Breast or Bottle??

In My Humble Opinion
21

Its so nice to see this discussion as wonderfully civil as its been.

As everyone else said, give the breast a try - unless you or your partner are opposed to it for emotional reasons (and if you are asking, it is at least under consideration).

When its easy, the breast is wonderfully easy. And when its difficult, it can be very discouraging. Don’t beat yourself up if it doesn’t work for you. Note that it takes two to breastfeed - some babies just plain won’t. On the other hand, many of my girlfriends had no problems whatsoever. (My own personal experience with it was two weeks of hell, another two weeks of difficult, followed by five months of it working pretty darn well, and then she decided to prefer the bottle. But even our pretty darn well wasn’t the breastfeeding bliss some of my girlfriends had. I go back and forth about whether the hell was worth it.)

22

Just to share my two cents…

When my wife was pregnant, she was so looking forward to breastfeeding the baby. Unfortunately, her doctors strictly forbade her from doing so – she was taking medication for hyperthyroidism, but we were told that if she breast-fed, the baby would get the medication in the milk and run a high risk of developing hypo thyroidism (she was on half-dosage throughout the pregnancy and the fetus was closely monitored the whole term).

Bottom line is, we ended up bottle-feeding because we had no choice. And while we both agree that breastfeeding is the best way to go, I have to say that bottle-feeding isn’t that bad, either. We used powdered formula bought from a wholesale cost-club, which wasn’t too expensive. Sterilizing and preparing the bottles was a bit of a hassle, but after we got into the rhythm, it wasn’t too bad. The biggest plus IMO is that it relieved the burden on Mom; if she was too busy/tired, I could grab a bottle and feed the baby instead. Don’t know how things will turn out in the long run, but right now the baby is big, healthy, happy, and a genuine pleasure (most of the time, anyway :wink: )

Breast might be best, but bottle ain’t that terrible, either.

23

I’m just gonna throw out my 2 cents and say please try to breastfeed. I breastfed until 15 months and loved it!
Also go to breastfeeding.com they have a fabulous message board.

24

I nursed my baby for two years. I loved it! Not only was it relaxing, but incredibly easy once I got the hang of it. Instead of having to sterilize bottles, water, and prepare formula, all I did was take off my bra and voila! Instant dinner! I didn’t have to pack a bunch of bottled formula if I was planning a day out–which was a relief as a new parent is already lugging around too much stuff.

When I needed to be away from baby, I had expressed breast milk in the freezer. (I’ve heard breast milk is not to be unthawed in the microwave, just fyi).

25

Hi, Jkayla.

Nursing my kids was a very neat part of their babyhood. And from all of the literature I read before they were born, I was firmly convinced that it would be a great benefit to their health. The first few days, when they receive colostrum before your milk has come in, are especially important, so I’d really urge you to give it a try at least that long.

I recommend you check out the Nursing Mothers of Raleigh. This is a really excellent organization that helped me out a lot. They are a volunteer group of experienced mothers who have taken it on themselves to become very informed on the topic, and share their information with others. They have monthly meetings, and rotate through about 4 different topics that they cover during those months. My advice: Go to the meetings BEFORE you have your baby. That way you’ll have had a chance to hear about how things work beforehand. You’ll also have the phone number of someone you can call to ask if things don’t seem to be working out when you get home with the little one (and the lactation consultant from the hospital hasn’t answered your page.)

We all think that this will be totally instinctive, and we’ll know how to handle it ---- but it’s not. And the nurses in the hospital may or may not be helpful to you. (The evil night nurse from hell who brought me my first son in the middle of the night for his first nursing helpfully told me “Be sure you hold your breast away from his nose, so you don’t smother him”, and then left the room. How’s that for terrorizing a new Mom with TOTALLY FALSE information?) Fortunately, I saw the lactation consultant the next morning, who reassured me that I was doing just fine, and that there was no way that I would smother the baby while nursing. (Of course, if you give birth during the weekend, a lactation may or may not be available…)

Anyhow, the best thing about Nursing Mothers of Raleigh is that they are very non-judgemental. Obviously, they are advocates of breastfeeding. However, they don’t feel it is their right to tell everyone what they MUST do. (In other words, they’re not as militant as SOME La Leche groups have the reputation of being.) Whether you plan to breastfeed for one week or two years, they are willing to support you in it. Give them a try.

