Thankyou Suzie, with listmother hat on I concur with your reasoning 
entirely. Lactnet benefits from the personal as well as the professional 
experience of its members but it is not a place to find support for personal 
issues unless there are exceptional circumstances.
With member hat on, I would like to say that I too am amazed that it is six 
years since you joined Lactnet and I contacted you to ask why, if you lived 
near me and were interested in breastfeeding, I didn't know you! The 
Internet is a very useful connector!
Karleen Gribble
Australia

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "S. Heaton" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 12:09 AM
Subject: Re: Mother support


>I totally agree with others that the quality of support varies whether 
>you're online or on the phone or face to face.  I also agree that all those 
>forms of support are really valuable.
>
> However, I thought that this thread started back with whether Lactnet was 
> an appropriate place for mothers to get personal support.
>
> I've been thinking about this over the years and more so in the last 
> couple of days.  In the end I decided that I don't think this is the right 
> place for mothers to come for support for their own issues (unless, as 
> Rachel said, there are exceptional circumstances).  For me, the reasons 
> that come to mind are
>
> 1. this actually isn't a list designed for mums to gain support.  Allowing 
> this list to become a place for mothers to gain direct support will likely 
> clog the list and mean that many currently involved would abandon the list 
> and the current teaching and learning that everyone brings may evaporate.
>
> 2. As mentioned by others, there are lots of places around the world, 
> where you can gain free counselling either one to one email, or on message 
> boards or email lists for support with breastfeeding.  Mothers are 
> actually not lacking in places to gain support.  I don't know about now 
> but five years ago Lactnet stated upfront that this was not a place for 
> personal issues and that if you had personal issues that required help 
> that you could go to Parent-L for support.  (I remember because I availed 
> myself of the wonderful Parent-L when I had issues).
>
> 3. You would not expect to be able to visit a list for doctors with your 
> own problems, why should anyone expect lactation professionals and 
> volunteers to use their learning/teaching/debriefing time to help mums.  I 
> would imagine that all, or at least the vast majority of lactneters 
> already put energy and time in elsewhere to helping mums either directly 
> or indirectly.
>
> 4. I don't think that those reading the list automatically have their head 
> in the space to be counselling mums on the list.  There will be 
> assumptions made, particularly if it isn't made clear that it is a 
> personal query from a mum, about what has already been tried or 
> considered.  I don't think this is fair to mums and my thought was that 
> this is what Rachel meant by
> "Mothers are generally better served by in-person help than by counting on 
> whatever they can find on line, and that is the reason for this part of 
> the guidelines."
>
> and finally
> 5. The listmothers very generously offer to be contacted directly for 
> support, just not post to the list.  Whether they offer one to one support 
> or whether they refer on, the mums are being taken care of.
>
> I think the listmums deserve due credit for their generosity, both for the 
> support they offer mums and the fact that they give lactation 
> professionals, volunteers and interested parties a list that is not 
> clogged but that is also not closed so that many have and will continue to 
> discover the list without knowing 'someone' first.
>
> Regards
> Suzie Heaton
> Australia
> Still amazed that it was lactnet that connected me to volunteers just 1/2 
> hour down the road :-) and that it's nearly 6 years since I joined.
>             ***********************************************
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