Ann(I think), Thanks for your relating your experiences with mothers misinterpretation of what we say. I have had similar experiences and it is the reason I will talk with a clien't physician before I criticise him/her for something the patient said they said to them. Many times they misiterpreted what the physician said. A client's ability to "hear" is greatly compromised by their anxiety, fatigue, by the barrage of info given to them by HP and by friends/family, and by their own backround and education.

Also, I think we sometimes communicate things by other than the words we speak.  When I teach my Lactation class, I emphasize how important it is to identify our personal feelings, personal experiences, and professional experiences.  These, I think, have an influence on how we communicate. I have the participants do a self ananlysis based on these 3 things. I myself have done this and could see how some these areas influenced me. There was an article recently(I'll look it up later) reporting research that was looking at influences on bf duration. All the nurses stated that they supported bf , but there was a low duration of bf. Authors concluded that it was non-verbal behavior that influenced the moms. Don't remember the specifics of the study.

Carol L'Esperance, RN, MSN, IBCLC, Albuquerque, NM USA

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