Why is breastfeeding better than formula?

[Lagirl20]

Hi everyone! We are planing to TTC within the next six months, and I'm super excited to breastfeed. Hopefully it will all go ok and be possible for me to do this. In the meantime I've been reading lots, and I'm curious as to the research and evidence behind the claim that breastfeeding is much better than formula - it makes sense but I've failed to actually find any stats and I have lots of friends who think formula is just as good and they never bothered. Sorry if this seems like a silly question but - what's the research/evidence behind this claim? Making no judgement on either method! X

Also, what is “let down”?

How come the pain goes away - is it just that your body gets used to it or something?

With the let down, yes, I think it is. With the soreness, I think it's because in the early days I struggled to get the latch right so the nipples got damaged and thus were sore, on top of generic soreness because they aren't used to being sucked on for hours. Once the latch was right the damage started to heal and that improved the pain. Plus, in the early days the babies nurse pretty much constantly to bring the supply in. Once your milk is in they don't need to nurse as much (though you can still have cluster feeding sessions throughout the whole newborn stage) and I imagine that the decrease in nursing frequency was helpful too in terms of discomfort. I do think you get desensitised to it too.

WRT nipples, mine were also really small and soft pre-baby (I think most are?) but it didn't cause any problems. I had oversupply, in fact, so lots of milk (which would shoot everywhere during let-down in the early days!) You'll probably be fine, most women are physically able to breastfeed, it tends to be other factors that prevent it working well.

If you are keen to breastfeed I would advise setting up support before the birth- you may not need it, but I wanted to breastfeed and it went horribly wrong for me, looking back, if I had known it may be a struggle I would have been more prepared.

By support I mean get as much information as possible and look into support agencies.

Hopefully Sod’s law will mean that if you get absolutely everything in place you won’t need it!

Also, what is “let down”?

The release of milk. If you have any other questions, feel free to PM me or start your own thread- I'm wary of highjacking OP's thread any more than we already have (sorry, OP!)

Let down varies, some women can feel it, some can at the beginning but it wears off and some don't ever feel it.

Sorry, didn’t mean to hijack.

Read about breastfeeding and gut Flora. Quite a bit of research out there.

Also if you are worried about not being able to BF, whilst some people struggle, lots and lots of people don't. Both my sister and I had no issues bf and I have lots of friends who didn't either. Please don't worry about it until it happens. Go in with the mindset that you CAN bf as majority of people can and if it doesn't work or you change your mind you can deal with it then and know that if you choose formula then that is fine too. Good luck

Good morning! That you all so much for your replies and sharing your knowledge and experience, it's been so useful!

Agree that being prepared is the way forward, and I won't put too much pressure on myself if it doesn't work out.