Comments on: According to One Study: Bottle Fed Babies are More Likely to Be Abused

By: Alisa

Alisa — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 05:30:56 +0000

Well…I breast fed for 11weeks and my son was totally unsettled from the age of 5 weeks. My baby would pull off the breast, cry for hours on end, not sleep and was never ever happy, so where was his play time? My milk supply was great my son’s attachment was perfect and I never experienced sore nipples. I was the ‘perfect’ candidate to breast feed. I stopped eating and drinking dairy, nuts, eggs, all Asian greens, wheat, gluten, garlic, onions, iron supplements and anything else that was on the list of foods that ‘could’ unsettle your breast fed baby.
After weekly visits to either his G.P, health nurse or paediatrician he was diagnosed with reflux, of course right? So…he was prescribed baby Losec .I was told all will settle in 2 weeks. So 2weeks later…A very unhappy baby.
Then the fluoro green diarrhea started…Poor baby would projectile poo twice during a feed and more! I suggested formula to my son’s nurse and G.P and I was looked upon like some ‘evil’ woman who indeed may ‘abuse’ her child by feeding him poisonous formula! So which is abuse again? Persisting to obviously feed him breast milk? Or try another alternative? Well being the ‘abusive’ mother I am I tried the alternative…well…Now he is thriving, he sleeps, eats well, plays and even smiles! So from one abusive bottle feeder to another, why not punish your child some more and keep doing what doesn’t work!
When my son was born he fed beautifully and I loved to breast feed, it killed me to think could I possibly be the cause for his pain? Well obviously something in my milk did not agree with his little system. I miss the early days of feeding but have visual nightmares of the screams he voiced when he fed from me from 5 weeks.
I wish there was a support network for mothers who choose to formula feed, there seems to be so many networks for breast feeding mothers.
One last comment…I was formula fed as I my mother cloud not breast feed. My mother is a beautiful woman who is a wonderful caring lady who would not hurt a fly! she was the eldest of 7 children and helped her own mother raise her brothers and sisters. a real saint… Hmm where do they find these ’study’ groups ???

By: Alyss

Alyss — Sat, 30 May 2009 14:14:44 +0000

Great. Not only do I not love my children becuase I chose not to breastfeed — and it was a choice — I felt I’d rather adopt bottle fed babies who’d been abandoned — and am there foreraising axe murderers, but now, because I was such an evil person, I’m also going to kick them around.

I’ve been told if I really wanted to be a good mother, I’d have chosen motherhood in a way that gave my children the best chance in life (ie giving birth to them myself, drug free, and of course nursed them until they were three. I’ve been told that breastmilk would cure the brain damage they suffered from lack of prenatal care, tramatic unattended births and the hours (in one case nearly 2 days) they spent along, exposed, before some kindly sole took them to an orphange.

I thought I was building a family, but apparently, I’m just an abuser.

I don’t think I can take it much longer.

By: Godi

Godi — Sat, 23 May 2009 13:52:27 +0000

I am 65 years old, from a family of 12 siblings; all bottle fed, because our mother did not have milk on her. She was never our abuser, but rather, our protector from our abusive father — who, by the way, can’t also breast feed us. By the way, we are all alive and doing well.

By: greenandcleanmom

greenandcleanmom — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 19:14:58 +0000

Yikes, the study was flawed though. Did you read it?

By: Green Fundraising

Green Fundraising — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 17:09:09 +0000

YET ANOTHER REASON TO NURSE YOUR BABY! Thanks for the great information. I think once people understand all the health benefits for you and your baby, they will make the decision to nurse!

By: Multi-Tasking Mommy

Multi-Tasking Mommy — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 01:00:41 +0000

Now this is good news!
Let’s hope my son continues to love breastfeeding

Multi-Tasking Mommy’s last blog post..Works for Me Wednesday: Book, Movie and Gaming Review Site

By: Breastfeedtil3

Breastfeedtil3 — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 17:17:17 +0000

It really did put me over the edge for a bit because of sleep and back problems and I got every breast related illness I had ever heard of (mastitis, yeast, raw nipples, etc).. My son was a snacker (took little meals every half hour or so) who loved to pull my boob and just latch at the tip… I mean, really, it was super hard. So I really understand where everyone is coming from when they say not everyone can breast feed. Despite all this, I agree with Tiffany. I managed to breast feed my son until age 3 and I still think the only reason I managed this is because I soldiered through a incredible barrage of unsupportive and unnatural circumstances. I mean, I couldn’t find a day care that could deal with my milk properly so I actually chose to be poor for a bit and stay home. I had formula suggested to me in more than one overt way and was actually given a can of formula at the hospital and the first thing I did when I got home was dump it in the trash lest I be tempted one cold dark night to pull it out and give it to him. I had very little emotional support from my partner and felt very isolated. Me and my entire family were kicked out of a fancy restaurant because I had to breast feed my son.. I mean really, the list goes on and on.

