Comments on Analytical Armadillo - The Booby Whisperer: Formula Saved My Baby's Life!

I think the reason you didn't want to breastfe...

2012-02-09T20:24:09.772Z

I think the reason you didn't want to breastfeed will be able to replace the poorly chosen word "bad" with a correct term.

So what was your reason for not wanting to.

I didn't want to bf so I formula fed. My baby ...

2012-01-12T19:37:59.613Z

I didn't want to bf so I formula fed. My baby is happy. Am I a bad mum?

I agree with Kris though as we don't have alte...

2012-01-02T14:35:54.466Z

I agree with Kris though as we don't have alternatives to ff at the moment. And yes i was so apalled at the lack of support i wanted to change things. (Dd2 was EBF and bar a month of topups dd1 had ebm til she was one).

I was disappointed that my local milk bank didn't want my ebm because they weren't being asked for it by hospitals - very sad.

@ Liquorice Torpedoes - with respect, I don't ...

2012-01-02T10:45:28.892Z

@ Liquorice Torpedoes - with respect, I don't think that makes sense :) You seem to say that poor BFing support led to your becoming a Peer Supporter (brilliant!!), and therefore I presume that lack of support led to your baby needing supplementation. Ergo - formula should not have been required.

It's like companies jumping in with food replacement packages (as they're trying to sell to drought areas) rather than investing in resolving the reasons for the drought. Does that make sense?

@Anonymous single father - as a few people have said, while it's lovely to feed your baby it honestly isn't needed to bond with your child :) Furthermore, if I was the father in a relationship (which I appreciate is not your situation) I'd want to ensure that my child had what he was supposed to be having rather than an inferior and potentialy dangerous product just for my own pleasure.

I can say from the mother's side that breastfeeding is absolutely not always a lovely, bonding experience. Sometimes it's totally overwhelming being the only person who can feed the child, so in a way there are similarities to your point. It doesn't take away from the fact that we still do it :-)

"As a father being able to bond with a new ba...

2012-01-02T04:08:48.099Z

"As a father being able to bond with a new baby by feeding them is enormously significant"

...as a father, why go around insulting a great number of fathers who instead diligently supported their partner so she could provide optimal feeding? That old chestnut, that babies should get a rubber teat or else they won't bond with Daddy, really needs to go. When my daughter was born, Dad did all the diapers, calmed her by taking showers with her, made himself available as her mattress, etc. I really do not think he was missing on anything "enormously significant" when kiddo didn't get bottles.

Does breastfeeding advocacy require a separate wing to reassure insecure Dads? One wonders, one really wonders... Certainly a lot of women end up messing around with pumps, not really knowing how the whole thing works but "Dad wants to feed," etc, and uninformed use of a pump can cause real breastfeeding problems. Do breastfeeding PSAs need to target fathers?

ok, i am going to take issue with dad's needin...

2012-01-01T23:37:15.255Z

ok, i am going to take issue with dad's needing to bond only thru giving the baby a bottle. there are so so many ways to spend time with your baby that feeding should be left to mom. my dear husband has been able to bond well with all 6 of our kids without having to give them a bottle when they could be nursing. that undermines breastfeeding and dad's need to be 100% behind it and support mom in another way: like get her water or tea or rub her feet or walk the baby or change a diaper or make a meal instead of insisting on feeding the baby.

As Kris said- formula may save lives, but it also ...

2012-01-01T22:08:18.215Z

As Kris said- formula may save lives, but it also undermines the breastfeeding relationship. That's like saying a car saved my life (by transporting me to hospital) after a car accident.
Babies survived prior to the creation of ABM. Pharma companies created a product to satisfy a need, then used marketing tools to increase the 'need' for the product.

I agree that if formula wasn't available we...

2012-01-01T19:48:40.224Z

I agree that if formula wasn't available we'd have other methods and i'd like them to be options which is why i've donated 25+ litres of ebm. However i strongly feel that whilst they aren't available now ff can sometimes be medicine. Ebm would be better medicine but when my dd was admitted to hospital after losing too much weight i had no real alternative.

A lack of bf support is why i'm now a peer supporter and i agree that more should be done to help establish bf.

Re dads, feeding and bonding my thoughts are here:...

2012-01-01T19:10:20.375Z

Re dads, feeding and bonding my thoughts are here: http://www.analyticalarmadillo.co.uk/2010/09/my-patner-wants-to-share-feeding-natch.html

Shouldn't human milk be freely available to single dads?
AA

anonymous is the only category under which I can c...

2012-01-01T18:49:53.040Z

anonymous is the only category under which I can comment but my email is
robcrow@iinet.net.au As a father being able to bond with a new baby by feeding them is enormously significant ;as a single father formula is the only option

Formula helps because it is there. i don't dis...

2012-01-01T17:50:49.118Z

Formula helps because it is there. i don't disagree that many women really feel like formula saved their children's lives. But if formula didn't exist would those babies have died? Not very likely. If there were no formula we would be forced, as a society, to have the means in place to support women so they could be successful at breastfeeding. We would have milk banks available. Wet nursing would be seen as common and normal.
So yes, formula has helped a lot of Moms. But the only reason it may have saved lives is because the formula companies have done such an effective job of making it the only option.