I did try breastfeeding about a week after he was born though. My grandmother kept harping on me about how much bonding I was missing out on and how I would regret it. So I tried it just to make sure I wasn’t making some huge mistake. I wasn’t. There was no mystical bond that only a mother can experience with her child (for me at least). It was like feeding him a bottle but it was my boob instead. I’m glad I tried it out though. At least now I know.

It’s common for nursing moms to think about what they are putting into their mouths and how it might affect their children, but to my knowledge, breastfeeding is not a reliable way to administer medicine to children.

Well, yes, she was asking me if the cold medicine she was taking was compatible but she just mentioned as an aside for my knowledge, that her son was 5 years old and she was still breastfeeding him and it was more for his benefit to continue to breastfeed him at that age because of his need to be secure. But my co-worker completely surprised me yesterday when she said her mother breastfeeds her 3 y/o daughter. She works that much that her child refers to her grandmother as “mother” and she also sleeps with her grandmother and I just learned, breastfeeds her as well.

Sorry, I was rushing to work and my comment was badly worded. Thanks for the reply and I agree, I don’t always recommend cold meds outside of normal saline to nursing moms. A lot of them would rather suffer than put anything into their mouth to alleviate a cold if it has adverse effects to the child because the medication is excreted into the breast milk.

The person at fault here is the employer, for not providing an appropriate space for pumping. This is in a sense blaming the victim.

As to why she didn’t just go nurse the kid — maybe she couldn’t.

I had no issue with her breastfeeding, or her pumping – or even her using the bathroom to pump. My issue stemmed from the amount of time she spent in the bathroom and then her leaving her gear there. There was no cabinet, just a single sink with a small counter and she would wash out her pump and leave it on the counter to dry, along with breast pads and nipple cream. Then after pumping she would leave to go feed the child. I could never understand why she didn’t just skip the pumping and go to the daycare and feed him. No mess at the office and half the time spent away from work.

Part of my issue probably stemmed from the amount of maternity leave she had already taken (6 months)then the fact that she brought the infant into the office for a period of time (3 months)and then the whole pumping thing. This occurred over a years time. I am all for employees making maternity leave and/or breastfeeding time available to mother’s without penality – but there has to be some consideration for the rest of us at the office. Given the open plan nature of our office, her infant crying at her desk made it difficult for me to conduct my job in a professional manner and there was no way to broach the subject with her or the boss without sounding anti-parenting.

Okay – enough with that.

Jessica said: but I think we do have to ask ourselves what we as a society owe to dependents and the people who are expending the effort to care for them, even when they are not, strictly speaking, “ours”.

I think we owe parents the opportunity to stay home and care for their infants without losing their jobs and the flexibilty to be available for young children – I was fortunate enough to be able to stay home with mine, so it wasn’t an issue for me. However having said that, an office is a place of business, not a daycare. While I didn’t object to my coworker having the time and opportunity to pump and feed her son, bringing him to the office, leaving the office to feed, tying up the bathroom to pump was disruptive to the rest of us in the office – and she was not the only one with young children, just the only one doing these things. I think the parents of young children need to take some responsibility for their choices as well – if you choose to or have to work, you need to be available during those work hours to do the job for which you are being paid. Sometimes you have to give up one thing for something else.

Staying home full-time doesn’t work for a lot of people though, and I really agree with all the above that there should be options for flexible work schedules for anyone with dependents (male or female) that aren’t as punitive as most current options.

What would’ve been ideal for us, would’ve been if my husband could’ve worked part-time for a few weeks after my maternity leave was up, but that just isn’t done. I could take time off, so I was supposed to do so, while he stayed at work. (Which is more an anti-civilian bias than a ‘women should stay at home’ policy, as in families where the woman is active duty, the civilian parent is the one expected to take time off for sick days and field trips, etc.)

But back on topic…

Jessica wrote:

Keishon wrote:
I had a patient call and ask me about taking some meds while breastfeeding. She stated that her son is 5 years old and it’s more for HIS benefit, not hers (something to do with bond?).
It’s common for nursing moms to think about what they are putting into their mouths and how it might affect their children, but to my knowledge, breastfeeding is not a reliable way to administer medicine to children.

I think she meant she was worried about the effect her medicine would have on the kid, not about a way to take her kid’s medicine for him. (The more for his benefit was talking about the breastfeeding bond, not the medicine.)

