A fellow volunteer just called me recently to complain a bit….As breastfeeding counselors we go through waves of people that have problems but will do everything to breastfeed, people that get bad info and would like to try give up easily because “formula is good enough” and then there are people that have problems just because they want to have problems, don’t really want to breastfeed so they make themselves believe that it isn’t going to work so that they won’t feel guilty when they go the chemical way….
I am getting so tired of hearing all of the excuses that people use, especially when you give them advice and they choose not to follow through with it but just keep on repeating in their head that it isn’t working out (so of course it won’t work out)
I have seen moms that have great breastfeeding relationships go against the advice that we have given and end up not breastfeeding within days or weeks.
The biggest thing is the “not having enough milk” excuse. This is the one that all women are scared of because they hear it from everyone they know. This is the one that makes breastfeeding not work for many people, this is the one that makes formula companies salivate.
What we explain to moms over and over again and what never gets through is that if you breastfeed on demand and avoid “supplementing”you will have enough milk. The minute you supplement a feeding (even with your own milk) you are walking on thin ice.
But, So many women that come to us with problems have this story…
– Baby was born at 37 weeks (the doctor around here LOVES provoking labour at 37 weeks (and gives many reasons for why he does it) and many end up with “emergency” C-Sections…)
– Baby and mom are in the hospital for 3-4 days, during which the baby loses a bit of weight. (completely normal especially if the mom had IV and the baby’s weight was inflated to begin with)
– The differences in weight loss between a FF baby and BF baby are not taken into consideration.
– The baby wants to feed often and the mom is told by one or more of the nurses/pediatrician etc. that her baby is in danger because she doesn’t have enough milk and they have to supplement with formula after each nursing session until her milk comes in. (They are working to become “baby-friendly” so they supplement with a cup)
-Mom and Baby are sent home to a house with little support or misinformation.
We then get called and we have to explain that she needs to put the baby to the breast on demand and nurse as often as she can and she will have the supply. They don’t listen though and keep on supplementing. Why? Because everyone around them has told them that they didn’t have enough milk either….
What I would love to know is what do people think women did before the sludge that the formula companies make was around? do they really think that 100 years ago women often just didn’t have enough milk so would just give up feeding their babies? No!!! People did have enough milk because they knew that their milk was the only food available and they had people around them that knew that all women have milk.
What it comes down to in many cases is misinformation for many people, but unknowingly and unwillingly they keep on spreading the rumor that some women just don’t make enough milk.
However, then there is another bunch. The ones that KNOW breast is best, the ones that know the dangers of Formula (but don’t believe it), the ones that just don’t want to breastfeed but want to alleviate the “guilt”.
These are the ones that I know are not going to keep on breastfeeding from the second I talk to them. They will find any excuse to not breastfeed, they will try and make me say that formula is just as good, they will try and make me agree that their problem just can’t be solved. They will invent problems and won’t listen to anything we say to help them. They just want to have the peace of mind that “they did everything they could but it just didn’t work out”. I wish that people that don’t want to breastfeed would just not call me, I don’t want to be a pawn in their game and I don’t want to waste my breath.
Here is an example I once had…
1st call: breastfeeding going great… I debunk about 10 myths in one phone call (she was trying to find an excuse, I know it) things I tell her: supply=demand, feed on need, no bottles before 5-6 weeks, pacifier not recommended for first 5-6 weeks… everything should go well…
2nd call: Her milk came in…She asks….Are my breasts going to be this big the whole time? I tell her no that they will go back to normal (though still a bit full) after a day or two and feel less and less full as time goes on.
3rd Call: breasts feel less baby nursing often, she KNOWS she doesn’t have enough milk… the baby is happy between feedings and has full diapers, I tell her that everything sounds normal.
