I think the discussion of "The Good Mother" and the framing of BFing issues
is particularly relevant within the context of guilt.  This is a must-read
for advocates and LCs, alike.  It talks a lot about how the way we usually
talk about BFing is heard in a much different way that its intended, often
creating perceptions of judgment and instilling guilt.

http://www.bmsg.org/pdfs/BMSG_Issue_18.pdf

On Wed, Jun 9, 2010 at 2:53 PM, Marianne Vanderveen-Kolkena <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Dear all,
>
> After reading Julia's and Heather's post, I started thinking about the
> guilt-issue again.
> I do not fully agree with Julia's statement that Heather's reasons are
> mainly about guilt; I think they are about many different kinds of feelings.
> Julia writes: "A mother who exclusively breastfeeds for 6 months and
> countinues to breastfeed past 2 years is NO BETTER than the mother who
> supplements with ABM from day one."
> Is this indeed true...? What is the general idea... that all parents are
> equally good, no matter how they raise their kids?
> What constitutes 'raising a child': feeding it? Cherishing it? Offering the
> child opportunities to reach the top of Maslow's pyramid?
> How will a child achieve that? What needs need to be fulfilled for a child
> to develop its full potential in every sense, physical as well as
> psychological?
> And if all parenting is equally good... why would any parent try to learn
> any additional parenting skill or invest in whatever you can think of? Does
> the way we act make no difference...?
> Even if you cannot judge parents by one issue with regard to their way of
> upbringing their child, the way they do it is of course made up of many
> habits.
> I think we can see a gradual difference: one who does *all things right*
> (admitted: impossible! hahaha) will bring forth a different kind of person
> than one who does * all things wrong* (impossible also).
> There are a thousand shades of grey in between these extremes and some
> issues in raising a child are more important for its personal development
> than others.
>
> An few analogies:
> Is a parent who does not scold a child a better parent than one who does?
> Is a parent who feeds a child healthy foods a better parent than one who
> regularly offers fastfood?
> Is a parent who does not hit a child better than one who does?
> Is a parent who leaves a child room for its own thoughts and wishes a
> better parent than one who does not?
>
> I've said it before and I want to say it again: guilt only arises when you
> know you could have made a better choice.
> Other feelings should not be called guilt, but sorrow, sadness, grief. "If
> only I had known... then I would have... and now I cannot make things
> undone..."
> You cannot chose to do something you don't know anything about; you cannot
> chose one option over the other if you don't know the difference.
> Pursuing certain routines, knowing they have a better, attainable
> alternative, however, rightly causes guilt, in my opinion.
> That is how humanity progresses; that is why many/most countries don't have
> a death penalty anymore and don't burn witches or own slaves.
> Knowledge is the problem: many people *do* know there is a better
> alternative and yet they continue with whatever they were used to (not only
> with regard to infant feeding).
> Lacking certain knowledge may cause guilt and/or grief to stay away: you
> can't regret or mourn something you didn't know existed or didn't know was
> wrong.
> Of course, many of us do the wrong thing because we were raised like that
> and did not develop capabilities to act differently.
> That is why we always have to keep learning and why self reflection is so
> important.
> Just the other day I had to settle a difference between our two youngest
> daughters (16 and 14) on the one side and a shop owner on the other.
> There was a communication problem and Miss 16 did not want to pay the
> amount the shop owner charged her.
> I felt she had a point, but settling differences is not going to really
> work if I start screaming or getting angry.
> I went to the shop and set out to stay calm and exceed myself. I wanted to
> respect her ánd the shop owner.
> I know that I can get nasty and impatient in situations like that and know
> that has something to do with my past, my childhood, my mother.
> I don't want to hand that trait down to my girls, though! I have to and
> want to set them an exemple I did not always have myself.
> Do I feel guilty about past situations in which I failed...? No. I feel sad
> that I wasn't able to do then what I try to achieve now.
> We need to learn to forgive ourselves in order to improve the way we deal
> with things. We desperately need a well working conscience to do that!
> Guilt is valuable guide, showing us the other one's pain; it shows us the
> exact point where we could act differently the next time around.
> This is something completely different than feeling sad or lonely or
> unheard.
> I think guilt and sorrow are often showing up together: if we would not
> have caused pain or suffering and felt sad about it, we would not feel
> guilty.
> This last weekend, I started reading 'Raising Our Children, Raising
> Ourselves', written by Naomi Aldort. Very interesting.
> Part of it is about active listening (about which I read a lot years ago,
> following the books by Thomas Gordon), but part of it is specifically about
> our own feelings.
> They often get in the way of doing the right thing, for all sorts of
> reasons, partly mentioned in Heather's little list.
> I think most of what Heather said, was about the outer appearance of
> underlying feelings of shame, of fear, of loneliness, of hopelessness, of
> lack of trust... but not about guilt!
> I agree with Julia that as lc's, we have to do the hand-holding and address
> those *underlying* feelings. Guilt usually has an underlying feeling as
> well, I think.
> We may not always be the parent we want to be, but in many circumstances,
> when we try our very best, we are good enough parents.
> That doesn't take away the fact that other parents may be better parents.
> I'd rather not see that truth denied, even though it hurts me too, every now
> and then.
> I would even go as far as saying that stating that all parents are equally
> good is one of the Gordon-communication hinderances (praising, soothing,
> diminishing feelings).
> Denying someone his/her feelings of regret, remorse, grief, guilt, sadness
> is not taking the intensity seriously and robs that person of a chance to a
> process of exploring those feelings, of letting go after the tears.
> Don't we all want to prevent making mistakes and hope to give our children
> all that they deserve because we love them so much? Don't we need to
> constantly learn to get as close to that ideal as possible?
> And isn't that what our whole profession is about... explaining to parents
> why closeness is better than separation, why frequent feeding is better than
> long intervals, why attending to a crying baby is better than leaving it to
> cry it out with extremely high cortisol levels... and why not breastfeeding
> is less good than breastfeeding...? If all that were not true... what the
> heck are we spending so much time on...? :-s
>
> As for the nazi-qualification... it is sad that people feel that they need
> to qualify us like that in certain situations. This may partly be due to
> societal views on the (lack of) importance of breastfeeding.
> If a government institutes a non-smoking culture in public buildings... is
> that a non-smoking-nazi-government...? Or is it a government that actively
> accommodates those who healthily chose not to smoke...?
> I don't remember who it was, but recently I read a post from a Lactnetter
> who let the audience rage first, before going on with her lesson (Nikki, was
> it you...?).
> That raging makes all kinds of feelings surface, most of them probably with
> an element of grief. Not being able to deal with grief can disfigure that
> feeling into very different things, even into overt hatred ("You nazi!").
> Maybe we should not let that label stick to us. Maybe we should remain calm
> and try to investigate where that feeling comes from, really comes from.
> If we use our counselling expertise, we might come across all kinds of
> sociocultural issues and we might be surprised...
> I think unmasking guilt for what it often is (sadness about what has been
> lost, about opportunities missed) and affirming guilt when parents
> righteously express it (in order to cooperatively find where the problem is
> and work on solving it), could be one of our major achievements in helping
> parents.
>
> Warmly,
>
> Marianne Vanderveen IBCLC, Netherlands
>
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