I am probably the least credentialled person on this list.   I am not IBCLC,
not CLC, not LLL,  (not even MD or DO or a PhD like Kathy Dettwyler :>) and
probably never going to be any of those things.  Frankly, I consider myself
part of this group on sufferance.  I got on here because I had become a de
facto lay bf resource for a lot of people in my part of the world, and then
started writing and editing work about bf, and before you know it I started
to get the shakes every time I tried to go nomail -- you all know how that
is...

So in some ways I represent the consumer in all this - even if maybe a more
than usually educated consumer.    And my take is that we are talking about
two different kinds of status here -- not mutually necessary, and not
mutually exclusive either.

First of all, I reverence knowledge, and I reverence it wherever I find it.
Anybody here ready to put down Ina May Gaskin because she is not a CNM, or
Kay Hoover because (I am told -- true?) she is not IBCLC?   I think not --
wisdom is wisdom.   If you have established yourself as being truly wise and
an important resource for people who care about your wisdom, then you are
deserving of intrinsic reverence for that, and anyone who doesn't come across
with that reverence is a narrow-minded dope.   Teresa, it sounds like you
have this kind of wisdom-status.  Even if your wisdom recognition is on a
local level it is real (I read your posts, so I know it is real!), and when
you say "IBCLCs aks me questions" I think you are basically saying that your
wisdom is the source of the respect that is due you.

But that would be true without CLC after your name, too.  Wisdom is wisdom.
The credential or lack of it doesn't come into that -- not for ill, and not
for good.

Contrariwise, a really substantial credential can be an intrinsic source of
respect.  For example, even though I know some physicians who are -- in ways
I care about -- plain stupid, I still revere the process of training that
produces and credentials physicians, because it represents something real:
an overall increase in public health, which by implication includes my health
and my family's health.    So I don't generally, for instance, resent the
system that requires doctors orders for anything to happen in a hospital,
because, **over all**, that "elitist" and credential-oriented system still
serves me and everybody else.

Credentials don't confer wisdom, any more than wisdom confers credentials.
But each is differently intrinsically valuable.  These are parallel systems,
with different advantages, and I am glad they both exist.

Of course it's great when those two different, parallel systems for respect
overlap.  When Ilene passed her exam she now had not only one basis for
respect (wisdom) but two (credentials), so that the net amount of respect she
got -- and the number of people who could figure out that they ought to give
it to her -- increased.

Contrariwise when they don't overlap it's a headache, as any LLLL who has
ever tried to contradict bad bf advice from a doc knows well.   I have a
chiropractor who has brought me back repeatedly from misery to health -- but
it still ticks me off that she tells her patients to call her "Dr."

So I guess I want to ask Teresa, With all the wisdom you have, why do you
want to stake your claim to respect on the frail reed of that CBC?   One
reply might be, "Because 'CBC' persuades the jerks in the business office to
pay my salary so that I can help mothers and babies." Fair enough, as far as
it goes.   But here you aren't at the hospital -- you are with family, so to
speak.   WE value YOU for your WISDOM.   You don't NEED ANY initials with us.

But contrariwise your manifest wisdom doesn't mean that the initials that you
do have after your name are the ones we do happen to value as a CREDENTIAL.
I personally don't especially value as professional breastfeeding credentials
any of the letters that people put after their name, other than IBCLC .
That doesn't mean they are valueless.  On the contrary -- the other hcp
letters from MD and RN out to RD etc etc all have obvious value, and LLLL has
great value to tell me where the holder "comes from" and how she is likely to
position herself with respect to bf moms and even what resources she has
available.  But to me, none of those are in themselves conclusively deserving
of respect specifically as professional bf credentials.

To put it another way, the letters CBC are not enough to account for the very
real respect felt for you by everyone on this who knows you or your posts or
your work.  If those (hypothetical) jerks in the business office value you
for your credentials, that why indeed don't they want the full credential --
don't they want an IBCLC?   And if they value you really for your wisdom, why
do they need that CBC credential at all?

Teresa -- and I know that there are a lot of wonderful bf supporters, some of
you professionals, for whom Teresa is speaking here -- to this point in your
life you have made decisions -- which I presume to be smart decisions -- not
to do whatever things it would take for you to aquire the particular letters
we do value specifically as a professional bf credential.   I don't think you
necessarily need to acquire them, because you have status intrinsically with
out them -- but it is different status from the status you would have if you
had achieved that particular credential (cf Ilene).    Maybe someday you will
decide to do that, maybe not; I imagine it depends on a lot of things in your
life.

I think a lot of people are focusing on the question of whether there is a
place in the lactation community for a different, possible less-intensive,
credential for lactation professionals.   But whether you think yes or no, I
bet everyone would agree that there is always a place for bf wisdom,
credentialled or not.   The question of credentialling may well in the long
run be a huge pain in your professional neck (cf Barbara Wilson-Clay's post)
because hospitals and health-care are very credential-driven environments;
but that doesn't mean it is an attack on you as a source of wisdom.  It's a
different conversation; I think that may be part of what BWC meant when she
wrote that it isn't personal, it's professional.    Wisdom is about wisdom;
but credentials are about credentials.

Elisheva Urbas
Unaccredited bigmouth in NYC

             ***********************************************
The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html