ETA: As for the woman who took 4 out of 8 work hours managing her breast-feeding, while I generally think we should support new mothers, I do think she should have had an option to legitimately work half-time, so work would be work, and she could spend the rest of the day with her child. Cause having someone at work who isn’t working is excessively difficult for everyone, even the one not working, I would think.

I had a patient call and ask me about taking some meds while breastfeeding. She stated that her son is 5 years old and it’s more for HIS benefit, not hers (something to do with bond?).

It’s common for nursing moms to think about what they are putting into their mouths and how it might affect their children, but to my knowledge, breastfeeding is not a reliable way to administer medicine to children.

Tumperkin wrote:

there is a huge difference between middle class and (for want of a better phrase) working class mothers. The rates of breast feeding are high in the former category and very low in the latter category. In Britain we have a National Health Service and I was in quite a big ward after the birth of my second son. It was extraordinary how different the nurses were with the middle class and working class mothers.

That is fascinating, and not surprising. We see the same divergence in attitudes when it comes to daycare as well. If you are receiving public assistance, you are a lazy mom if you do not work or try to, but if you are middle class, you are a bad mom if you do work.

Christine wrote:

Neither ever had a bottle, although I tried pumping for my oldest so I could teach part time when she was 6 months old, but she refused every single bottle and would just wait for me to come home so she could nurse.

Boy, I know first hand what this is like. My eldest would go 6 hours without taking a bottle of expressed milk, then I would have 3 hour marathon nursing sessions when I got home.

Christine wrote:

I find it difficult to accept that anyone can deny breastfeeding is best for both baby and mother,

I agree. All things being equal, it is. But (a) it is not AS superior as it has been made out to be in the press (breastmilk = liquid gold, formula = poison), especially not these days when formula has improved so much, and (b) all things are rarely equal.

I am glad the newer research is showing that the benefits of breastfeeding are also in the closeness and nurturing it provides. We moms did not need an NIH grant to tell us this, of course. But I wish this didn’t in turn lead to the argument that mothers have to stay at home full time while nursing, because it overlooks the fact that fathers can nurture and feed expressed milk, grandmothers can nurture and do the same, and yes, even day care providers and nannies can do this as well.

Jill Sorenson wrote:

My sister in law chose to pump even though she was home. I think she found breastfeeding uncomfortable. I admit that I was baffled by this decision; instead of spending precious moments bonding with her baby, she was pumping milk alone.

This is something new, which Lepore in the New Yorker discusses. I definitely see more of this these days.

Christine wrote:

To me, pumping seems like a hassle, but it hardly deserves backlash! Same with formula. I was formula fed and my brain developed fine.

The Atlantic piece has a funny bit about this, the author is looking around her child’s classroom trying to find the formula fed babies, and is amazed that she can not pick them out. My sister-in-law’s formula fed kids are outperforming mine academically, and we are professors who breastfed!

Maya M. wrote:

what an interesting yet unexpected topic to find under the heading ‘racy romance reviews’!

You have no idea how many times I have cursed the title I chose to give this blog. I went for alliteration over accuracy.

Maya M. wrote:

when i finally gave up after two months,it an enormous relief for both of us. my son, his brother, and his sister were all fed formula, and i defy anyone to tell. none of them have allergies, they are all wildly healthy, two have never been on antibiotics and one had a single course of them.

There’s nothing wrong with breastfeeding (obviously!) but there is something wrong with creating unnecessary and at times extremely damaging stress for people who choose another route.

I think very few women breastfeed exclusively for the recommended 12 months. Instead of being made to feel good for doing it exclusively for 6 months, I felt like a failure for introducing formula so I could stop pumping after 6 months. There is something wrong with that. Most of the research on the benefits to breast milk concentrates heavily on the first 6 weeks after birth. I did my own research, and found that after 6 months, the benefits over formula are negligible. Why wasn’t I allowed to weigh, as one factor in the decision, the inconvenience to me of continuing to do it, without feeling selfish? I support breastfeeding, and it is clearly superior to formula, but I am glad some sobering reality is coming to the discussion.

azteclady wrote:

Aren’t we lucky that we have choices our foremothers didn’t have? Why do we have to make it a crusade against those who choose differently? I don’t know in the end–but I know I’ll support my daughter’s choice if and when, and damn what anyone else has to say on the topic.

I agree! I got it both ways: my hippie mom was all about breastfeeding, and my mother in law, mother to doctors who did not BF, thought I was this hick for doing it. It’s such a personal thing, it annoyed me that people would feel free to express their opinions about it so freely.