4th call (about 5 days later): baby not taking breast well… they started a using a pacifier, didn’t think she had enough milk because the baby was nursing every 2-3 hours so she tried pumping and “saw” that she wasn’t making enough… so they went and got formula because the baby was “starving”… I tell her that the pump isn’t a good indicator of amount and that the baby is better at getting milk out… tell her that supply=demand so as long as she feeds when baby wants it then she will have enough milk…. the baby was probably not taking the breast well because they suck differently on the breast then on bottle or pacifier… I advise her to stop the bottle and paci and put baby to the breast often.
I call a few days later… She explains that she knew she wasn’t making enough milk because her baby would cry and wanted the bottle more then the breast and seems much happier now, “but I know I at least “tried” and guess what!! Now I can go out without baby and leave the month old baby with MIL for the night while I get my “much needed rest”.
I knew at the end of the first call that she would breastfeed. I knew that she was going to use the time that I would spend trying to help her as a way to alleviate the guilt of not giving her child the best food possible….
I am tired of wasting my breath with people I know are not going to breastfeed… they take the time away from those who really do want to breastfeed and really do need and want help.
I can’t stand the “not enough milk” excuse either. I just want to roll my eyes when I hear it. Seriously, how common can it be? Our species has survived a long, long time. I’m hoping that this enormous lack of breasfeeding is nature’s way of pruning our species so only the intelligent, instictive types survive. Sad to say, though, that my own mother switched to powdered cow’s milk when I was four months old, because the pediatrician said I was getting too fat on breastmilk. She said she didn’t want to stop breastfeeding me, but did as she was told. Then she chose not to breastfeed my sister so she wouldn’t be as dependent as I was. Then formula supplementation sabotaged her efforts to breastfeed my twin brothers. Interestingly, my sister and I are devoted breastfeeding mothers.
Good for you Paxye calling it like it is, as much as it may ruffle so many people’s feathers. What do you think about the other excuse I hear often – “My boobs were too big” ??
Sara…
I really do hope that we go back to the way that we are supposed to feed our children… but we seem to be getting so much farther from natural as possible I just can’t see when it coud turn around…
I wish my mom would have breastfed me… she was UTBF because of meds… she was already in the hospital for a kidney infection before I was born and the doctors and LLL leaders that came and saw her told her that she couldn’t breastfeed with the meds…
Sh still gets defensive about it… and I feel like I was jipped especially because of my health…
liamsmom….
Ahh…. this is my Rant… this is the place where I can do it… this is the reason that I started this place….
The “Boobs are too big” excuse… LOL… I just can’t understand that one especially cause I am a big breasted mama! What is the reasoning why people would believe that they can’t breastfeed because they have big breasts?…. I mean I can understand and debunk the opposite…. but not that one… it is positioning?, it can’t be supply? Why then?..
I just have to chuckle when I hear it!
“…do they really think that 100 years ago women often just didn’t have enough milk so would just give up feeding their babies… No!!!”
I agree with you there – they didn’t have any choice. Then again what was the infant mortality rate 100 years ago? 😉
Anyway, I am totally pro-breastfeeding. I did it for 6 months (not long to you – I know) and struggled the ENTIRE time with cracks, bleeding, mastitis and a VERY persistant yeast infection that left me in tears and excruciating pain after every feeding for 3 months – despite the excellent help of some wonderful lactation specialists. It actually got to the point where I was terrified to feed my daughter but I persisted because afterall, breast is best – right?
In the long run, my daughter ended up being failure to thrive (in her first six months of life she gained just 4 pounds and – only in the first 3 months of her life did the gain happen), and I ended up quitting breastfeeding because the other option was a feeding tube. Was I making enough milk? Yes, most likely. Was my daugther getting enough of what she needed to survive(literally)? – no. Was I disappointed after overcoming all those struggles with breastfeeding to end up having to quit? You bet. I struggled and cried over the decision to quit breastfeeding, but it turned out to be the right one.
I also don’t have a lot of sympathy for those who don’t give it their full effort – but you can bet that I don’t judge nearly so quickly anymore either. After all, you may not know their full circumstances.
bethany… Your daughter hd failure to thrive because of very serious allergies…. I followed to whole thing the whole time and I followed the way you did your elimination diet (not the way that is recommended btw)….. you always come back by saying how “sometimes breast is not best”….
