Breast Feeding - too much pressure

Beck

It seems to be constant, these comments by other mothers about how you must breastfeed. I recently read a quote from a women who said she left her Mothers group because she was the only one bottle feeding and was made to feel bad about that. As someone who is still traumatized from my failed attempt at breastfeeding my first child – to this day I am convinced that is was one of the major factors that lead to my post-natal depression, I find these comments very upsetting.

The pressure on mums to breast feed and breast feed only is enormous. In hospital we are inundated with pictures of angelic mothers breast feeding with ease. Then we are often faced with midwives telling us that failing breastfeed will result in your child not being as smart (or in one case a friend, who suffers with bipolar disorder and therefore not permitted to breastfeed due to medications, that she was artificially feeding her baby) – where do some women get off.

Why do some breastfeeding mothers feel that they can judge women who choose to bottle feed (for what ever reason and sometimes there is no choice) . Why are they even concerned, really? My bottle feeding doesn’t impact their child and according to some very dodgy research I am merely paving the way for their child to get into med or law school – really I am doing them a favour! So I guess what I am really trying to get at is why do women have to judge other women for ‘their individual’ choices?

Georgy

I agree with Beck, I wish women would stop judging. Putting so much pressure on women to breastfeed can actually be quite detrimental to the health of some mothers. Yes we all know that breast milk is preferable for the baby but not at all cost.

I breastfed my first child through four bouts of mastitis (one which landed me in emergency), all in the first three months of my babies life. In this case after about four months I did find the breast feeding experience a good one and breastfed until my daughter was about nine months and I had to return to work but during that period it had a huge impact on my mental health and my ability to do other things, even so I kept going because of all the pressure from others. My husband had to take a bit of time of work to help me.

With my second I again tried to breastfeed. He was a hungry baby, feeding every two and a half hours during the day, due to the fact he slept through the night quite early on. Soon even this wasn't enough and he got really unsettled. When he was about three months I got diagnosed with postnatal depression and it was strongly suggested by medical professionals that I stop breast feeding, so I did. Once on the bottle my little boy was more settled, he thrived and my health improved dramatically as well.

As my Mum kept saying, 'darling if you are finding the breast feeding that hard please stop. I had to with all three of you children and you turned out just fine.' Mum I am glad I finally listened to you. And she is right, maybe there is some credibility in those studies that say breast milk helps with IQ but in mine and my brother and sisters case we have all done very well in the academic area, so can't have effected us too much!

So I guess what I want to say from this, yes breast feed if you can, it has a lot of benefits for the baby, but if you struggle for what ever reason please don't be under pressure to continue and in the end it is your choice, what ever you decide to do.