In a message dated 98-12-03 07:49:28 EST, you write:

<< And the common thread in all of this is what she wants. Not what does and
will
 the baby want. Just her.  Why is it so hard for some to think of the baby's
 needs?
  >>

Well, maybe that's the common thread in what she was asking, or maybe it was
just the common thread in the poster's perspective on what she wanted.

Maybe she never enjoyed bf, was sexually abused or culturally impaired or in
pain or just didn't like it, or felt that impossible constraints on her
ability to support her family  made it nearly impossible; but wanted to give
her baby some of its benefits despite all that.

Maybe we just haven't walked around in her shoes long enough to know what the
heck she wanted, or nearly enough to be judgmental about her feelings about
herself and her child.

Lactnet is a place for bf advocates to vent, and to get mutual support and let
out frustrations about what they are faced with.   And of course as a non-
full-time bf type *I* have not been in most of *your* shoes as you encounter
these frustrations.  So I can relate to this post in that spirit.   But I
would think twice, and then think again, before you chalk up choices that you
wouldn't make to character flaws in mothers, who have come to us because they
are thinking about ways, within **their life** to bf or continue bfing their
children.

Elisheva Urbas in NYC