How did you make your decision?

[CrosswordGeek]

Why did you choose breast or bottle feeding?
Why didn't you choose the alternative?
Do you have any regrets?

Genuine intrigue!

It's true that the skills and knowledge and conditions to help mothers breastfeed comfortably and happily are not there - and informing women that breastfeeding matters is not enough, I agree, without the support structure.

FF marketing is unethical and false - not just in developing countries, but here, too. And also here, there is a lack of information about the health effects of using formula - there is very little honesty because of various reasons.

I too think women should be treated as grown ups, with honest facts and information.

That's usually not what is intended when this plea is voiced. The honest facts and information about formula are resisted - people really don't like to hear them. People hear the honest facts and then say they are being told that formula is 'evil' or is 'poison', neither of which is remotely true.

I am not sure what you mean about 'letting bf speak for itself' Petitioner; how does that happen? I think there is room for the 'nice' things to be shared about breastfeeding, too, but as I said, saying it's a good thing to do is nothing like the whole story.

Have been exclusively bf my dd for 7 weeks. Other than purple nips for a week before the discovery of kamilosan I've had no probs at all. Love the convenience and the sleep. She's gained nearly a lb a week!

My reasons were initially really really shallow - wanted the weight loss - but after doing lots of research on how to get bf off to a flying start (Best Feeding) I am more and more determined to stick at it for the millions of other reasons, including the political. So many of my friends would have loved to have bf and it seems that their efforts were only thwarted by the lack of support from hcp whereas I felt staff went above and beyond for me. Love bf and love the sleep it gives me too.

I am not sure what you mean about 'letting bf speak for itself' Petitioner; how does that happen?

Mum's are probably the biggest group that chat and compare notes? Currently the exchanged talk is a lot about the convenience/intimacy but balanced by the failure (and the huge sense of failure). Imagine if you could remove that last negative bit and just talk about why you wanted to b/f, what put you off and what you did to overcome... the flip side is also being honest about ff and being honest about the negative things of b''fing. I sense that they are played down to avoid putting women off yet when they then occur (as they do!) those women are unprepared and assume 'they can't do it'

Petitioner - what are the negatives of breastfeeding? Genuinely curious as it is the physiological norm. Bit like saying the negatives of breathing using your lungs.

Sorry - my message sounded crap. Of course there is the possible pain, engorgement etc but isnt that more about poor support and education rather than the actual breastfeeding itself?

First time round I intended to bf because of the health benefits. To me ff was something that you did if bf didn't work out not something that you set out to do. Bf didn't work out so I switched to ff early on.

Pregnant again, this time round I hope to bf, feel more knowledgeable and confident than I did first time round but slightly less determined.

The thing is though, that, if you can get through the initial problems, bf is easy and lovely. I had to ff DD1 and I never felt angry at being told the bf is best, because it is. The fact is, FF is a medical substitute for the natural process. If you have to use it for whatever reason, that is fair enough, but it isn't the same as bf.

Both my kids were born by section, which is a medical substitute, like ff, and they are fine and it was the best thing for us. You don't see me claiming that sections should be promoted as the same as natural birth, because they aren't.

I don't feel guilty for ff dd1 or having the two sections, because I wouldn't feel guilty taking multivitamins or injecting insulin or any other medical procedure, but it doesn't change the fact that it is daft to deny that they are substitutes, pretty good ones, for the way we are designed to work.

My area is pretty deprived, and so those are the babies where every little chance they can get helps, yet even the antenatal bf class focused on how incredibly hard and complicated bf is. We were shown videos of women feeding with piles of cushions and a nurse hovering. Yes, there can be problems, mainly at the start, but the majority of feeds are lovely. In my area less than half of women even try to bf, I saw the keeness of the midwives to get the babies on formula, it must be really hard if you start to get problems round here and don't know where to turn.

I chose breastfeeding because I knew it was best for the baby, and I'd read all about the bonding and the eye contact and the closeness etc etc...

ha!

1 - my milk never seemed enough, no matter how much they had, they were always starving! So I (and dh) got really paranoid and I had to top up with formula, so of course in the end you produce less milk and within a few months they end up totally on bottles.

