Breast is best - no it’s not actually.

[bubblesforlife]

I’m a new mom, my baby was born last weekend.
I followed feeding guidelines, listened to professional advice, and decided to breast feed my baby.

A few days in, my baby has developed jaundice and low sodium. This is due to dehydration and no fluids.

I gave my Baby colostrum, by breast and syringe regularly.

I asked my visiting midwife if I should supplement feeding with formula until my milk came in, she said no I am doing the best by my baby. Not unless there is a clinical need.

Now we’re readmitted for 2 nights minimum and placed on as strict baby formula feeding plan.

2 other ladies in the ward also have dehydrated babies for the same reason as me. How does this happen all the time yet no one talks about it?

Breast is best? No. Starve your baby until your milk comes in, and then hope for the best that you’re on for the lucky ones it works for.

My milk came in on day 3, a normal timeline.!

The messaging is wrong to mothers. This is so very common according to hospital.

Breast is best..... eventually.... but feed your baby what it needs, if that’s a supplement of formula, so what.

I don’t know what I’m trying to say, but I’m just so upset. No one told me I was starving my little newborn. I did my best, I tried so hard and sat there filling syringes of colostrum.

Something has to change here. The pressure placed on new mothers throughout pregnancy to breast feed is wrong.

I hope my baby recovers soon so we can go home and be a family.

No one says breast is best anymore do they? It’s an outdated slogan that the NHS abandoned because of the backlash.

And “fed is best” is such a stupid meaningless phrase it drives me mad. When people say it what they really mean is “formula is ok”, which of course it is! In some cases it’s absolutely necessary, and in others it’s the mother’s choice to use it - both fine obviously.

But breastfeeding is biologically normal, and has proven health benefits for mothers and babies. You can talk about all the fantastic benefits of formula without having to deny the reality of breastfeeding.

Jaundice is extremely common, milk not coming in until day 3 (or later) is standard, and the OP’s problem is not breastfeeding as such but inadequate guidance and support from medical professionals. If she had decided to formula feed but hadn’t been given info on how to make up feeds safely, and the baby had ended up ill as a result, I’m sure she wouldn’t have started a thread claiming that formula feeding was dangerous. Context is important.

The same thing happened to me OP, and it was one of the worst experiences of my life. I had a CS, and my LO lost a lot of weight and cried endlessly while I was frantically expressing colostrum and latching constantly to no effect. I was determined to breastfeed and no-one properly communicated the dangers of dehydration until one HV about 5 days after birth who basically sat me down and insisted we give my daughter formula. She was a life saver.

The guilt I felt that we could have hurt my daughter while we were trying to do the best for her was just horrendous. It haunted me for months afterwards.

Happily, we combi fed for a while and then went exclusive, and she’s still feeding at 2 years old. I’m expecting no.2 and we’re taking formula and a cup feeder to the hospital with us this time. Still want to breastfeed but I’m not risking another dehydrated baby.

Very sorry this happened to you too. I think the messaging around breastfeeding is too simplistic, and really should give more nuanced advice around dehydration and top ups in the early days. It’s such a stressful period and we’re all trying to do the best for our newborns and that can lead to bad outcomes if the guidance is too dogmatic. I also think there’s not enough support for women who can’t produce any/enough milk.

No one says breast is best anymore do they?

Yes they do. I have a 10 month old and 'breast is best' was said all the time. In the ante natal feeding classes they didnt even cover formula feeding. It was ignored as if it wasnt a thing. I remember someone asked about it and she was told, "the instructions are on the side of the box", and that was all that was said about formula.

“Breast is best” used to be an NHS slogan, it’s not anymore. However the NHS does promote breastfeeding because it’s a fact that it is better for babies (and mothers).

If the baby is dehydrated that’s because they aren’t getting enough breastmilk, which can be caused by a number of things, and because the mother hasn’t been given the info needed to identify the problem in time. If you were trying to formula feed a baby with a broken bottle you’d hardly blame the formula for the problem if the baby wasn’t getting enough.

I thought jaundice was natural and not harmful?

It can be very serious if bilirubin levels in the blood exceed a certain level.

I was in the same boat, I expressed colostrum in hospital. We had trouble (me and the midwives) getting baby to latch but got there in the end but he was starving. After 2 hours of him breastfeeding I had to call a nurse for formula as he was just wailing and then he finally settled. My colostrum just didn't satisfy his hunger. My milk came in on day 5, but he just didn't latch properly so we ended up going down the formula route in the end. No regrets, he's happy, healthy and hubby got to bond with him by feeding him too x

Completely agree women need to be given more realistic expectations about breastfeeding.

On the one hand there’s people who end up exclusively FF because they are panicking about the normal process of milk coming in.

On the other there are women convinced BF is the only way and don’t know the signs that baby isn’t feeding well.

I did an NCT class that did a through ‘brainwashing’ job on us about how easy and natural BFing is (remember being shown a video of newborn that basically crawled up it’s mother to latch itself on the breast as some kind of proof that babies instinctively know how to feed ).

