I’ve done both but in the interests of honesty not by choice.
I bf dd until 9+ months and then my milk dried due to a medical condition and I had to literally overnight switch to ff.
Based on my own experiences (and everyone is different):
Breast feeding
Pros
1 Free!
2 Very convenient - no need to plan and remember everything needed for ff, no need to restrict where you go based on facilities for ff
3 lovely bonding experience there really is nothing else like it
4 healthier for baby and you - loads of research to back this up.
i Main reason I did so as tons of allergies in both mine and dds dads family and bf supposed to minimise or even eliminate these.
ii Also history of female cancers on my side and it protects against these
iii thrush - I was badly prone to this as a baby and it apparently protects against this too. Dd never had it once
iv breast milk adjusts if baby sick to provide right balance of nutrition and even antibodies amazing stuff
v reduces risk of sids
Cons
1 hurts at first - I think the ‘if it hurts you’re doing it wrong’ myth leads to lots of mums giving up early on because they think they’re doing it wrong. Well your nipples aren’t used to working like that so it takes time for them and you to “toughen up” but it’s temporary. Took around 6 weeks for it to feel completely comfortable for me but then it actually felt quite pleasant.
2 it is quite knackering at first while you’re establishing supply and the onus is always on mum to feed
3 it can be a little stressful not being sure exactly how much baby is having takes time to get used to that. Plus rather too many midwives and health visitors and other hcps seem unaware of the fact that bf babies do tend to lose a little weight at first but that’s normal and they regain it fairly quickly.
Formula feeding
pros
1 dad and others can feed sometimes so that means mum gets a break possibly even an actual lie in!
2 you can eat/drink what you like as you don’t have to worry about it affecting baby.
3 no pain of establishing bf but I also don’t know how painful/uncomfortable it is not feeding until milk dried
4 easy to see how much baby having
Cons
1 expensive! We had the unusual situation of buying everything for a reasonable sized baby all at once and it was SO expensive! Not helped by the fact that the first few formulas we tried she couldn’t tolerate so they went completely wasted! There were no sample size options and I couldn’t even give the stuff away. She also had problems needing different bottles and teats to what we initially bought. It’s very much trial and error. Some babies are fine with the cheaper, most commonly sold items but ime (not just dd but others babies) is that often they need a certain type of bottle & teat as well as formula.
2 inconvenient - I found it a LOT of faff washing, sterilising and making up bottles. At that time it was considered ok to do all bottles for the next 24 hours in one go and refrigerate until needed - apparently that’s no longer advised. But even so that meant iirc 1.5-2 hours total spent washing, sterilising, boiling and cooling water and making up formula. Total pita!
And then if your day didn’t go to plan for whatever reason, eg dd wasn’t very hungry at a feed, or traffic delays or ending up staying out longer than planned for another reason meant that at least one bottle was no longer safe to use and had to be thrown - such a waste of time, effort and money very annoying!
3 There’s an increased risk of infection/stomach upset with ff. we did eventually find a formula dd could just about tolerate but she definitely had more frequent and worse upset tummy’s on formula. Which in addition to the worry & distress this causes also means more nappies - more expense!
4 more to remember when you’re getting ready to go out inc you have to note the time so you don’t use an unsafe bottle. Personally I also found that even WITH the supposedly right kit and everything put together as it should be there were still times I had to clean up mess from a leaked bottle.
5 even at home it’s a pain waiting for a bottle to heat up all the while baby’s getting more stressed & upset. With bf at night I barely needed to wake up! Dd didn’t get to a point where she was screaming cos it was so easy just to put her on the breast.
As I say. Just my take having done both.
Also remember you could establish bf supply and then combi feed - best of both worlds?
None of the choices makes you a good/bad mum. Everyone has their own things they find easier/harder.
I HATED ff with a passion but accept that a big part of that was because it wasn’t my choice. I had wanted to bf at least until 12 months possibly longer. I later learned I could have been given meds to restart my supply which I was not told at the time and that’s really annoyed me too, but can’t change it now (she’s 19 next month!).
Friends and family have done all kinds depending what suits them, including working mums who expressed at work and sahm who Ff from beginning, mums who used donated milk - all sorts
Combi feeding I strongly feel isn’t mentioned nearly enough. But as I didn’t do this I don’t feel qualified to comment much on this.
I chose bf initially for the health reasons but once established it was SO easy and convenient, I loved being able to go places on a whim and not have to worry about feeding dd. Not have to worry about getting home before the next feed was due. I can change a nappy anywhere! (Ex nanny) with one hand!
I’d say give it a good go if you can, in the knowledge it takes time/patience to establish but if it’s not working for whatever reason (and that very much includes mums mh) then switch to either combi or fully ff.