snip
>     Second, in response to comments like, "How would the species survive?"
snip

because it just is not logical to suppose that the first tool to assure
survival of the species is that loosely attached to the first ones to give
it.

snip
> Many babies can die and the species survive.  In a country where there is
a
> high infant mortality rate, how do we know some of it is not from
lactation
> failure?
snip

It certainly will, because some mothers indeed are unable to lactate as some
are unable to carry a pregnancy for the full 40 weeks or to get pregnant at
all.

snip
> Consider
> the quote posted:  "-one who gives birth is partly mother, one who nurses
is
> fully mother."  Thanks a lot from women who are unable to breastfeed for
any
> reason.
snip

This quote was meant by the poet to be a warning to the common use in his
days of wetnurses by wealthy mothers who did not want to give up their
social lives because they had to feed a baby. The babies were send to women
in the countryside. It turned out that the children had a better bonding
with their wetnurse and turned to her in life crises in stead of to their
own parents. Jacob Cats (1577-1660) wanted to warn people not to take the
risk to loose their children and therefor wrote these lines.
In my view it did show a similarity with modern tendencies to have others
(bottles and formula in this case) take care of the baby for convenience
sake and therefore I thought it might be a nice quote. As I stated before,
not meaning to offend any mothers who really are not able to breastfeed how
much they want to. Judy, I really do feel very sorry for you and feel you
still grieve for this loss of  trust in your body. I really wished that  all
women could conceive, be pregnant, give birth and breastfeed as they like,
but that just is not always possible.
While it seems that people can feel offended I'll not use this quote again
on lactnet.

Gonneke van Veldhuizen, IBCLC

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