Would you judge someone who didn't try...

[hermioneweasley48]

To breast feed?

I know this is a subject that can become quite divisive but I'm looking for facts, opinions and experience not nastiness.

I'm pregnant with dc2 and my first child is 10 so big age gap. When I had dc1 I was young and had a very traumatic birth and wasn't given much help or encouragement to breastfeed. So dc ended up being exclusively bottle fed. He's always been a healthy child and settled quickly as a baby. He was just very easy to manage and other than the usual struggles of babies/toddlers I felt very relaxed as a young, new mum.

I always said if I had another I would try to breastfeed purely for the baby's benefit. But as I look around at friends who have/are doing it, it seems pretty stressful. Their babies don't tend to settle as well and I had one friend in particular who pushed herself to the brink of madness being determined to feed her baby herself. Others have suffered huge guilt when they tried and failed.

Is it rally that bad to go for the 'easy option' here? I've done my research, I know the health benefits to baby but looking at my older dc who never had an ounce of breast milk in his life, kids can thrive without it. Or is that a selfish attitude from me?

I'm just weighing up my options at this point. After such a long break between babies I am understandably nervous about going back there and want to make life easy as possible for us all.

No I wouldn't judge you. Breastfeeding is hard work and women have to balance different things... other children, work, health issues. It can all become too much very quickly.

The one thing I would say is that are you sure mixed feeding wouldn't be an option for you? I mixed fed in the end and personally would have found it a complete faff to always be sterilising and making up bottles. Bottles were useful when I was going somewhere I didn't want to breastfeed, wanted an uninterrupted few hours of sleep or didn't want to take the baby with me.

You do what suits you best (and ditch the guilt!) but it doesn't have to be all or nothing.

But I suppose the fact that you can't always tell how much baby is getting might worry me

They get what they need! You would assess it in the same way as you would assess a FF baby - are they putting on weight, are they happy and content, are they producing lots of wet nappies? If not then you speak to a midwife, HV or GP, depending on what point you're concerned. You can't force feed a baby, whether that's with formula or breastmilk, I've never really understood this need to know how many ounces of milk a baby is having in one feed.

It's quite interesting - in this short thread we've already had exactly the sorts of comments I (and my friends) had when I/we was/were breastfeeding.

No. It doesn’t matter if you breast or formula feed as long as the child is fed

Do what works for you

I BF my DS and he wasn't unsettled, but I just think we got really lucky with him as a baby, just like the fact I found BF easy to do after the first few weeks. We did eventually started to combine feed and as far as I remember he wasn't unsettled, but again really easy baby (toddler years is when I paid for this)

If you haven't already you might want to have a look into breastfeeding groups, there is a lot more around than 10 years ago.

However to answer your question, I don't think I have twigged let alone judged anyone, unless you see someone making up the formula, I am not sure how you can tell if its formula or if it has been pumped

@SirChenjins I'm only going on my own past experience. I'm sorry it anything I'm saying regarding bf sounds stupid but I have no experience of it! How are you supposed to know about something you've never done?

This is what it boils down to for me, fear of the unknown.

@hermioneweasley48 that's perfectly fine. Do what you think is best for you and baby. Please don't worry.

My eldest was given breast milk via ng tube for 3 weeks before my supply just dried up and was on premature baby formula till 16 months. His health has been awful and he has learning difficulties but is a happy child.
I never could breastfeed my youngest as I never produced a drop of milk and I'm glad as he was a ery sick baby who constantly fed and vomited everything up until his surgery, if I'd breast fed him I wouldn't have coped. He is now very health and happy.
I'd never judge a mother for how she decides to feed her baby. Breast feeding is all very well and good but not when the mother pays with her mental health. Surely it is better for a baby to have a happy healthy mother than a mentally destroyed one over breast feeding.
I don't understand why mothers become so obsessed with breastfeeding. If it works for you great, if it doesn't thats also fine and not the end of the world.

@LowlyTheWorm

So you’ve not really looked at the health benefits and statistics then. You’ve looked at your child who was fine formula fed and decided not to bother. And judged your friends who have breastfed as having less settled babies.you’ve made your mind up which is fine but yes I judge people who choose the easier option over the one that is best for their child’s health and well-being for such trivial reasons. I’d only ever tell them that when, like you, they ask. Formula feeding costs the NHS a lot of money over the years as a result of the poorer health collectively of FF babies and the increased rates of cancers that would be prevented by BFing. Those are the facts.

What a load of bollocks, @LowlyTheWorm those aren’t the facts, there is 0 concrete medical proof that if a mother had breastfed said baby that this child wouldn’t have developed cancer. In fact that is a disgusting claim to make and you should be deeply ashamed of yourself for even insinuating that it’s even the case. Your argument is so deeply flawed as often the reason people turn to formula is because they are pressured BY the NHS and the woeful lack of breastfeeding support by midwives, health visitors and even on maternity wards. Breastfeeding rates will not improve until there is adequate support.

