Edwina Froehlich, hero

What is the history of breastfeeding? I expect there's a book on it somewhere. I know that Rousseau persuaded upper-class women to breastfeed, when they had previously used wetnurses. I wonder when it fell off again?

I've been told that when I was born, in 1964, the only reason I was breastfed was that my parents couldn't afford the powder milk! I don't think the movement to encourage breastfeeding started as early as the 1950s in England, and, whereas 40 or 50 years ago poor mothers breastfed and better-off ones bottle-fed, now it's the opposite way round.

Rod: The same thing happened to my mother. Of course, my sister and I were born in the late 40's and mid-fifties, respectively. The doctor almost passed out when she suggested it, the heathen! And then explained how much more healthful formula was.

My sister, who would die if she knew I was writing about this, went
through torture to breastfeed her oldest, circa early 1980's. When she told the nurse at the hospital she wanted to breastfeed, the nurse visably shuddered, while making those little disapproving noises. The doctor never asked her preference, bottle feeding was an assumed thing.

Then when the time to feed the child came, they told her to use rubbing alcohol (can you believe it!) to sterilize her breast. Of course the baby didn't want to feed with the taste of rubbing alcohol on Mom. So Nurse Nelly grabs the kids head, twists his neck around and shoves his face into my sister. I believe at that point she got her mitts slapped away. But the child had already had a bad experience and had an unhappy time of it.

So to add to an already bad situation, she was given an "artificial nipple" , a sort of pacifier with out a handle and with a hole through the middle. Baby, naturally, hated it. But my sister was a trooper. She stuggled through it while she was in the hospital. We helped her sterilize and boil everything for days when she got home.

Then one day, the medication they gave her wore off. She called a local La Leche League chapter. They said "You are kidding." After talking with them a couple of minutes, she hung up, threw out all steriling equipment, picked up the baby, sat in a rocker, rocked, sang and finally fed that poor kid something without the taste of isopropyl on it. Problem solved.

When she had her next child, about five years later, it was a beautiful, pleasant feeding experience. The nursing staff couldn't be more receptive to the idea. Don't know if times had changed or the local LLL chapter had a chat with the hospital but everything had changed.

My children were born a different hospital about ten years later. The nurses were so excited that I was breastfeeding they almost tinkled. There was a lactation specialist called in and I was provided with the number of a LLL representative in my area. What a difference from her experience.

Permission to come from a different perspective?

There are some women who don't produce enough milk to sustain their baby. That's what the LLL sometimes doesn't tell you. My wife is one of them. She tried to breastfeed three of our four, but just couldn't. The kids were starving. We ended up using formula on all of them.

Growing up on a dairy, the same thing applies. Some cows give more, some cows give less.

I mean, can you believe the arrogance of the medical establishment back then?

Sadly, Rod, this is only true if "back then" includes four years ago. I had a repro. endocrinologist yell down a fellow medical student in front of the class for bringing up LLL. He called them a "bunch of milk Nazis" and insinuated the student (and the quarter of the class who agreed with her) was just as bad. The silence was deafening.

My remaining illusions about the nobility of the medical profession died that day (the Yale "Abortion Day" a few months earlier having already taken the bulk of them).

Just ask a physician what he/she thinks about at-home births with a midwife.

This physician thinks it is great! Of course I am getting older and do not like getting up in the middle of night so much anymore. We think breastfeeding is great also. The history of formula feeding is interesting. It was probably driven by the big food companies as much as anything. Remember that in the 50's people were pretty much unaware that antibodies could be passed from mother to baby in the breast milk. When I went to medical school in the early 80's we were pushing, actively, breastfeeding. It was actually quite a hard sell in an inner city academic hospital. The better educated women who came for specialty care were open to it, but the local poor population was resistant.

I think breastfeeding ties in more with general food issues rather than medicine. Nutrition is its own separate science in many ways. It is more subject to fads and marketing influences. Lots of opinion and anecdotes, little science.

Steve

On the other hand.....some breast feeding supporters can be just as arrogant. When I had my first child, he nursed well in his own way, but the breastfeeding support person kept trying to "adjust" him. I was sick and tired of dealing with her after four days in the hospital. At least when he was in the NICU she finally left us alone. I breastfed him for a year, but was incredibly annoyed by their treatment of us in the hospital. When I had my second child, they left me alone from the start--I couldn't nurse after having breast cancer and chemo. It was one small reason to be thankful for having cancer (okay--that's a little joke). And you know what--both of them are bright, reasonably healthy, and engaging children.

When my first baby was born in 1990, she breastfed past the time allotted by the nurse, who came in to take her back to the nursery. When I told her my baby wasn't done yet, the nurse exclaimed, "You've got to set limits!" The kid was less than 24 hours old at the time. When my 5th was born in 2006, a nurse's aid saw him during a long bout of breastfeeding and told me he was just using me as a pacifier. She looked surprised when I agreed and went on nursing him. But many nurses do try to help if you need it. The medical practice we take the kids to practically requires moms to breastfeed their kids--if you can produce milk, you're expected to nurse your babies. They refer moms with problems to LLL. Edwina and her friends did a good thing when they started LLL.

Rod, good article, but I disagree with the 77% statistic of current BFing rates. I am a family law attorney in a rural area, and after 12 years of practice I have yet to find a mother of a child under 1-year-old who is breastfeeding. That is sad, really.

My wife breastfed all three of our children for about a year each. I don't understand why breastfeeding is not more popular, especially considering the cost (free!) and ease of preparation compared to formula. My guess is that the lower classes get formula for free via food stamps, and they don't have any financial incentive to breastfeed. Another example of the law of unintended consequences with respect to government programs.

My mom's response to "Did you breastfeed us?"

"Your father was in college working minimum wage at [burger joint] when your sister was born and had just started at ****** at nine thousand a year when you were born. [in 1971]. What do you think? Breastfeeding is cheap!"