2 - so much for closeness! ds1 would never make eye contact with me and went stiff and it was like he was trying to push me away. Turned out later he was autistic (as was ds2 but he didn't go stiff), but I thought he hated me. Didn't help my pnd at all!

I still feel a failure for not breastfeeding them for the first year. I feel like I didn't try hard enough, or could have done something differently that would have changed things.

I even had the fleeting thought that they were autistic because I didn't breastfeed long enough, or successfully enough and they didn't bond or love or whathaveyou.

God, breastfeeding / bottlefeeding... it all makes you feel so bloody crap, doesn't it.

My children are 9 & 10 years old and I STILL have feelings about it. How stupid is that?

Rainbow: pain (constant unremitting for the first few weeks for me), mastitis, poor relationship with baby (the agony of feeding did not help me enjoy her)my partner didn't like my breasts whilst I b/f, they became drippy sore lumps with blue veins running across them...(whilst I'm supposed to be a doting mummy I did also want to return to being a sexy woman again...this seemed unlikely !!... )the lack of support from some sections of my family (they were convinced baby was starving because she cried so much and 'b/f was to blame') lack of quantity in mls (compared to ff) meant I lacked confidence to know they were right or wrong, I gained weight, I couldn't exercise due to dripping sore lumps attached to my chest... privacy issues on trying to feed in public/ returning to work/letting someone else feed/barely any sleep because until mine had a bottle they didn't really sleep well.

Other than that it was fine

To be fair...it was lack of skill to deal with hopelessly engorged breasts. I had far too much milk and the babes couldn't latch to my flattened nipps (flat due to the vast quantity of milk)

Then when (and if) the let down came they choked with the speed of the flow..

With the third I spent several weeks coping with this (time consuming and more skilled and more determined... easy? NO!) and it settled just in time for me to get seriously ill and the milk dried up!! Ironic or what.

But most of your problems wouldnt have existed had their been proper support in place (well, possibly for a very short while) and bf was accepted as the norm. Your problems weren't down to the breastfeeding itself iyswim.

there not their

Heqet
My eldest is 18 this year and I still feel guilt

For those whom it works, they can sit in smug judgement of the rest of us

I'm not anti b/f at all. I just would like us to be supportive of women who struggle instead of implying 'it's a bit difficult but it's normal and with the right attitude you can make it work'. You might as well turn around and say 'you don't love your baby enough'

It's physiological.
So is breathing
Tell that to asthmatics.

I agree that good support could have changed things for me.

It didn't exist then. Does it now?

I agree somewhat with Petitioner in that it might be natural and the normal way of things, but some people just won't accept that it doesn't work for everyone. I expressed for my DS for 6 months but if I'd given up and ff I would hope that noone would judge me after all the effort I made to bf. Some people can't because of lack of support letting them down, some because of lack of information, some have too much going on in their lives which affects their ability, some have physical problems or get off to a bad start and end up with nipple injuries. Some people have babies who just won't or can't nurse. Lots of people who really wanted to breastfeed couldn't. And this is why you have to promote breastfeeding but not make these people feel shunned when they are often so upset about it already.

I always wanted to breastfeed and made the decision to pump breastmilk when it wasn't happening. this time around I have been blessed with a champion breastfeeder and better circumstances, and I might just make it.

I think determination is a big part of breastfeeding, or at least the success of it. Like most things we do with our body, there are possibilities of infections, soreness and not feeling right.

I had LOTS of problems with breastfeeding in the start, and it would have been very easy for me to just say "That's it, formula it is". It would also have given me free reign to do what I like and leave my DD with someone for a night. However, I was determined to breastfeed, I perservered through the pain, through crying my eyes out during feeds, and DREADING my DD becoming hungry. But after those first few weeks, and some amazing support when I had the brains to ask for it, it got better. And now it is one of my favourite things in the world.

