information I needed in order to carry on. (I should add that I did not post, I just obsessively read everything on the topic). I felt defensive and angry.

But then something changed. My perception of what I was reading altered and I began to see that no one was getting at me, that no one was criticising me. I was reading reasoned debate that forced me to rethink my position. I ended up managing to breastfeed my ds (although he always had some formula). When my next baby came along I managed to totally breastfeed her. Mainly thanks to information from people on here.

I suppose I just want to say how my emotions changed my perception of what is written on here. In the end I didn't feel criticised for formula feeding my son, I felt enabled to carry on breastfeeding him. The arguments had not changed, but my perception of them had.

Well I too dislike the idea of being labelled. Pretty annoying. This is a bit off topic but once on a thread I suggested someone co-sleep because the Op said this was the only way she got any sleep. Then someone came on and called me part of a 'Pro Co-Sleeping Camp'. Actually, I am merely pro-sleep, any kind of sleep, baby in cot sleep, baby in my bed sleep just as long as I get sleep

I have the same attitude regarding breastfeeding and bottlefeeding. Just because you choose one doesn't mean you are anti the other.

chillybangbang, by flexibility I mean being able to accept evidence that is staring you in the face, not burying your head in the sand while your child is losing weight.

I did not necessarily mean formula feeding. But getting medical help, for a start. Not telling yourself that my baby must be thriving because I am breastfeeding and latching on correctly and overflowing with milk. Being prepared to listen to a second opinion.

And frankly, if you are in the rare position of having a baby that is too weak to breastfeed- then why is agonising such a good thing? Does PND make you a better parent? (If it is, then I can console myself with having done a brilliant job )

I was one of those stubborn mums who face all obstacles to carry on breastfeeding. It was the baby who was not stubborn enough if you like. I was committed: in fact, I was still breastfeeding when she was 11 months. It is the interval before then that I am not particularly proud of. I was putting her at risk: if she had caught an infection then, she would have had very little strength to fight it. And I see nothing particularly natural about syringe feeding.

And when ds was born 3 years later, I was still committed to breastfeeding to the point where I risked my own health by taking a medicine that was putting me in a zombie-like state, so that I could carry on breastfeeding. Looking back, I wish I hadn't. I feel I missed out on the early months and that I could easily have caused an accident because I was too much under the influence to know what I was doing half the time. Again, it was nothing to do with lack of medical advice- my GP did point this out to me.

I fully appreciate that mine is not a usual story, but I am not keen on the idea that mums must be not be told that anomalies can happen, for fear that it might put them off breastfeeding. Some babies are born with hidden disabilities. Those mums need to be vigilant. I was not.

btw it is not true that all medical institutions are negative towards breastfeeding. At our ante-natal hospital they went round and asked the mums how they intended to feed and the ones that said formula really had to defend themselves. I of course got patted on the head.

couldn't agree more with supercherry, being pro one thing does not make you anti the other.

couldn't agree more with supercherry, being pro one thing does not make you anti the other.

ooooh, poor cory, her head must be getting sore.

cory, your post says it so well. A rhetorical question: although BF is best when it is going well, if things are not working (for whatever reason) is it really worth risking your child's/your own health and mental stability in order to make it work?

I'd also just like to add that in much of the NHS leaflets/antenatal classes they discuss the pros of BF and the cons of FF, but they don't tend to tell anything about the reality of BF. Even simple things like if you are breastfeeding you are likely to get less sleep because your partner can not take over some of the night feeds are dismissed as trivial, but in reality when you are feeling flabby, postnatal and after weeks of sleep deprivation it doesn't seem so trivial anymore. Personally I'd like to see a more realistic "warts-and-all" picture of breastfeeding being given to mums-to-be. For me at least, I wouldn't have been put off but it might have made me realise what I should expect. I suspect that this is half the reason mums give up early - they expect BF to be this completely mind-blowingly amazing bonding experience and when they are faced with the reality, get a feeling of "what, this can't be right. This isn't what I signed up for..." and therefore stop.

Finally, what really hacks me off is why do midwives etc promote the benefits of BF before birth and yet after birth, nothing! Even at the hospital where I had my ds's there is 1 BF room in the entire place (it is a large hospital) and this is dirty, smelly and unhygenic.

Oh, I probably should add as well that ds1 was FF not because I planned it that way (everyone in my family BF and I just expected that this was the 'normal' way to feed a baby and didn't consider anything differently), but because I tried and tried to get him to latch on and he simply wouldn't despite help. At a certain moment I couldn't watch him go without food any longer and started to bottle feed (first with EBM and later with formula). For the first two months of his life I spent every day either feeding or expressing and beating myself up about my "failure" to do this one simple thing for my baby. Then I realised that there is more to being a good parent than that and the best thing I could do for him was to let it go and get on with enjoying being a mum.

I must admit, as a mum of one (BF for 8 weeks) and expecting LO2, I am shocked at how little I knew about BF. I struggled on not even knowing that you could BF lying down, with a horribly judgemental HV who never offered any advice, but actually banned me from trying anything else without speaking to a BF counsellor who wasn't available for an appt for 2 weeks. I started FF that night and have never regretted it for my son.