I think it is sad that she has such serious allergies but at least she got the colustrum and the first months of breastmilk (not excusive though right? as I remember) I couldn’t imagine how worse off she would have been by getting formula from the begining that would have left her gut wide open…. and she would have been exposed to the proteins fully….
Can I ask… did she get any supplementation at all during the first few days of life?
Also… (hope you don’t mind Sara;) )
Sara (msaraann) has a dd that has serious allergies… I would have to say that she probably has the same amount of allergies as your dd…. however, she has succesfully breastfed and eliminated things from her diet…. Breast is still best… it is the food that we eat that can be dangerous…. not the breastmilk!
As for infant deaths 100 years ago…. what the stats show is that most deaths 100 years ago were due to circumstances that have been prevented with cleaner living circumstances, better education, smaller families, better medicine etc….
However, What the decline of breastfeeding has brought is a whole new wave of infant deaths from diseases that would be less prominant if more people breastfeed and actually were almost not heard of 100 years ago… a great study shows that 50% of infant deaths in the US could be prevented if kids were breastfeed excusively for the first 6 months….
No, my daughter was not supplemented at the hospital, and yes, she was exclusively breastfed until I had to quit. It took me about a month before she would ever let a bottle nipple in her mouth (when she was 6 months old mind you.) I would be intrigued to hear what I did wrong in my elimination diet. I plan on breastfeeding with future children AND doing a total elimination diet in an effort to help prevent allergies (which run in the family BTW). So I am open to any suggestions that can help me not go through that again!
In a side note, I do want to emphasize again, that I have been coming to your blog for a long time, because I am intrigued by your parenting style – same reason I follow a vegan blog even though I’m not vegan! You have a lot of great things to say and obviously the one thing that I struggle with is your black/white views of breastfeeding.
In another random question – maybe you can save it for another post – how common is it for a child who is raised AP to have a comfort object like a blankie or a stuffed animal?
Thanks
I don’t remember exactly what I remember reading about when you did your elimination diet that I didn’t agree with… there were a lot of posts about it…. but please feel free to e-mail me and I will go through it with you…. However, you are learning more and more how to cook for your dd and wth that diet for yourself you shouldn’t have any problems milk wise… (babies can not be allergic to breastmilk)
Yes… I have very strong views on breastfeeding… Breast is best and other milk should only be used when absolutely needed. Formula can have side effects and the lack of breastmilk for a baby can lead to substantial health problems and even death. It shouldn’t be a choice to breastfeed or not.
I truly believe that Formula should be used by prescription only and only when all recourses to breastfeed (with the right info of course) have expired. Even the I would rather see Breastmilk banks then formula companies.
At the moment there are women that really can’t beastfeed for many reasons and there are not enough breastmilk banks, they are expensive, and there are still cultural barriers around them and that is the reason that Formula is here…
Is is the lesser of two evils and it should be treated as such…. Babies need to eat and there are circumstances that breastfeeding is not possible and breastmilk from another source is not availible… I can accept that… but not accept when people choose to breastfeed because they think that it is an equal or good enough choice… it isn’t…
As for the question about transitional objects…
I wrote this a few months ago…
Transitional Objects…
btw Bethany… I was wondering what you thought about what I said about time-outs… since you had asked me to talk about it before….
On the topic of breastfeeding babies with allergies and failure to thrive: Both my daughters have tons of allergies. I have tons of allergies. I’ve done elimination diets. My first daughter was big and appeared healthy even though she had tons of allergy troubles, but my second daughter was small and gained very slowly. I think she would have been diagnosed failure to thrive if I had taken her to wellness visits. At nearly one year old, however, we’ve eliminated foods and she’s a petite, but chubby, healthy baby.
I don’t know why a mother would be suggested to stop breastfeeding because of allergies, especially since cow’s milk and soy are two of the top most allergic foods. I understand the fear of slow gaining (“failure to thrive”), but why stop breastfeeding completely? Is it because the person recommending doesn’t believe the mother will eliminate trouble foods from her diet or that it would be too much of a bother?
