Rachel wrote:
>
> But lately I've been thinking how strange it is that I managed to
breastfeed
> for the first time 23 years ago after a long and difficult labor with
> operative delivery, with no hands-on help because I didn't need it.  I had
> copious production by 48 hours.

I'm wondering if you had seen many mothers breastfeeding before you had your
baby?

I think back to when my first baby was born 27 years ago (gosh, how did I
get so old??). He was the only breastfed baby in the hospital nursery at the
time. A few of my friends had attempted to breastfeed and all had failed but
one, and she weaned by the time her baby was 3 months old. The nurses were
no help and at and in fact actually tried to discourage me from
breastfeeding (one by suggesting that it was disgusting, another by telling
me that I had the wrong kind of nipples). Feeding was on schedule: 2 minutes
per breasts every 4 hours the first day, 4 minutes a side every four hours
on the next day, etc.

I was 20 years old, first baby. So why did I succeed in breastfeeding (and
manage to continue for the next 2 years?) I think it was because my mother
breastfed both me and my younger sisters. Quite unconsciously, I had an
image of how breastfeeding was supposed to look and how it worked. When they
gave me my son wrapped up like a mummy, I unwrapped him (much to the nurse's
distress) because in my mental image of breastfeeding the baby had to be
closer to me and curled around my body.

We knew nothing about latch then, but I think that in trying to match my
baby up to the mental image of my mother nursing my younger sisters, we
found a good latch. The nurses were astounded that I never had sore nipples,
especially since I was ignoring their instructions to nurse for only 2
minutes a side and refusing to wash my nipples with some horrible red liquid
they gave me.

I do not believe pain when breastfeeding is normal. I think that many women
experience pain because the images of feeing a baby that are unconsciously
in their minds are based on having observed many, many babies being fed
bottles. So they - without being aware of this - tend to adjust the baby's
position to match what they remember seeing. I've seen mothers who have been
carefully instructed on how to postion and latch the baby, and then the
mother rolls the baby away from her onto his back or tries to "feed" the
breast into his mouth like a bottle. She doesn't realize what she's doing,
but I think this is what tends to happen when you have a bottlefeeding
culture (and why I think LLL meetings or similar groups can be so helpful to
women especially if they come while pregnant).

Teresa Pitman
Guelph, Ontario

             ***********************************************

To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail
To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest)
To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
All commands go to [log in to unmask]

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