When we had terrible difficulty establishing feeding I was absolutely clueless. Had no understanding of formula feeding (completely failed to follow safe procedures initially as I had no idea). No-one had told me about cluster feeding so I thought when he was still screaming after a feed I had to give formula. I was told not producing enough milk ‘wasn’t a thing’ (when i’m sure now I had poor milk supply, party because it had never got well established as I wasn’t cluster feeding). It was a disaster and I felt like such a failure. It was hard to find advice and I got so many mixed messages.

We did mix-feed successfully in the end and I was still BFing at 18months but gosh we would have done so much better (including my mental health!) if we’d had better information before birth.

@YawnyOwl

I'm not sure how common your situation is honestly.

I think it's incredibly common.

Completely agree with the OP

I was overwhelmingly pressurised to breast feed. It’s easy they said. You baby just needs you. Your milk will come in.

I had a serious condition that led to an emergency c section - my milk did not come in - it just didn’t.

I had serious pnd due to the pressure to breast feed and the ‘breast is best’ mantra - I was suicidal at one point due to the pressure.

I had a man tell me that I was lazy and going to kill my baby when out and giving a bottle of formula is public.

My experience was that it was yet another tool that society uses to beat women with, to judge, to divide, my formula fed baby is a thriving academic top of the class child with no health issues and an amazing immune system.

We need to stop judging those that formula feed - you can’t even get Tesco club card points on it. You can’t buy formula on the pay £40 and get £10 off vouchers in supermarkets as it is in the same category as cigarettes.

Stop judging. Breast fed or formula fed does not matter. Health of mum matters and so does the health of the baby.

@Barracker

I had a very similar experience to you. However I eventually reached a very different conclusion. I didn't blame my breasts, my apparent lack of milk, the messaging about breastmilk health. I didn't blame the time it took for my milk to come in, or my colostrum. I didn't decide I'd been lied to about breastfeeding being healthy. I didn't conclude it had been inevitable that we would end up struggling the way we did. It wasn't on me. And this isn't on you either.

I did realise that those who should have best advised me how often I might have needed to feed, didn't. That those who should have told me I might need to wake my sleeping baby to ensure a feed happened, didn't tell me to do that. That although I had learned how to correctly latch my baby, I hadn't learned that for things to fall into place the frequency of feeds might need to be way, way more frequent than I had ever known. Noone told me. They gave me a chart, and told me to note feeds, and nappies. And I did. They said not to let X hours pass between feeds, and I didnt. But I didn't know that "don't let four hours pass" didn't mean "as long as it's every four hours it is not a worry at all". I thought my baby would ask if she needed a feed. I was 100% responsive to her. But I didn't know she might not have been able to signal if she was too sleepy, or jaundiced. Some very basic knowledge was missing, and those who should have known, didn't know and so they didn't tell me. So I didn't know.

I thought I was following my baby's lead, and all the advice I had been given. And I was. The correct advice about how to make this work well was missing. That wasn't my fault.

The moment I knew her blood sugars were low and she was jaundiced, I understood better. The moment I saw her repeat blood test after a tearful feed in the hospital and saw how those bloods returned to normal, I realised I was still capable of fixing things.

You didn't fail.
Your breasts didn't fail.
Those who should have given you the best advice about how to make it work, failed. You were failed.

If you decide to continue with formula, I wish you well. If you decide to persevere with breastfeeding, the same. Congratulations on your baby.

But please, separate out what happened
to you from what might have happened had you only received the correct support, advice and help from those whose job it is to KNOW about breastfeeding. It isn't enough to send new mothers off without them having all the support they need to make this a success.
You were let down.

Barracker this is such a great post, thank you x

I think that the whole issue needs de-escalating as much as possible. That would be best from a public health perspective. It's all far too emotionally charged. People just need to feed their babies appropriately, whether that is formula or breast milk.

We also need more honesty from both sides. There are issues that can arise from either method of feeding and it's very important that new parents have as much honest, straight forward information as possible. There's too much pussyfooting around with trying to make people think that breastfeeding is magical and can never go wrong, and that formula feeding is just as good and could never have any negative outcomes. It's all emotionally exhaustive nonsense.

Feed your babies. If baby is suffering health problems due to the current feeding situation then look at realistic solutions to improve the situation. None of it needs to be so tangled up emotion and self worth and guilt. New parents have enough to deal with without health care providers piling on with all that emotional shit on top of it. It is not their choice how you feed your baby.

@Belinda554 what do you suggest I do?
Go against consultant advice? Starve my baby? Let the sodium levels drop further so it could potentially be fatal to my newborn baby?
All because I’m wrong and formula has chemicals and doesn’t taste sweet?
Wow. get a grip and jog on to another thread to share your ill informed views.

Shame on you.

@WunWun

Just because it didn't work for you doesn't mean it doesn't work for most people.

Nobody is saying that. OP is saying the pressure in the slogan “breast is best” is a lot for new mums.

Midwives shouldn’t be allowed to take a side regarding which option a mother should pick they should give options and leave their own personal thoughts out of it.

Well OP, you did make a big, controversial statement in your thread title so you've got to expect some push back. Obviously human milk is best for human babies. No biggy if that is not for you, we have alternatives now, but it is like comparing butter and margerine - there is no substitute for the real thing.

