Apropos of the guilt issue:
Friends are here visiting from the States. Their daughter had vastly
different breastfeeding experiences with her 3 kids, and they wanted to
share the story. With the first two babies, she delivered in a hospital
where breastfeeding was not really encouraged, and she got very little
help, even though she really wanted to breastfeed her babies. She had
all the problems that can make breastfeeding a nightmare. When her
third baby was born, she gave birth in a hospital in another city. She
had already decided not to even try in light of past experience.
However, that was not possible in this hospital. She was not given the
choice NOT to breastfeed. When I heard this, I found myself reacting
negatively to such an aggressive and insensitive approach. BUT, along
with this approach came excellent post partum care, good breastfeeding
help, and she not only loved breastfeeding that baby, but also continued
breastfeeding him for another year and a half. Good marketing, great
packaging and great instructions and support made all the difference for
this mom who really had absolutely no intention to breastfeed. I will
see this mom when I am in Charleston later this month and want to get
the full story from her and hopefully get to visit this hospital.
Second story:.
For those of you who don't know about my breastfeeding room, it is a
room in the hospital where all moms who need help come during the 4
hours of the day that I work in the hospital. There are days that I
have 30 dyads in there all needing immediate help, and usually I am
alone. It is the ultimate LC nightmare.
Yesterday, a mom comes into my breastfeeding room. She is bottlefeeding
twins…….what chutzpah!! But that is not the point. She is telling the
mom sitting next to her that she did not breastfeed her first baby and
that bottle feeding is the way to go…..much easier, blah, blah, blah.
I take myself over to the second mom who is mulling over this
information and sit down and start talking to her so that the twin mom
can also hear. I plan to give a guilt trip like you cannot imagine. The
mom is unsure if she will have enough milk. I start to ask her the
usual questions which will tell me if she might not have milk:
1. Is this your baby?
2. Did he emerge from your body?
3. Did all of the placenta come out?
4. Are you healthy?
5. Do you have thyroid problems, hormonal problems, did your
breasts grow during pregnancy, have you been diagnosed with PCOS etc,
etc, etc
Of course there were no signs of lactation problems, and I was just
about to start mentioning how healthy her milk is for her baby.
The twin mother looks at me in shock. "PCOS??? I have PCOS, and I
tried so hard to breastfeed my first baby and everyone told me that I
wasn't trying hard enough, was not resting enough, drinking enough,
eating enough. I really wanted to breastfeed him, but I had to give up
after 3 terrible weeks. Now I understand why I did not have enough
milk. Thank you so much for solving this for me. All these years, I
felt so bad and so guilty. You have lifted a weight off my shoulders."
She had tears in her eyes and she hugged me. Her twins were IVF because
of infertility problems related to PCOS. She was never told that there
could be a relation to this problem and her breastfeeding failure. I
then gave her the whole lecture on PCOS, possible treatments, other
signs, and she was in shock that her physician had never told her any of
this.
I hope I have learned my lesson to keep my mouth shut and not judge
anyone until I hear the whole story.
Esther Grunis, IBCLC
Lis Maternity Hospital
Tel Aviv, Israel
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