Aside from any biological reasons why people can’t breast feed, which really, I can appreciate and find totally valid (that is what formula should really be used for: as a medical remedy to legitimate medical issues in mom or baby that preclude them from breast feeding)

My sense is that many of the things I was up against could have been different for me if there had been more support for breast feeding. Our culture tends to want to make parenting a convenient act that we have to fit into life as consumers and worker bees. Breast feeding interferes with that, it interferes with the schedules and the pressures we have to take on to be succesful in our day to day.

If more of us were willing to support the fact that parenting is not convenient and that we can’t always fit our mothering into an ‘efficient’ schedule, then we’d all have a much better chance of succesfully breast feeding or even seeing it as a viable choice.

That’s my 2 cents

By: mary

mary — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:27:54 +0000

I had a lot of difficulty breastfeeding my daughter.I worked with almost every lactation consultant in town, it seemed. I really wanted it to work out, but in spite of almost constant nursing, she kept losing weight. I had to supplement using a bottle. She eats a combination of pumped breast milk and some formula. Now she is gaining weight and is healthy. That’s all that matters to me. At a certain point, I felt that to continue to insist on exclusive breastfeeding was making it more about me when it should be about her. (I’m not saying that’s the case for anyone else, just me in this particular situation) Breastfeeding is a big part of the culture where I live. I may have had some minor apprehensions about breastfeeding in public, but now I feel even more nervous about bottle feeding in public. I keep expecting complete strangers to berate me for bottle feeding. (Yes, people feel that strongly about it around here)
As for the bottle feeding-abuse connection – previous posters are right: correlation does not equal causation.

By: Katarina Bole

Katarina Bole — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 06:02:37 +0000

Oh, well, I think tha as many people so many opinions on how to feed our babies: breast feeding or with bottle. As for me I’m not stuck to any point of view, but think that breast feeding is more natural ways for this…

By: Jaime

Jaime — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 18:06:38 +0000

I have to be honest I never really thought of bottlefeeding my child.I come from a long line of breastfeeders (some up to the age of 3). I never thought I would have any problem breastfeeding I was scared of childbirth but didn’t think much about breastfeeding. Well childbirth ending up being much better than I ever expected and breastfeeding was a nightmare.
I would have tears running down my face from the pain and everytime my husband brought me the baby I would look at her in disbelief. I couldn’t believe she could possibly be hungry again. I looked to family for advice they all gave it with the “breastfeeding is best” comment. I was barely getting thru the hours (she was eating every 45 min to 2 hours) and they all would say well you have to at least breastfeed for the 1st 3 months.
I finally called up a homeopathic doctor to see what option was best for formula and he refused to even give me advice. He gave me the number of a lactation consultant. This was after telling him I was so overwhelmed and felt so guilty that I felt like I was going crazy. To make a long story short I ended up getting mastitis and was told by my midwife to continue breastfeeding although I was on antibiotics . My daughter ended up getting sick and finally I was able to give up breasfeeding and put her on formula although I didn’t admit it to anyone for a few months.
I TOTALLY agree with you there is very little support for bottlefeeding moms. Even for moms trying to transition over from breastfeeding. I was very discouraged and felt very alone. After talking to more people I have found out that many mothers dealt with the same type of issues that I did . But nobody came out and told me until after telling them my story. I think we all need to be a little more honest about our parent hood struggles so we can support eachother and realize we may be going thru the same struggle instead of judging eachother so much. It would help people not feel so isolated in motherhood.
My daughter is now a thriving one year old who is very rarely sick . I really haven’t been thru too many struggles since the initial breastfeeding one but truly wish there would have been more support in my 1st month of parenthood.