However, I think a lot of the antagonism from both camps comes from a blanket attitude. Yes, BM is the best thing for a baby in the ideal world, but it may not be the best thing for a family. If I choose to BF my next LO, it affects me, him, my first son and my husband, we all need to adapt around the decision to BF.

Chilly, I get the feeling that you are unwilling to accept that any parents can be well informed. The fact that a well informed person can still make the decision not to bf seems like an alien idea to you, therefore if a person does not bf then they are not well informed. Is that the way you feel?

I feel that people can make that decision and be well informed. I understand that you feel that bf is the only real option for baby but I feel that it is not just about the option for baby it is for baby and mum.

I do think I have experience of bf, ff and attempting but not managing bf. I tend to find that I see most sides of the issue but cannot really come down on any one because of the extreme views of some of the people involved. I just do not want to tie myself to one of the other when both have valid points to them. The only real issue I have with ff is that I cannot (and I have tried) get down with the "yucky", "to save my boobs" or "tits are for sex" POV. To me that is a cop out from someone who is not prepared to make any effort to look at the real issue involved. The best I can do with this is to remember that this is my view and I do not have the right to inflict that on everyone. I will answer if I am asked and I will always take the time to gently suggest the ways bf could help.

I think strides would be made if people really tried to separate opinion and personal statements from fact. If someone posts "I do not want to bf at all, and do not wish to discuss this", then they quite rightly should be left well alone. I have no beef with this poster, why should I?

But when a poster writes "I do not want to bf at all, because [inaccurate statement about bf/ff] and do not wish to discuss this", they HAVE to realise that, for the sake of others who will read that potentially damaging untruth and may believe it to be true, the STATEMENT must be challenged, with supporting evidence.

Like Aitch, I have no interest whatsoever in challenging somebody's decision on how they feed their baby, and I'm not interested in 'converting' anyone. I'm mighty grateful that we live with freedom of choice in how we feed our babies.

But I will challenge a statement which perpetuates a damaging myth about ff/bf. And I hope I would challenge someone who uses inflammatory and hurtful language on either side of the debate.

"I fully appreciate that mine is not a usual story, but I am not keen on the idea that mums must be not be told that anomalies can happen, for fear that it might put them off breastfeeding. Some babies are born with hidden disabilities. Those mums need to be vigilant. I was not"

No - I would never support mums being misled in this way. In fact there was an article in the paper on dehydration in bf babies only yesterday which IMV flagged up the very real need for parents to be able to recognise the signs of a baby who is not thriving at the breast. I'm saddened that you are down on yourself for failing to recognise the signs that your baby wasn't growing well on your milk. It would have been easier for you had you been given the skills to do this. Good bf preparation helps mums to identify when bf isn't going right; sensitive and timely care postnatally is crucial, as is a health professional knowing when to refer. Very few mums get that.

"Chilly, I get the feeling that you are unwilling to accept that any parents can be well informed. The fact that a well informed person can still make the decision not to bf seems like an alien idea to you, therefore if a person does not bf then they are not well informed. Is that the way you feel?"

I cannot accept that someone with little or no experience of normal breastfeeding - ie, someone who hasn't grown up seeing breastfeeding as a normal, functional way to feed a baby, can know what they are rejecting when they choose to bottlefeed. They simply don't understand the breastfeeding reality because they haven't been exposed to it. That's the first problem I have with the concept of 'freedom of choice'.

Secondly, very, very few people who ff will have come across good, detailed, up to date evidence based information on the differences between human milk and artificial milk, because this information is not readily available to people who are inexperienced in breastfeeding, who necessarily usually have a very narrow frame of reference in relation to this issue. You have to seek this information and these discourses out. It doesn't inform the vast bulk of popular dicourse on this subject. And I find it's very much the case that in RL, once a woman reveals an antipathy to breastfeeding, health professionals and friends will often temper and censor the advice and information they give her on the subject in an attempt to spare her feeling pressured or criticised.

So no - I think it's very, very difficult to make a truly informed choice on this issue, not in a society where bf is so widely misunderstood.

"Yes, BM is the best thing for a baby in the ideal world, but it may not be the best thing for a family. If I choose to BF my next LO, it affects me, him, my first son and my husband, we all need to adapt around the decision to BF"

Of course we all have to make decisions that suit our whole family, but they should be made with acknowledgement that (a) not bf a baby has consequences for that baby's health and development that last into adulthood (b) that at that point the baby is the most vulnerable and least powerful member of the family (c) infancy lasts a very short time (d) that most things that make bf difficult for women and families stem from poor management of bf, a lack of knowledge about how bf works, and from a lack of practical and medical support, and often there is no attempt made to address this before someone gives up bf. Not blaming people for this - it's just the way we do things as a society. We don't understand or really value bf and we are not 'baby centred'. We like babies to be quiet, feed at fairly widely spaced, regular intervals and sleep a lot. We don't want to have to assume sole responsibility for feeding them. You can see these things (frequent feeding, night waking) as a problem and a barrier to a happy family life or you can see them as a normal feature of infancy which need to be accommodated for a few months by everyone within that baby's social circle.