I had cracked nipples, thrush, blisters, latch problems, and clogged ducts almost constantly for the first seven months of my first daughter’s life, but because of my babies’ allergies, it was especially important to me to keep breastfeeding them. Additionally, their father has Type I diabetes which is associated with formula feeding. He was not breastfed. My girls may be genetically predisposed. Diabetes along with the host of other diseases associated with formula feeding are not worth risking. Breastmilk protects my babies from diseases. It’s a gift easily within my ability to give them.
About brestfeeding I don’t know if I am special but all my friends brestfed their babies wonderfully, me also. Still I have a question about the reasons for the difference in gain weight from baby to baby and Mother to Monther, like for instance some babies gain in the first months an average of 200 g per week while others gain 400g, is it the milk more or less fat, is it the baby, or the food the mother takes, or the production. I wander… :o)
Ok, I first want to state that I firmly believe breast is best. I Love Love Love La Leche League and other pro-breastfeeding organizations and what they do to promote breastfeeding. I think it is a shame that more women don’t breastfeed, and that so much misinformation and unnecessary interventions prevent them from doing so. Breastfeeding is natural and necessary to a happy and healthy child (and mother!).
I also do not agree with women who never want to start, or want to stop breasfeeding because it is simply too much of a bother even if they are able to do so with little or no problems. So this is not what my post is about.
I did want to address what Birdie was talking about though. IME there can be problems with breastfeeding despite mama’s best efforts. For the first year of DD’s life and during pregnancy, I was an extremely strict whole foods vegan. She started developing major tooth decay even while she was pretty much strictly breastfed (she would only lick food and then promptly spit it out, so I didn’t really consider her eating anything solid yet). This prompted us to change our family’s diet, and after we switched, she started growing. A lot. And started acting more mentally chipper. It was noticeable to the degree that I could not just think it was a growth spurt or developmental milestone. And then the tooth decay stopped spreading and growing larger, whereas it was rapidly spreading pre-diet change. The only thing that changed was my diet, and thus my milk. Even though I was nursing on demand, and nursing well making plenty of milk, I was starving my little girl.
I have so much more to say on this subject, but I want to respect that this is Paxye’s space to rant. Instead I will link to my posts on this thread: http://www.mothering.com/discussions/showthread.php?t=414949 and an exhaustive (and exhausting) discussion about breastmilk and diet off MDC: http://www.mothering.com/discussions/showthread.php?t=343188 .
As you can tell, this is a subject very close to my heart. My DD also has severe food allergies (we carry an Epi-Pen) and we battled eczema for a few months early on due to allergens coming through my milk. I am currently trying to heal my and DD’s guts to stop us being so allergic to things and it’s a slow process. Yeast problems supposedly have a lot to do with diet and are correlated with gut health as well. I think if we can educate ourselves and do our best to support nursing mamas in their nutritional as well as physical needs, then we may be able to help some of the mamas with problems early on to continue breastfeeding successfully.
Marta… I think the weight gain can have all different kinds of reasons… could be diet, metabolism, how much a baby is sleeping etc…
It is just like Some people will eat the same thing as another person and one will gain and the other may lose…
toraji…
Like I said to Birdie… I see problems such as yours and hers as lying within the parents diet and not the milk itself… (you change the diet and the milk will change also…. though I am not saying that it is easy!!!)
What I disagree the most about with Birdie is that is that when she switched to formula she just has a habit of preaching that “sometimes Breast isn’t Best”…. and has said that it was her breastmilk that caused the problems…
these comments have left me with a sour taste in my mouth…
It makes me so sad hearing stories like yours…. and I understand that you are still going through a lot of guilt… As parents we want to do what is best for our children… and choosing a vegan whole food diet is what many people regard as what is best… but you found the problem and made the change….