I breastfed my daughter until 20 months, and it was a rough road but I’m glad I did, but we used formula here and there especially in the beginning. So I’m al for breastfeeding as it is the most ‘natural’ thing for a human child. That being said the benefits of breastfeeding, as backed up by scientific research are vastly overstated, even by the nhs website, it’s exceptionally hard to prove correlation v causation. One of the only proven benefits, it’s breastfeeding reducing the risk of NEC in prem babies.

@hermioneweasley48, I’d never judge anyone for not breastfeeding but I’d always say give it a try, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. I also don’t think We should talk of breastfeeding in terms of success and failure. Often what’s deemed failure is lack of support. Mums matter too and that so often gets left out of the lactavist narrative

No I wouldn't judge at all. It's your body and your choice if you think bottle feeding is the way you want to feed your baby then that's entirely your own decision and not anyone else's business.

Having said that, I did personally find breastfeeding easier than bottle feeding so I wouldn't necessarily think that bottle feeding was the easy way to go.

I also found with breastfeeding the "baby blues" or hormone dip or whatever was much easier to cope with and I'm not sure I ever got weepy in the same way after the birth of my second and third babies who I breastfed as I did after my first who was bottle fed. I realise that could have been for many reasons though.

@hermioneweasley48

Thank you for the supportive comments. It is my choice and I am a grown woman but I still feel conscious of what others think, especially where parenting is concerned. I probably ought to toughen up a bit!

For those who breastfed for a little while, did you notice any change in your babies when you moved to the bottle? Did the change unsettle them?

Yep I noticed a massive change after I switched to formula after trying breastfeeding for 6ish weeks. My baby was happier! He was getting fed in a timely manner because I never had any milk supply despite all efforts. I was happier and I took a sharp U turn away from PND because I wasn’t attached to a bloody pump around the clock. Absolutely no judgment from me.

It's a polarised debate. For every 'your selfish not to try' there's a 'holier than thou breastfeeders' comment, so ignore the lot of them & do what feels right for you.

I honestly don't think anything you're saying sounds stupid, far from it, and I'm really sorry if that's the impression I've given you, I genuinely didn't mean it to sound that way .

I can understand your fear of the unknown and if it's something you'd like to try then speak to your midwife and ask about breastfeeding support - there's a lot on offer, although I know some places are better than others. It's just a case of seeing what's out there and telling your midwife you'd like to try it (if you do) and asking to be put in touch with sources of help and support asap.

I just find some of the comments on here really unhelpful and it was those kind of attitudes that I found challenged my intentions to breastfeed - the actual breastfeeding was fine once I was shown what to do (I know not everyone has that experience though), but oh my goodness, even after it was obviously going well some of the negativity and dire warnings of the impact it would have on my mental health, relationship, baby's growth, my ability to lead a normal life for the first few months after birth and so on were very difficult.

OP I breastfed 3 babies for 6 - 9 months in each case and for me it was one of the best bits of the whole experience of being a mother at the baby stage. I found it very convenient and emotionally satisfying.

So for this reason I would suggest you give it a go because you might feel the same. But obviously, no judgement either way.

And I did not have any problems moving onto bottle-feeding

I wouldn’t judge you - I’d assume that you had your reasons and those reasons are none of my business.

Full disclaimer: I breastfed both of my DC but had terrible trouble getting feeding established with my first (we ended up back in hospital due to weight loss) and mix fed DC1 for months - formula was hugely beneficial to his healthy development and he needed it. So I am not anti-formula in any way, and I really do understand that breastfeeding can be very difficult and unnerving in terms of not knowing whether the baby is getting enough.

The only thing I would say is that - sorry if this sounds really obvious - you can start breastfeeding and see how it goes before switching to the bottle (if you introduce a bottle early enough to avoid refusal). You can’t start on formula and then switch over to breastfeeding if you change your mind.

So you may want to consider mix feeding from the start with a bottle a day after the first few weeks to take the pressure off, and then you have all the health benefits of breastfeeding but the option to move fully to formula feeding without the baby refusing the bottle.

I know a lot of people who found the baby wouldn’t take a bottle once breastfeeding was established - personally I would introduce one around 2-3 weeks, no later, rather than the 4-6 weeks I was advised by midwives. It’s “evidence by anecdote” but I know a lot of people who waited dutifully to introduce a bottle and then found their baby wouldn’t accept them and either felt trapped into continuing breastfeeding beyond when they wanted to, or had a really stressful time getting the baby to switch feeding.

If you don’t want to do that, obviously start as you mean to go on with a bottle. It really is your choice and we’re lucky to live in a country where formula is a safe choice and freely available.

I breastfed and it was easy. I always looked at the mums having to mix up bottles thinking thank God I can just get my boob out wherever. I wouldn’t judge, but from my experience I found breast feeding so much more convenient. In the night just roll over and continue sleeping, or traveling or baby upset.