Nicola O. wrote:

Pumping was not a good experience for me — let’s just leave it at hormones and feelings of inadequacy.

It’s not a great experience, even when it goes well, although clearly some women prefer it to nursing. I am glad the Lepore article took pump manufacturers to task for the hyperbolic language comparing pumping favorably to nursing. But it’s one thing to admit nursing>pumping, and another to say it’s a grotesque mimicry.

willaful wrote:

And as long as they’re not making public policy, I couldn’t give a shit.

Hear, hear.

KristieJ wrote:

But this is one area I think the US lags behind. In Canada mothers (or fathers) get a year of maternity leave – with their job or one similar guaranteed when they return. They get paid the entire time – though not 100% of their salary.

That’s so nice. My view is that the US lags behind in most areas of social policy, and this is just one of them.

Lauren wrote:

At the same time, I don’t believe that formula is poison, nor do I think bottlefeeding will turn your kid into a bag of hammers. The idea of a woman nursing when she’s disgusted by it, or it it so frustrating she turns into an emotional wreck at feeding time alarms me far more than her choice not to breastfeed because she simply doesn’t want to do it.

Mothers need to cut each other a break. This gig is hard enough without the guilt trips over every single thing you do.

Well said. I think a lot of the tendency for women to critique each other comes from insecurity at not being able to live up to perverted ideals of femininity we did not invent, and that we are punished for not living up to. (You can look at my banner and predict my view on that one.)

Lissa wrote:

except for the nighttime feedings they use bottles to allow Daddy to share in the caring of the boy.

I am glad you mention this, because this is another reason many women choose to express milk. My kids, of course, would have none of this, at least not if I was within smelling distance.

Lissa wrote:

Pump all you like – but do it on your own time and don’t expect others to pick up your slack in the name of breastfeeding.

She sounds inconsiderate, to me, but why couldn’t the employer have found a spot for her?

This point — and I do understand where you are coming from — is one I have heard a lot in my day, being the only faculty member in my department with young children. There is no excuse for selfishness, but I think we do have to ask ourselves what we as a society owe to dependents and the people who are expending the effort to care for them, even when they are not, strictly speaking, “ours”.

My oldest is now married and has a son of his own. His wife breastfeeds – both nursing and pumping, because she went back to work when he was 8 weeks, thought except for the nighttime feedings they use bottles to allow Daddy to share in the caring of the boy.

Breastfeeding is a very personal choice and no one should be made to feel guilty for not doing it, or feel superior because they do. In days gone by, I imagine that breastmilk was the most nutritionally sound choice for your baby. In this day and age, I am not entirely sure that is still true. Formula has come a long way – and as a Mother who had 3 of 4 children on soy formula because of lactose issues, sometimes I think formula may be the better choice.

As for the breast pump being evil? That too is a personal choice. However I once had a co-worker who would go into the only bathroom in our office and spend nearly 45 minutes, 3 times a day pumping – then she would leave the office to take the bottle to her son’s daycare and then stay to feed it to him. That meant that out of every 8 hour work day, she spent about 4 hours pumping and feeding her son. Really not fair to those of us who 1) didn’t have access to the bathroom when it was needed and once we did have access we had to wade through her stuff to get to the sink and 2) had to pick up her work because she wasn’t there doing it. Pump all you like – but do it on your own time and don’t expect others to pick up your slack in the name of breastfeeding.

I breastfed all three of my children. With each of them I had to supplement with formula due to severed ducts impacting supply. In the beginning, each time I had a child, I pumped to get my supply as high as I could.

I didn’t find pumping to be grotesque and I suppose if I weren’t in such a good mood just now, I’d be annoyed at another person having the audacity to generalize so varied an experience as breasfeeding and pumping. It’s paternalistic, which is even worse coming from another woman.

I support mothers making the best choices for their kids and their families. I am hugely supportive of breastfeeding. Yep, it hurt like a mutha at the beginning but I was lucky enough to have had the support of my doctor and a lactation consultant who were both really helpful and educational about creating a way for me to nurse and supplement as much as necessary.

At the same time, I don’t believe that formula is poison, nor do I think bottlefeeding will turn your kid into a bag of hammers. The idea of a woman nursing when she’s disgusted by it, or it it so frustrating she turns into an emotional wreck at feeding time alarms me far more than her choice not to breastfeed because she simply doesn’t want to do it.

Mothers need to cut each other a break. This gig is hard enough without the guilt trips over every single thing you do.