My biggest recommendation for breastfeeding? My husband and I referred to it as St. Joseph’s Valium for Children. It is a huge source of comfort to your child. With either of my sons, when he got totally stressed out, if I could just get him to stop screaming long enough to latch on, he would instantly calm down, and you could almost see the stress pouring out of him. Now THAT is worth its weight in gold when you’re dealing with someone that doesn’t understand the soothing words you’re trying to say to him. I had two of the mellowest, laid-back babies you could ever hope to see.

And, as everyone has pointed out, there are lots of great Moms who have breastfed, as well as great Moms who have bottlefed. There’s a lot more to a great relationship with your child than breastmilk.

Best wishes,

Lib

26

BTW, we never “sterilized” bottles. The dishwasher was good enough. I know we boiled the pacifiers and stuff the first time we got them, but thereafter is was into the dishwasher to let Cascade and the hot water do what it could.

I also remember my breast pump instructions saying to take all the pump parts home and boil them for 15 minutes every single night. Hardee har har har. What a laugh that was!

Cranky Jr’s not dead yet.

27

snopes says it is a hoax.

28

I never had any problems or pain, plus my milk came in real early anyway, so I breast fed #1 son exclusively for three months, but by then he wanted more food than I could give so we started supplementing with formula spiked with a tablespoon of rice cereal - after that we had a very happy baby, and breast feeding was down to morning, evening, and night only. Since this was about the time I had to return to work, and hubby didn’t, the system worked out great for us. See, I also stink when it comes to pumping - never got a drop.

Now that #2 is on the way I have no intention of messing with a system thats always the right temperature, always there, and free - unless Blue2 objects for some reason of course.

29

I nursed both my kids for about 6 weeks. Kid #1 took a bit longer for both he and I to learn what we were doing as far as breast feeding, but the effort was worth it. Weaned kid #1 because he got the flu and with the congestion he developed, a bottle was easier for him to use. Kid #2 needed/wanted/demanded to eat every 2 hours, no matter the time of day or night. It got VERY old very quickly. 6 weeks later, she was switched to formula and we settled on a schedule of every 4 hours.
I do have to admit, the time we were stuck in a 6 hour traffic jam (end of the Thanksgiving weekend) breast feeding helped quiet a very hungry little kid #2 who wouldn’t have understood why we couldn’t mix any formula. (Out in the desert, Vegas to LA, no towns, gas stations, anyplace to get water, clean or sterilize bottles, etc. for miles.)

Kids are now ages 6 years and 3 years and still two of the healthiest little kids their pediatrician has seen.
Congrats, and go with what works best for baby and Mom.

Sidenote, with kid #2, when I was weaning her onto the bottle, about every 2 hours, I’d spray like a fountain, especially if I heard any baby cry. Hubby often woke up in a puddle of warm milk on the bed. I used a pump for relief when trying to get my milk to dry up, and fed that to the kid as well. If you try a pump, look for a battery operated one, I never could figure out those hand ones.

30

Oooh, if we’re gonna talk breastpumps, we could probably do another thread! I’ve got to add caveats to this last post. All pumps are not created equal; I have to say PICK THEM CAREFULLY. I don’t think I have heard of any battery-power pumps sold off the shelf that work well, but I haven’t been active on the pumping lists for a while so maybe that has changed. IME, most moms find the Avent Isis hand pump just as effective as the electric pumps. It’s very well designed; before all was said and done I had three of them–one at home, one at work as backup for my Medela, and one spare for emergencies. Any of the evenflo pumps are horrible–do NOT waste your money. While 1 in 10 moms may succeed with these, they’re generally so awful that there has been talk about bringing governmental oversight into the sales of such items. I mean, for god’s sake, a bad breastpump can destroy the breastfeeding relationship. Stop trying to make a fast buck off of moms, you rat bastards! I cannot say say “evenflo breast pump” without adding at least three obscenities in the same sentence. [down girl, down]

If you’re going to do serious pumping (say at work) then invest in a Medela or an Almeda. These are hospital grade and universally recommended as the best. No, they are not cheap. It’d be nice if medical insurance helped with the cost, given the medical benefits of BF, but that too is another thread. They also make hand pumps, which are probably good based on the long-time commitment of these companies to the enterprise.

All this is moot, of course, if you don’t breastfeed, but I get really freaked out about how bad pump choices can kill good intentions, so I had to chime in (what is it, for the FOURTH time now, Cranky? Get a life!).