For those who breastfed for a little while, did you notice any change in your babies when you moved to the bottle? Did the change unsettle them?

None of mine were FF but DS had a CMPA. He had 6 months EBF with no symptoms because he had no exposure to cows milk, as soon as we introduced cows milk in solid food he reacted immediately. He was 4 before he grew out of his allergy. If he'd been FF (which is made using cows milk) he would have been in pain for potentially weeks or months until we identified the issue. 7% of infants have CMPA according to the NHS, so there must be a lot of FF babies in a lot of pain before their allergy is identified.

I don’t judge when I see people feeding a baby with a bottle but if I knew that someone hadn’t even attempted breastfeeding and there was no medical reason etc why not then I would think they were being selfish.

Even if you just did the first few days giving the baby colostrum is so important.

Though it isn’t for everyone, breastfeeding for me has been really easy, baby is thriving and I enjoy the time I spend feeding him.

Baby will happily take a bottle as well he just doesn’t like it when the bottle runs out! Breasts don’t run out 🤣

Historically I think we’ve been conditioned to believe that women’s bodies often aren’t good enough in the context of labour, birth and breastfeeding. The vast majority of people will make enough milk to feed their baby, even though they can’t see exactly how much they’re getting.

I breastfed for the first few months. My FIL thought I was weird and MIL thought I was doing it to spite them then moved to combination feeding, HV said i was confusing my baby. Moved to bottle at 5 months, woman at sensory told me I was selfish and prioritising my sex life over my babys needs???

What I'm getting at is it doesn't matter BF, FF or shove a Mars bar down their neck every day. Someone will always have something to say about what you do.

Secretly yes but not openly.

Please don't worry about what others think. Remember that those who are critical of others often do it to make themselves feel better and it's often linked to low self esteem. People who are happy and secure in themselves, don't tend to be bothered about the choices other people make for their families.....imo
Do what works for you and enjoy your baby!

You don't need to know how many ounces of milk they are getting in order to feed them well. If a BF baby is producing wet nappies, putting on weight consistently and seems content then they are getting enough.

You just have to do what works for you.

I certainly wouldn't judge you, but you're right, a lot of women will. Sorry.

I would be hesitant about thinking it was the formula that made your baby more settled though. Mine were formula fed except for first few weeks and one was easy and settled and one wasn't. I have found in my circle (so clearly not in any way scientific!) that babies of younger mums do tend to be a bit easier to settle etc. Certainly, in our NCT group, that was absolutely true. It felt (again, in no way scientifically) that the younger mums were much less "precious" than us older mums. Much more able to cope with a bit of crying from the baby etc. Like I said though, completely unscientific!

@LowlyTheWorm

So you’ve not really looked at the health benefits and statistics then. You’ve looked at your child who was fine formula fed and decided not to bother. And judged your friends who have breastfed as having less settled babies.you’ve made your mind up which is fine but yes I judge people who choose the easier option over the one that is best for their child’s health and well-being for such trivial reasons. I’d only ever tell them that when, like you, they ask. Formula feeding costs the NHS a lot of money over the years as a result of the poorer health collectively of FF babies and the increased rates of cancers that would be prevented by BFing. Those are the facts.

Oh my lord hee we go

Honestly, you will get such divided opinions. Why don't you just try it for a week or even a day at a time. What's the worst that can happen? If you hate it then switch to formula. In the early days, babies need to feed regularly through the night either way, it's only later on around 3-6 months that fornula fed babies tend to be sleeping for longer stretches than BF (not all of them though!) Some of it is just to do with whether you have one of those mythical 'good sleepers'. I found with BF you just end up putting them on the boob for anything as they get a lot of comfort from it. Great in some way but tricky with 2 other young chn at times. Also I had to do all the night wake ups as not much point in my OH doing it as he didn't have the boobs to feed him lol. Why don't you write a list of pros and cons and see what you think? It's okay not to be 100% sure. If you bottle feed from the get go you can't really go back but if you start with BF you can easily switch. I really really don't think you should worry at all about what other people think. It's not their boobs, not their sleepless nights, not their baby, not actually anything to do with them...there will always be something somewhere with a different opinion to you about everything... especially anything to do with parenting x

I don't understand what MNers mean by the word "judge". Does it mean "disapprove of"?

So yes I used to disapprove in general...
It depends why not.
People who say "i can't do that! It's disgusting!" I just flatly disagree.
I get cross if they say they think anyone is gross to breastfeed. That's the only time I hugely "judge"!

"i can't do that, I might show my boob in public" - I'm sad, but I can't change your inhibitions.

"I tried it and It turned into a disaster" -- then you didn't choose not to breastfeed. How can you be judged for something that wasn't your choice?

Mostly, now, I just don't care.
People do all sorts of small decisions I think could easily be done differently, and I don't think are best. But it's not my business.
They aren't important decisions.
Lord how much MNers "judge" many of my life decisions.
I don't have energy to care so much about others' small decisions.