Comments on: In Defense of Formula

By: To wean or not to wean?

To wean or not to wean? — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 00:01:06 +0000

[...] copyright on this information is from 1997, which is a little dated by now, and as I posted once here, while breast feeding is great, to say that not breast feeding is “deleterious” is a [...]

By: miriam

miriam — Sat, 02 May 2009 22:54:13 +0000

I’m going to breastfeed because I’m cheap and lazy.
Sure, breastmilk is better– but formula is by no means an unacceptable solution. I just don’t feel like paying for it after lugging around these 5 lb milk bags of mine for the last 6 months of my pregnancy. And mix formula at 2 am? I think NOT!
That all being said, if I can’t seem to get a good latch or pump enough, that’s exactly what I’ll be doing.

By: Shin Merrill

Shin Merrill — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 20:51:33 +0000

Super-Duper site! I am loving it!! Will come back again – taking you feeds also, Thanks.

By: LauraR

LauraR — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:12:39 +0000

“Can you breastfeed without holding your baby close to you, looking at her?”

I can’t tell you how many times I see women posting on message boards and explaining typos by saying NAK (nursing at keyboard). That’s pretty darn detached if you ask me, and hysterical that they think it’s providing superior bonding to being fed through a bottle.

By: Rational Moms » Blog Archive » “You do not walk up to a complete stranger and criticize their parenting”

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 19:17:48 +0000

[...] and that the skeptic crowd is more willing to allow for a range of right ways to do things (see the post on formula, for example, or even some of discussion in my post about public transportation [...]

By: Cate

Cate — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 17:29:23 +0000

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/provider/providerarticle.aspx?feed=AP&date=20081126&id=9408651

http://www.enviroblog.org/2008/11/melamine-in-formula-here-we-go.htm

Choose wisely. 90 percent of formula is affected by this. Once again, I ask: Can anyone tell me precisely what is in infant formula?

Please don’t blindly trust the FDA with your child’s health.

By: kristi

kristi — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 03:02:03 +0000

Thanks for this post. I’m not surprised that it brought out some unhappy responses. I tried to breastfeed both of my children, but no matter what I did, my supply was inadequate. I got a frustrating amount of flack from other mothers and from breastfeeding coaches, insisting that I must be doing something wrong, that if I didn’t keep messing up, it would all mystically start working the way nature intended. I continued to breastfeed both after I started with formula, mostly out of misplaced guilt. (Due to my medical issues, they weren’t getting enough breastmilk to justify doing that.)

Looking back, I can’t believe I felt so much guilt over something my doctor told me was not my fault. I do agree that breastfeeding is best when it works. I just think that some of the claims are unrealistic, and can lead to a lot of heartache when breastfeeding doesn’t work out.

Oh, and if my kids had another 7 IQ points, I would not be able to keep up with them.

By: Dr. Chuck

Dr. Chuck — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 01:41:53 +0000

Great discussion! I am a pediatrician who advocates breastfeeding and supports mothers wholeheartedly who wish to breastfeed. I also support mothers who choose not to breastfeed and those who are unable to breastfeed for various reasons.

What has not been mentioned is that all breastmilk is not the same. It may sound blasphemous to some that a pediatrician would say it, but breastmilk does not always contain the perfect balance of nutrients. The evolutionary drive is not to produce perfect breastmilk, but to balance the survival and health of the infant with that of the mother. With the possible exception of calcium, breastmilk from mothers whose diet is deficient in a nutrient is also generally deficient in that nutrient. DHA, ARA and iron are three good examples. Also, even the most well-nourished mothers produce breastmilk with substandard amounts of vitamin D. This has prompted the AAP to recommend vitamin D supplementation for all infants of breastfeeding mothers. (Historically, infants received more sun exposure than today and adequate amounts of vitamin D were manufactured in the infant’s skin. The combination of living indoors and the migration of humans, especially those with darker skin, to more Northern latitudes has caused the problem.)

It is true that certain aspects of human breastmilk can never be replicated by artifically produced formulas, but breastfeeding mothers must also take care to ensure that their infants nutrient intake is optimized.

By: Laurie T.

Laurie T. — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 05:17:05 +0000

Julie,
Thank you for writing this post. It is important to remember that we need to consider issues like this critically, and not just believe what we want to believe, since it is a very emotional issue.

One issue that agfmama touched on is the fact that many people in the middle of this country exclusively bottle feed because that is what everyone else in their family, and even in their socio-economic group, does and has done for years. Breastfeeding, in many parts of the country, is a new-fangled trend, practiced mainly by the upper middle class. Many people don’t breastfeed because they don’t know the benefits, and they aren’t encouraged to by healthcare workers or by family or friends.

There are huge ad campaigns in favor of bottle feeding, but very few in favor of human milk.

Plus, there is this American fixation on the breast as only a sexual organ, that makes people feel uneasy about breastfeeding.

So, while some bottle-feeding moms are undoubtedly feeling pressure from human milk advocates, there are many more who aren’t. And they probably stare if they see a mom nursing her child at the mall. There just isn’t as much education about the subject as there should be.

By: Mark M

Mark M — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 14:06:35 +0000

As a stay at home dad with the three best children on the planet (I’m sure yours are all a close second), I have very mixed feelings on the matter. My wife is the sort who will go on a two week business trip with a plane flight a day with a carry0n, her pump, and a growing bag of frozen milk. This may be great for our kids, but the hassles by airport security and confused hotel staff looking for a bag of breast milk in their freezers can’t be good for my wife; however, she does what she feels she must do. Especially, if it allows her to have a closer relationship with our kids than she might have otherwise given career demands.

That said, it is sometimes unpleasant being the stay at home dad trying to comfort a crying, hungry baby, because your spouse will want to feed them when she gets home in a half hour or a little bit longer. Whether valid or not, I can’t help feeling at those times that it adversely affects the bond I have with the kids. Daddy is the one that lets them go hungry sometimes. For better or worse, I suppose we are still such a minority that it doesn’t rank as an issue, but it should and I’m sure it eventually will.

So to the extent that devotion to breastfeeding interferes with the larger family life and well being, I say break out the formula if you need to and breastfeed when you can. I’m sure my wife would disagree with me …

One important caveat – living in Asia and having seen all the Chinese brands of milk products including formula pulled from the shelves over widespread melamine contamination which killed some infants and hospitalized many, many more in China, I’d be careful about where my kids’ food comes from.