Here is my letter!  It's very long, so skip if you want!


Dear Oprah,
I feel that I must comment on your show which aired here in Sacramento, Ca on
3-1-96.  It was about pregnancy and what happens to your body after the baby
comes.  I was extremely disappointed at the attitude of the guests, and
yourself.  Also, as a woman who usually has her inforamation correct, you
allowed a lot of misinformation to be aired to the public, many of whom are
first time pregnant moms who believe everything that your show says.  Had I
watched this show two years ago, I would have been one of those to believe
everything that came out of the show.  However, I have a lot more education
and knowledge now, and feel that your show did a great disservice to women
and babies around the world.  My background is, I am a Certified Lactation
Educator, I counsel breastfeeding moms for WIC, and am in training to become
a Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC).
Let me give you some example of the missinformation from your show and the
harm that this information can cause.  The first thing is that you siad you
advocate epidurals, and the guests all seconded that attitude.  Well, it has
been proven that drugs during labor can have minimal to profound negative
effects on newborns.  Babies that have these drugs ion their systems are
sleepy, and do not breastfeed well, if at all.  Babies without drugs in their
systems can breastfeed well, and are alert and responsive to those around
them, especially mom.  A sleepy baby is not responsive.  This sleepyness
results in less breastfeeding which, in turn, results in jaundiced babies,
which results in sleepy babies who do not breastfeed well, if at all, which
results in possible hospitalization and separation from mom, the introduction
of Artificial Baby Milk in a bottle, the interruption of breastfeeding,
possible nipple confusion in the baby and a lot of work by the parents to
save the breastfeeding relationship.  As you can see, this chain reaction is
not a good one, and can be avoided if women are given accurate information:
 Drugs during labor DO affect the baby.
Regarding the information on breastfeeding.  The only good thing I saw was
that all the women had breastfed their babies.  However, pumping milk was
portrayed as humiliating and painful, neither of which is accurate.  If mom
has a good quality pump, pumping  is very comfortable.  From experience, 4
months of pumping, I know this to be true.  I work with moms who pump their
milk for their babies who are in the hospital or who cannot breastfeed due to
genetic defects such as a severe cleft palate, and they feel as I do.  It is
neither humiliating nor painful.  The woman who pumps her milk for her baby
is giving her child the best possible food in the world.    The author of the
Girlfriends Guide to Pregnancy also gave out incorrect information.  She said
that it was the hormone Pitocin which calms a mother and relaxes her while
she is breastfeeding.  Not true.  Pitocin is a chemical made to be like the
natural hormone Oxytocin, that causes uterine contractions during labor, and
it is used to induce labor.  The hormone that causes a woman to relax and
calm during breastfeeding is called Prolactin.   Breastfeeding was made to
look like a chore and something that should be given a try but , hey, if it
doesn't work out, that's ok.  Well, it is NOT ok.  There are a lot of hazards
to feeding infants Artificial Baby Milk (also known as formula).  More ear
infections, diarrhea, colic, SIDS, allergies, cancers, illness, colds,
malnutrition, are just a few.  Did you know that babies fed Artificial Baby
Milk (ABM) in third world countries and here in the US die more frequently
from things like malnutrition and diarrhea than do exclusively breastfed
babies?  They die from malnutrition because either their moms do not know how
to prepare the ABM correctly or they dilute it to spread it out because they
don't heve enough money to buy what they need.  I digress a bit.  Another bit
of misonformation came when the Author said that at six weeks your breasts
still hurt.  If your breasts still hurt at six weeks, then something is
wrong.  If breastfeeding is well established, then there is no reason, save
from something being wrong, for your breasts to hurt.  And if the mother has
chosen not to breastfeed, then her breasts should be well involuted (dryed
up) by that time, with no dicomfort to the mom.  Also, the comedienne
mentioned something about her breasts being the size of bowling balls when
her milk came in.  Listening to the story of her labor and delivery, I am
really not surprised.  She herself said her baby was high on Demerol (like
that is a good thing) and wasn't breastfeeding well.  Another reason for no
drugs during labor.  Had her baby been alert, and had she been breastfeeding
frequently, she would have experienced some breast tenderness and possibly
mild swelling due to her milk coming in, but not the bowling ball situation
she described.  It has been shown that frequent breastfeeding after birth
significantly reduces engorgement experienced by so many women.  Engorgement
that prevents the baby from latching on to the breast to breastfeed is not
"normal" and should not be treated as a "normal" occurrance that all women go
through.
Breastfeeding information needs to be accurate and up to date.  There is so
much incorrect information out there that the Lactation Community is trying
to correct, that to have a show like your give out the wrong information is a
set back for us, and makes our jobs that much harder when trying to educate
the uneducated in the realities and facts of breastfeeding.
Regarding Lamaze.  A "Hype"?  How could you allow such an untrue statement to
be said?  The fact is that prepared childbirth helps hundreds of thousands of
women through their labors.  Women learn how their bodies work during labor
and how to help their body do it's job the best way possible.  Also, Lamaze,
the Bradley method and other prepared childbirth techniques teach a mom how
to relax through the contractions,  control her pain and conserve her
strength for pushing the baby out.  Lamaze is not a hype that makes women
feel bad about themselves if they don't take the class.  I am still amazed
that the Author of the book said that.  From personal experience, the
contractions I "breathed" through (a technique taught in my Lamaze class) I
made through with no problems.  The contractions I didn't breathe through
were the most excrutiatingly painful things I have ever felt.   I still felt
pain when breathing through my contractions, but it was made much more
bearable because I was focusing on what my body was doing and staying as
relaxed as possible, rather than focusing on the pain that I was in.
I fear that this show trivialized breastfeeding, Lamaze and normal natural
childbirth.  Your guests were portrayed as "experts" who knew what they were
talking about.  In fact they gave a lot of wrong information, and only gave
the stories of their situations.  I was surprised that no disclaimer was made
by your show regarding this fact.  So many young mothers out there will
listen to what these guests said take it as the gospel truth.  No mention was
made as to who to contact for information regarding breastfeeding or
childbirth, Lactation Consultants were not mentioned, La Leche League was not
mentioned.
Oprah, I would really like to see you do a show about breastfeeding and
childbirth with real experts, who know what they are talking about, on the
show to give the correct and accurate information on these topics.  There are
many of us out here who would love to come to your show and give the world a
great education on breastfeeding the importance of breastfeeding and all the
benefits of breastfeeding.  Please give us a chance to repair the damage that
was done on March 1.  We need the women of the world to know the facts about
breastfeeding, not the opinions and incorrect assumptions and information of
peopl who are appearing to be "experts".
Sincerely Yours,

Janet Simpson, CLE
Sacramento, CA

(916) 381-8816

PS I am a real fan of yours, which is why I took the time to write this
letter to you.  If I didn't care about the information and your credibility,
I wouldn't have bothered.  JS