What makes me the most angry about this situation is that breastfeeding
advocates seem to be constantly told that they must be very careful about
what they say in case they make mothers who chose formula feel bad or
guilty, and yet the mother who is breastfeeding for more than a few months
is fair game for ridicule and criticism.

Today I had a visit from a mother I had helped almost three years ago. At
that time, she had a newborn baby and a nursing two-year-old. The older
child became very ill with pneumonia and had to be hospitalized. Of course,
she desparately wanted to nurse, so mom and her four-week-old baby moved
into the hospital room. I visited her there several times and was so
distressed by the treatment she received. Here was a very weak, ill child
whose primary comfort was breastfeeding, and everyone seemed to want to take
that away from her. The nurses told the mother that if she didn't wean, they
would call the Children's Aid Society. (This threat did not work, because I
actually was working for CAS at the time.) At times, when the older child
asked to breastfeed, a nurse would forcefully carry her out of the room and
away from her mother, saying that it was time for this child to learn to
separate. (Remember, she was still very sick!) Another nurse told her that
she must have psychological problems or be trying to avoid having sex with
her husband, and that's why she continued to breastfeed.

Then they said they were concerned about the new baby. Even though the baby
wasn't officially admitted to the hospital, but was only there because the
mother wanted to stay with the toddler, the nurses decided that the toddler
was 'drinking all the baby's milk." Since the mother wouldn't wean the
toddler, they insisted that the baby be weighed before and after every
feeding to make sure she was getting enough. We eventually got around that
by repeatedly telling them "she isn't finished feeding yet" so they were
never able to figure out when "before and after" was.

It was so hard on this mother. Her husband was working and could only be
there for a few hours each evening, and she was exhausted from her recent
pregnancy and birth, and trying to care for her very ill toddler and her
newborn. What she needed was help and support, not ridicule and constant
criticism.

The good news is, she kept on nursing both her daughters, the toddler weaned
at age four, and everyone is healthy and doing well.

Teresa Pitman
Guelph, Ontario

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