Getting through the first few weeks is very difficult, and if you don't have someone to support you, I can understand people turning to formula. I almost think that there is TOO much to look at about breastfeeding. It should be the most normal and natural thing in the world, but because we get nervous about it, I think it makes it harder. I have horrible scars on my nipples from DDs latch being wrong for the first two weeks (not helped by the size of my mammoth 36Gs ), but that was because ALL of the magazines/books etc said it was important for baby to have a lot of the BOTTOM of your nipple in her mouth. So that's what I did, and it was wrong for us. There is no uniform blanket way of dealing with breastfeeding, just like any other function of the body. We all work differently, and all of our children work differently.

Once I started listening to my body, and DDs actions, as well as the help from my amazing midwife, it all fell in place.

I think I had a similar experience to you Crossword. My first few days with DD were terrifying as she just would not latch and of course no one had ever mentioned that this could be a possibility at any of the ante natal classes, oh no, just whip em on and off you go . And the midwives in the postnatal ward just said 'she doesn't want to suck'... well I KNOW THAT, but what do I do about it!!! They sure as hell didn't know...

We did, eventually, thanks to a wonderful nurse in the SCBU, get BFing going and I managed to keep going for 11 months but we did have our fair share of problems along the way:

• 2 ENORMOUS cracks which were agony until we got our positioning right. All very well saying women don't experience pain with the right support, but you don't get or seek out that support until you have a problem IYSWIM
• 4 bouts of mastitis (I recovered quickly from each, but my goodness was it painful and I felt SO ill)
• 1 nursing strike - cue a whole week of very distressing screaming at the breast and the feeling of rejection and failure was more than I could bear really
• DD was also an incredibly distracted feeder so after about 4 months it became impossible to feed her anywhere but at home really which was incredibly tying and quite depressing to be frank. Feeding in public was impossible, but of course the BF propaganda had banged on about how easy it was to feed in public so once again I felt conned. I found expressing took bloody forever for very little reward so producing a bottle of EBM to take out with us was exhausting, and (now that she's on soy formula I know this), WAY more hassle than preparing a bottle of formula.

I also HATED how I felt and looked while BFing. I felt like a giant frump and couldn't wear any of my nice clothes. This made a massive dent in my self esteem which I didn't expect.

I also was never presented with any hard, undeniable facts about BF superiority to FF. I have since heard all sorts on MN and want to believe BF is better since I made such a massive effort to do it, but honestly I am not really sure. Still. And when I posted on here asking about reasons to BF post six months no-one replied with anything remotely conclusive.

I will BF again when this baby arrives, but I felt so angry and outraged at the picture perfect image of BFing that I'd been sold by people who probably have never even had a baby - midwives, BF 'specialists' at ante natal class, mother and baby magazine journalists, the lot. What a crock. I felt like such a failure because not only had I not achieved a drug free birth, but BFing didn't come naturally either.

We did manage to do it, through sheer bloody mindedness on my part, and the fact that I was lucky enough not to suffer any of the genuine contraindications to BFing, such as PCOS or huge blood loss during birth leading to poor milk supply, inverted nips etc...

But I did find BFing pretty exhausting a lot of the time, and was more than ready to give up at 11 months. Luckily it was DD who decided (I am PG again and I guess milk tasted odd).

I wish someone had told me about the commitment that might be required with bfing. (I bf until 6 weeks, then mix fed until 6 months, then ff.)

I think I assumed that if I got DS to feed soon after birth (which I did) and to latch on correctly from the beginning (which multiple mw said he did), there would be no problems. There were many times when I sat bfing and crying because I couldn't go anywhere or do anything, because DS needed feeding alternate hours (more often in the evening) and it felt like no one else could help.

My previous thoughts on expressing were totally unrealistic for me - it took me 20 minutes to express 1/2 oz.

I also felt deeply unsexy and not like me at all - I didn't realise quite how unhappy this made me until I dropped to just morning bf and was able to wear real bras again.

Also, I agree with CrazyCatLady that the problem is often obvious, but the solution isn't. I tried to go to a bf clinic, but the counsellor was off sick for 3 months and the hv covering for her was in a meeting.