@2021hastobebetter

"We need to stop judging those that formula feed - you can’t even get Tesco club card points on it. You can’t buy formula on the pay £40 and get £10 off vouchers in supermarkets as it is in the same category as cigarettes".

Wow is that true? If so that's shocking and so wrong.

@bubblesforlife you can ignore that poster banging on about chemicals obviously.

But your OP is misconceived - it’s not breastfeeding that’s the problem, it’s the support you were given (or not given, as appears to be the issue). If breastfeeding was working well then your baby would not have become dehydrated. They don’t need more than colostrum in the days before your milk comes in so something must have happened to prevent your baby from getting enough colostrum. Hope you both feel better soon.

@Belinda554

Breast is always best. You may have had problems, but thinking that filling your child with chemicals is best...just no.

Breast milk tastes sweet and formula 🤮 each to their own, but you are wrong.

1. Away and google PKU. CMPA. Lactose intolerance.

1. All food is chemicals.

You’re completely ill informed. There are some babies who cannot digest breast milk and for whom formula made from chemicals (!) is the only way for them to feed and thrive.

How was that being supportive to the op. Nasty post.

I’m jogging on nowhere love!

A natural birth is best, I wanted one..it didn’t work out, so I had a c section. Did I proclaim natural births are bad. No I accepted that wouldn’t work.

You can’t feed, so don’t. Coming on to claim formula feeding is best is stupid and ill informed.

It didn’t work for YOU, but formula can never trump breast.

Personally I don’t care what you do.

@Belinda554

I’m jogging on nowhere love!

A natural birth is best, I wanted one..it didn’t work out, so I had a c section. Did I proclaim natural births are bad. No I accepted that wouldn’t work.

You can’t feed, so don’t. Coming on to claim formula feeding is best is stupid and ill informed.

It didn’t work for YOU, but formula can never trump breast.

Personally I don’t care what you do.

Again. Have you heard of pku? CMPA?

@Belinda554

Breast is always best. You may have had problems, but thinking that filling your child with chemicals is best...just no.

Breast milk tastes sweet and formula 🤮 each to their own, but you are wrong.

When breast feeding works it's an incredible thing and there's no denying the benefits. When it works.

The shaming of mums who can't with comments like yours is really unhelpful. Maybe read the room? This isn't AIBU.

@Belinda554 here have some to satisfy your sweet requirements.

@Belinda554 how you any idea of just how factually inaccurate abs scientifically incorrect your post is - never mind bloody offensive.

Breast milk is not all the same. But on the whole it has more sugar in than formula. Whereas formula is specific and has the nutrition carefully scientifically tested in it, and what amount. Breast milk is dependent on many factors including what the mother eats, any drugs they are taking or have had in labour or after. Eg you have paracetamol and breast feed- it passes potentially to the baby.

I had 6 weeks post c section on strong medication. I couldn’t of had more breast feeding support. My milk did not come in.

It seems to be a badge to separate out women. This women had a nature delivery and the baby latched on straight away - baby is great and everyone happy - big tick.

The woman can’t. Big cross.

Comments such a breast is best are not true and do not help.

As for those saying breast fed babies is the norm and the human race has managed just fine without - just look up some stats for mortality rates will you? Amongst women and children in other countries and history. What is the mortality rate?

That was the mantra when I had my first. Even having a c section after eclampsia- comments abounded like my body had failed and I had failed my child.

With my second I breast fed and he fed for hours and hours. My nipples were oozing pure blood. The pain was immense. Seriously for weeks and weeks I tried. He failed to thrive. I pumped. I expressed. I fed him over and over and over with huge quantity of support. Yes it was painful and common to be but we will succeed. Was it good for my mental health - no. My physical health - no. Did I sleep or enjoy my baby - no honestly no it was beyond painful and destroying. I fed him by breast. There is a reason why the majority of breast feeding fails.

At the time I read as many scientific papers that I could about breast feeding the only decent scientific paper I could find had 11 categories where they compared breast and formula fed babies from the same family and looked at 11 criteria such as asthma, hospital admissions etc in comparison to the health and welfare of formula fed and breast feed babies. In 10 categories the outcome for a formula fed or breast fed baby was the same in one category - like good to develop asthma - formula fed baby is less likely to have it. Ergo I rest my case.

What about a paper that looks at the health of mothers breastfeeding or formula feeding ? Or is that predictable?

I do think there needs to be less pressure on new (particularly first time) mums to breastfeed at all costs. For some, it works, for others, not. We’ve enough going on without being made to feel like a failure if we can’t do it. Fed and happy is best, whether that’s breast, formula or a combi.

I do think that by the time you have your second you’re much more relaxed and clued up about it all that it doesn’t bother you as much - that was my experience anyway

Sending love to you OP

You can’t feed, so you make a statement about breast not being best.....

It didn’t work for you, but formula is not and never will be the best option. ( for the majority)

My sisters babies were lactose intolerant, picked up early and the correct formula was given. It doesn’t mean breast is not best.

Don’t make factually incorrect statement, because it’s not best for you.