31

Congratulations JKayla and Tygr! Sleep now.

You’ve got lots of good, long responses here, so let me just add a few quick tips, YMMV of course, and of course if your child has any health concerns whatsoever, YMWV.

  1. Buy disposable breast pads (necessary to absorb leaking milk) BEFORE the baby is born. (Also, be sure to have plenty of sanitary napkins in stock–I lost track of the fact that I was nearly out since I had 9 mos. without a period.)

  2. You can buy fully-mixed formula in pop-top cans. Very expensive to use all the time, but great for travel (and we used to keep a can and an empty bottle upstairs as the kids got to the point of almost sleeping through the night so if they did wake up we didn’t have to go downstairs).

  3. If your breasts bleed a bit and the baby spits up a bit of milk with blood in it after feeding, but otherwise seems healthy, you do not need to go to the emergency room.:slight_smile:

What Cranky said. Same with whoever said that some kids don’t care about the temperature of the formula–don’t make extra work for yourself.

  1. I hated my $80 electric breast pump; the one that worked for me was an $8 plastic hand pump. (And I see Cranky’s post on this on preview, too!)

  2. You need to sit down to feed a baby and, if you want that baby to start sleeping at night, you want the night feedings to be the least disruptive of sleep possible. Get a chair you can sit in for the baby’s room.

Here’s a :slight_smile: specially for the baby.

32

If we’re on the subject of breast pumps — Nursing Mothers of Raleigh rents the Medela, and posibly other, breast pumps (or still did, last time I checked.) The Medela is the Rolls Royce of breast pumps – it runs on AC power, has a variable speed motor, and you can get an attachment to allow you to pump both breasts at once.

An endorsement by a Mom (and mechanical engineer! :smiley: )

33

I breastfed both of my girls. If there is one good decision I’ve made in their lives, that would be it.

I wasn’t blessed with an over abundance of milk with either of them. With my first baby my doctor said that it was probably because of the difficult delivery. I ended up giving her formula once every night out of desparation until she was 6 weeks old and refused it. (That’s a pretty risky thing to do, BTW. Often leads to giving more and more formula and mom’s milk supply doesn’t keep up with baby as she grows.) About that time I went back to work and I couldn’t get enough pumped to send with her to the sitter. So she was always a breast/bottle baby until she was 5 months old and I decided that I didn’t make enough money to continue working. And then she started on solid foods. She was never totally breastfed, but I don’t regret the time we spent nursing. What she got was better than nothing.

Now with second baby, she was born with low blood sugar. The NICU people wouldn’t let me breast feed her at all for several hours and then not for every feeding while she was there. Thank goodness she nursed some while we were waiting for her blood sugar test results. I won’t go into all of the horrible details but let’s just say that it wasn’t easy getting my milk supply up after that interruption. She finally got off supplements at 3 months old. Again, it was worth all the effort. After mom and baby become a nursing team, it’s much easier to just put baby to breast than mess with everything involved in making bottles. (Well, that’s my opinion after experiencing both with both kids.)

Youngest child developed an allergy to the formula she was given and so, encouraged by her peds, I nursed her until she was 2 years old. They told me that receiving breast milk might make the difference in asthma, allergies, eczema, and sinusitis especially with her already having a severe allergy to dairy. Right before her second birthday she cut her feedings back from 5/day to 2/day and ended up in the emergency room with wheezing less than a week later. Coincidence? Could be, but I tend to think they were related. She’s had another wheezing episode since then too. Possibly breastfeeding her kept it from beginning earlier when it is harder to treat (according to her drs).

Other things I liked about breastmilk. The cost (or lack of), it’s always ready to go when we wanted to go out, it doesn’t need to be packaged or shipped to a store so doesn’t contribute to pollution, never had to worry about formula recalls, and I could eat just about anything without gaining weight (your mileage may vary).

34

ooooooo that’s right! Allergies.

If you have allergies in the family, breastfeeding becomes even more of an issue. I’ve got two food intolerant kids and I cannot imagine how much worse the first year with the older kid would have been. He’s allergic to dairy and soy and reacted to these in breastmilk. If he had been on a dairy or soy formula, then IMO life would have been even more exciting.

We’ve not come through with the allergies not happening but if I had known then what I know now, I would have been on a non allergenic diet through pregnancy and breastfeeding. However they’re doing OK and more OK than they would have been if they had been on dairy or soy formula.