I'm glad some people have had very positive experiences with bfing, but it would also be useful to be given more support for those, like me, who didn't ask for help because we thougt we were doing it right.

As with most things in life, attitude and luck help.

Honestly, I really didn't think about how I was going to feed

I was more freaked out by the idea that I was going to be bringing a REAL LIFE BABY home with me

It was a fleeting "Yeah, I'll try bf I suppose", with the afterthought along the lines of "My Mum can tell me how to do bottles if I can't do it"

That was as complex as it got

Luckily, DD1 bf with zero problems from 1st feed so all worked out ok! I guess the fact that there was no pressure might have helped... who knows

When pg with DC2 I was more aware that I wanted bf to work, as it had been so good with dd1, and I wanted to repeat that experience

Is the 78% for initiation of breastfeeding for first babies only or for all births? I know quite a few people who had horrible bf experiences first time round and didn't bother trying again at all. I would probably have been one of them before MN...

In the UK, figures show 76 per cent initiation (it's 78 per cent for England, 76 per cent for UK) for all mothers. There is a difference between 1st time mothers and others - 79 per cent 1st births, and 73 per cent for subsequent births. This gap has always been there but it appears to be getting narrower compared to previous surveys.

Petitioner

I would really like to say that this.... "
For those whom it works, they can sit in smug judgement of the rest of us"

I find extremly hurtful and incorrect. I have never smugly judged anyone who has not b/fed for whatever reason. As I have said on another thread I too have been judged and told oh but its icky to b/feed a boy!

I personally detest the whole "competativeness" between the 2 camps of b/f versus f/f.

B/f is not always easy and formula is not the devils own brew.

Kitkat - it wasn't meant personally against you or any one person on this thread. I am genuinely sorry if you felt that it was.

It was a personal gripe against a group who can be smug and thoughtless when they claim they too suffered problems but overcame them implying if you really wanted to you could.

Caveat:
a) If b/f meant the difference between life and death... many more women would find they could breastfeed... so, they have a valid point
b) Judging another woman on her mothering is destructive often. Helpful and sensitive support is the best thing about being a mum
c)Breastfeeding is valuable but at what cost to that family dynamics?

I'm human. I have issues with the whole breastfeeding propaganda which affected my relationship with my baby for a very long time. So.. I have strong feelings on it.
But I also breast fed and would breastfeed another.

I too detest the competitiveness. Mums should support each other.

I guess I never really thought about how I would feed the baby(s) let alone really thinking about owning one.

With the first I found she was a naturel feeder who had read all the books and she fed like a dream for 17 months.

DD2 was a good feeder until she got teeth and tried to bite through the nipple at 7 months she was put on a bottle - that was an odd experiance having to ask a neighbour of my mums to stitch the bloody great hole up, she was a doctor thankfully she was in or it would have meant me asking the bloke in the village who was a large animal vet.

DS1 well he was born and he saw a boob that was him happy for the next 14 months, he was getting a tad obbsessed with them towards the end.In fact he is still obsessed by them mine or anyones he can get hold of, still I guess he will grow out of that by the time he is 100 or so.

I honestly think I chose to feed them as I am too usless to get out of bed in the middle of the night, it was far easier to unhook one side of the bra and let them get on with it.

I never considered FF with either of my two...however, I mixed ff and breast with Ds from 10 months and I cannot even give you a reason for it. I had gallons of milk with Ds, so it certainly wasn't due to the lack of milk. I expressed for him before returning to work and built up a stock in the freezer for my Dad to feed Ds and continued bfing him until he was 18 months and then only gave up when my Mum said that I needed to give myself a break from it(I was ill and shattered, but didn't know I was ill at the time).
With Dd as with Ds, I didn't ever consider ff, so didn't buy any formula and I'm still bfing her at 3 years...she won't give it up and I don't mind at all...Mum did try to get me to stop on quite a few occasions until I told her to stop. She now just accepts that I do it. I had real trouble trying to express with Dd ~ completely different to Ds and anyway, she wouldn't take a bottle.

when people ask me how i am feeding my baby i reply........ "through its mouth ..... why is there another way" xx