I have seen a fair number of women choose to breastfeed their babies and then switch to bottle feeding after a few weeks. The common denominator, I always felt, was a spurious reason to wean prematurely, but the underlying factor was that the mothers felt *obliged* to breastfeed. (I am not talking about those who ran into problems and were not able to receive adequate help.) I am not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, I am awfully glad that these babies received the benefits of colostrum as well as at least some of the mature milk. On the other hand, I worry about the effect of being breastfed by mothers who did it out of a sense of duty. Imagine being fed by a mother whose expression is grim, one who cannot wait until she can *justifiably* stop. A typical example is the mother who weaned her first child because she caught a cold and didn't want to pass it on, despite being assured by her doctor that the best thing would be to continue nursing. After her second child was born, you could actually hear her talking about how she would nurse till she caught her first cold! The sad thing was that even when she switched to bottle feeding ABM, she did not seem to bond more closely with her babies. I have seen this scenario played out many times, the most bizarre being the mother who chose to switch because of wanting to go in a vacation alone with hubby - his *reward* to her for having a baby! I must confess that while I am always non-judgemental and accepting of the mother's decision, I truly do not understand this mindset. I have to keep repeating to myself, like a mantra, *This is not MY baby! This is HER baby!* And it doesn't end with infancy. Limited mothering can extend throughout childhood. I was just talking to the coordinator of the religious school where I will be teaching first grade this year. We were discussing ways to welcome parents into the classroom, and she mentioned that one of my students would be brought by the nanny :( Sometimes, I just wonder :( Norma Ritter, IBCLC [log in to unmask] _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp *********************************************** 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