I hope you use your experience as a way to educate others (MDC is down so I can’t see the discussions)
I know that I will keep it in mind also… and I will ask more about mom’s diet…
I do encounter many people that do have a LOT of problems… most of it is due to misinformation and lack of supprt and to solve the problems thay have to let go of the bad info they got in the past… this often has to come down to choosing the “guilt” route by saying I thought I was doing what was best and now I know that I was not the right desision…
but then you have to learn to leave that guilt behind…
Quote: What I disagree the most about with Birdie is that is that when she switched to formula she just has a habit of preaching that “sometimes Breast isn’t Bestâ€â€¦. and has said that it was her breastmilk that caused the problems…
Ohh! Got it. I totally agree. Breast is always best no matter what. Sometimes there are problems that make it difficult, whether it is totally physical or just a lack of information. And if those problems make it impossible to breastfeed (like if you had breast surgery) then you can still agree that breastmilk is the ideal route even if you formula feed. At least, that is my take on it.
I am learning to leave my guilt behind, though some days it is very difficult!
Toraji… exactly… I have no problem and even more then that… my heart goes out to people that try to breastfeed, work at it, want it, and can’t… it does happen and it is must be heartbreaking especially whe you know and believe that breastmilk is the best food and that there can be serious risks to formula… Who would want to give their child something that is dangerous? It is for this reason that I see Formula as being equal to a medication… sometimes you need it and there are times when you have to take the risks…
Like medication, you need to be aware of the risks, you should be followed by a medical professional and it should be by prescription only…
I really like the WHO’s take on it…
For one… they recomend breastfeeding as the optimum, expressed milk from own mother as second choice, breastmilk from another mother as 3rd choice, a subsitute fed by cup in fourth choice and last a bottle of formula…
They also state “Infants who are not breastfed, for whatever reason, should receive special attention from the health and social welfare system since
they constitute a risk group.”
http://www.who.int/gb/ebwha/pdf_files/WHA55/ea5515.pdf
This may be an old post but I wanted to comment. I disagree with your lack of confidence in your post-I think it is both eloquently and passionately written. I entirely agree with you that the majority of women have decided long before their baby is in their arms.
I’m also aware of the very real problems that can occur. In the thread at AA that led me here I outlined some of the problems I faced with my tongue tied boy. We tried so many things, relied on an sns with my expressed milk, until I realized that I could simply express as he attempted to nurse, essentially hand expressing into his mouth. Over time he grew stronger and less aggressive breast compressions sufficed, and now at seven months he can nurse unaided in his sleep-never awake.
I live on oatmeal and so much fenugreek that I smell awful. Without it my supply is abysmal, thanks to those weeks of such heavy supplementation. It is volatile too, dipping down at times so much that I get nervous, other times I’m so engorged that I have to express eight to ten ounces, after he is done in order to get comfortable. I consider those my give back days, where I can put back in my stash what I take on bad days.
I could have quit so many times. It was so tempting thanks to the lack of support available. But I stuck it out because I’m aware of the risks of formula use versus benefits of breastmilk and this is where I lay the blame.
It’s not the culture of failure and justification that I see as being at fault. It’s the failure to adequately make known the true dangers of formula. And all because we don’t want to upset the vulnerable women who ‘couldn’t’ breastfeed (yes I know there are some-about 2% of women). So instead of upsetting someone we instead continue to allow harm to innocent babies. If more women knew the truth they would be less anxious to reach for that can. Thank you for this post.
Apologies for the obvious typo, pissy should have read post 🙁
lol… I was a bit confused at first… I corrected it for you 🙂
Thank you for your comment. I agree with you, it is in the name of making sure we don’t lay any “guilt” that the truth of Formula stays hidden. Women just don’t know unless they research or unless they have great support . I don’t hold back, guilt is personal and the only time that facts can lead someone to feel guilty is when they made the choice knowing those facts. But the facts should not be hidden because of that. Those that had NO choice, rarely feel guilt. What upsets me the most at times is that Formula feeding mom cry out that they are being stigmatized when they are actually the Majority. How can the majority be the victim?